Do you have a leader you could talk to about this? Someone who might be able to help arrange that you don't work so closely together. How long have you been feeling like this? I'm all too well aware that the loneliness and stress of cross cultural living can cause a person to get overly attached to anyone who seems "like me". It's very nice to be understood and not feel like you have to explain and justify yourself all the time. And it led me to get too attached to a guy who was the unreliable and didn't have his life together kind of bad news. So yeah, I get it.
One thing I will point out about your post is it sounds very self focused. Not trying to get on your case, but if this is real love, love is mainly concerned about the other. So the fact that you talk about not wanting to be hurt and wanting to stay away from her because it will be easier for you but don't mention not wanting her to get hurt or how your actions might affect her, makes me question how much this is really love for her and how much it is just loneliness and getting attached to someone familiar and comfortable on your part. And that is not to say that you aren't a good guy, just that what you are calling love might be more about your wants and needs than anything about her.
As far as wisdom in sorting through things:
Find someone you can trust to talk things out with. Doesn't matter if it is an online friend or someone who knows both of you, but I find that for me, especially in the area of romantic interest, breaking the silence of my thoughts and talking to someone neutral helps them seem less overwhelming and urgent without the awkwardness of talking to the person directly and having the potential for major life decisions being made in that conversation.
Trust your gut. If the more sensible side of you is telling you that it's just a bad idea to get together with this girl, believe that sensible side. It takes more than attraction to make a relationship work out. You sound like you already know this, I'm just reminding you which side of your internal conflict is wiser.
If you aren't going to pursue a relationship, probably best not to even mention that you have feelings for her. On the off chance that she does reciprocate, that will make it difficult to not get in a relationship (even if you know it is a bad idea). If she really isn't interested in you, then it just makes being around each other more awkward (and speaking as a girl, we won't forget that you said that, even if you realize later it was a mistake or you tell us you were just joking around, or anything else we're always going to wonder if you're telling the truth about it once it's out there. We will probably spend way too much time overanalyzing everything you said.).
Also, if you aren't yet, get plugged in with a wider community and as many people as possible. Do everything you can to feel connected to the people around you so that you aren't quite so vulnerable to the loneliness that often leads people into bad romantic relationships.
Yeah I think that's all the wisdom I have to share at this time. Hope some of it helps.
