The plane touched down with a jolt, the kind that reminded Zahra she was no longer in Ghana. Outside the window, everything looked gray; not the warm, sandy-gray of Accra's roads, but a pale, cold gray. The buildings stood tall and distant, as though observing her arrival with polite disinterest. Beijing Capital International Airport loomed ahead, glass and metal stretching endlessly under a sky choked with smog.
As Zahra stepped off the plane, a sharp wind slapped her face. She blinked and pulled her hoodie tighter around her braids. Everything was foreign. The scent in the air, the way the Chinese airport staff moved with precision and speed, the musical rhythm of Mandarin echoing through the terminals. It was her first taste of being the outsider. And it tasted like iron and ice.
The signs were confusing, her legs shaky from the long flight. She followed the crowd, gripping her documents like a lifeline. Customs took longer than she expected. The officer scrutinized her passport, frowned, then looked at her with a gaze that sat somewhere between curiosity and caution. When he finally stamped her visa, she released the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
Outside the airport, a university van was supposed to pick her up. She spotted a laminated paper with her name misspelled but close enough: "ZAHIRA WILYAMS." She gave the driver a tired smile. He didn't smile back, just motioned for her to get in.
The drive through Beijing was surreal. Giant billboards of unfamiliar celebrities. Neon signs with characters she couldn't yet read. People on electric scooters zipped between cars like fish in a coral reef. Zahra pressed her forehead to the van window, her breath fogging the glass. This was her new home. At least for the next six years.
But as the van turned off the highway, her heart dipped. The buildings thinned out. The streets became narrower, older. Soon they passed through a rusted gate with faded characters painted above it. Qinghe International Medical University.
Not exactly what she had imagined.
Her dormitory was a narrow concrete building with peeling paint and a long fluorescent hallway that hummed like a mosquito. Her room was small, bare walls, a metal-framed bed, a cracked mirror. There was no heater. Just a radiator that clicked like an old typewriter.
That first night, she cried into her pillow, muffling the sound with a blanket so her roommate wouldn't hear.
The days that followed moved in slow, uncertain steps.
Zahra sat through orientation, not understanding half of what was said. She struggled with chopsticks, burned her tongue on hot pot, and got lost three times on campus. She tried asking for directions in English, but most people just stared or giggled nervously. Some pointed at her skin and asked for photos, as if she were a rare species from a documentary.
On the third day, a woman in a long beige coat approached her outside the campus library.
"You are Zahra Williams, from Ghana?" she asked, in heavily accented but clear English.
Zahra nodded cautiously.
"My name is Professor Mei. I knew your father."
The words hit Zahra like a slap. "My... father?", she asked
"Yes. But not here. A long time ago. Before... before things changed." Professor Mei smiled, but her eyes didn't.
"We should talk. Not now. Come see me next week. My office, Room 407." She handed Zahra a card and turned without another word.
Zahra stared at the card in her hand, the cold wind swirling around her like a whisper. She had come to China for a degree. But it seemed China had its own plans for her.