Bangkok Notes
Leaving my homeland, I felt like a creature stepping into a fragment of higher-dimensional space. This place was imperfect—full of uncertainty and disorientation. Yet the first time I arrived, an indescribable vastness enveloped me. Time seemed slower and richer; every frame revealed unfamiliar clarity and depth. My horizon stretched beyond the everyday, as though life had acquired another dimension. I saw more possibilities, and understood for the first time what breadth could truly mean.
In the end, this fragment was not mine. Whenever I tried to return to my original three-dimensional world, a pressure lingered in my chest—as if I were being squeezed from an infinitely open space into a narrow box, its light, vision, and sensation forcibly compressed. The familiar scenes remained, but an invisible shadow seemed to cover them, leaving no room to breathe. Things I once found comforting now seemed cramped and thin, as though the world had lost its depth and color.
Life in the higher-dimensional fragment was not necessarily better than life in the old world. It was strange, unknown, precarious, and lonely. But its sense of space—its breadth, large enough to hold souls of every kind, good and bad—made it impossible to settle again for the flatness of my former life. The days I had taken for granted became a cage. They were not without beauty; they were simply too small, too narrow to contain someone who had seen such vastness.
I cannot know whether I can remain in this fragment forever. But I know I can never entirely return. That brief higher-dimensional experience has rewritten the course of my life. Every day back in three dimensions feels like the pain of being compressed into fewer dimensions. Even so, I am grateful for that fragment. It showed me breadth and the boundless unfolding that life ought to hold. Even a fleeting glimpse is enough to remember for a lifetime.
Perhaps some places become impossible to return to not because they have changed, but because I have traveled too far.
Fragments on higher dimensions and returning
The following literary passages accompany this essay. Their provenance has not been verified; they are not presented as quotations from The Three-Body Problem trilogy.
“In higher-dimensional space, they felt a freedom beyond description—an extension of space beyond three dimensions. Light, vision, and the senses opened as never before. Everything seemed transparent, the world filled with interwoven layers and dimensions; even time seemed folded into space. Cheng Xin felt a clarity she had never known, an existence beyond what language could describe.”
“But this beauty and openness did not last. When they were reduced to three dimensions again, Cheng Xin felt the world become a picture brutally compressed, leaving no room to breathe. The boundaries of vision blurred, as if the weight of the entire universe were pressing upon them.”
“Back in three-dimensional space, Guan Yifan felt an unbearable oppression, as though the world had suddenly been sealed shut. The scenery around him looked unfamiliar and distorted. He tried to breathe deeply, but invisible barriers seemed to fill the air, preventing him from drawing in enough life. Everything had lost the depth of the higher-dimensional world, becoming a barren, lifeless surface.”
“Cheng Xin pressed her hand against her chest, trying to ease the pressure within. Even in familiar surroundings, the feeling of loss would not leave her. Her expanded awareness had been compressed into narrow senses again. This return made her realize how impoverished three-dimensional space could be.”
“The magician had experienced another state of existence in a higher-dimensional fragment: an immense world in which everything flowed with radiance. She could see every hidden truth. Space seemed transparent, and time lost its meaning, becoming a clear river moving slowly through her consciousness.”
“But when the fragment collapsed and threw her back into three dimensions, she felt an unprecedented weight and suffocation. The world narrowed and dimmed. Light lost its layers and became ordinary color, like a crude picture compressed onto rough canvas.”
“She looked around. Familiar sights seemed alien. The boundless freedom of the higher-dimensional world now felt sealed inside a narrow cage; each breath seemed to strike an invisible wall. She reached out to touch the air, only to find her arm apparently fixed within a rigid frame, unable to escape the limits of three-dimensional space.”
“‘This is hell,’ she whispered, her voice heavy with pain. ‘I thought this was my world, but I was wrong. We are only shadows, trapped in a tiny cage, forever unable to touch the true light.’”