Peppermint tea – I’m out. I add it to the list I’ve been compiling for the past year titled, ‘To buy, in Canada’. I scan the list: chocolate chips, oven mitts, deodorant – decidedly ‘unchinese’ items. Thankfully I will be waiting only days to make these purchases, not years.

When I first moved to China, I went two and a half years without being able to buy the essentials – literally bread and butter. I sat in a restaurant, greasy fish, tofu and eggplant spread across the table, my stomach twisting as I force-fed myself. Pangs of hunger followed. I craved a piece of bread.

I cried on Christmas Eve, the twinkling lights on our one foot tall tree reflecting on the shelf liner I had used to wrap gifts. l wished the packages held something special, something that signified how deeply I loved my children. Colouring books and shrimp flavoured crackers had to do.

Previously, when I had lived in Canada, I barely noticed that I could buy MegaBLocks and cottage cheese. In China, I missed them bitterly. Eager to return I sat on the plane, only hours from landing in Vancouver thinking, “The people in Canada must be so happy. They can buy cheese!”

I gloried in pizza, hamburgers and milkshakes and quickly ate back the pounds I had lost over ‘old duck hot pot’, ‘dog bone soup’ (you hold a stewed pig femur in your hand and suck the marrow out, making it look like the table is surrounded by dogs gnawing on bones) and rice. I also did some shopping for the kids. While I rejoiced in purchasing the cheapest kids pyjamas – something I had spent hours scouring countless stores for in China, I couldn’t help notice others walking the merchandise-rich aisles with discontentment written on their faces. Does having more make people less satisfied?

The China of ten years ago is a blur in my memory. I can now buy cheddar cheese and even Lego for the kids and I love eating tofu and eggplant. But it was good for me to go without. It taught me to enjoy the simple pleasures – when they are available.

Less is more.