Traveling around the globe has erased many invisible boundaries that exist and I thought existed. Moving to different countries has made me feel like a true citizen of the world. On the surface it might sound cool (as a teenager I used to dream of living abroad) but when the time arrived to actually leave my homeland at age 30, the pangs of missing home often visited me in patterns of choppy ocean waves. Less than 6 months since we moved to Cingapore, here we are in Germany, painted 50 shades of grey.
I remember exiting Berlin Tegal Airport a week and a half ago; delighted in watching clouds escaping my breath as I chased É catching a taxi, embracing the chill just like that. That happiness didn’t last too long. Winter here is harsh and windy, you could almost taste its bitterness.
Back when I was a traveler, I saw only the surface of Berlin and experienced only the best from my itinerary. Living here, something as simple as cooking becomes hard. To find fish in this city is as tough as a fisherman’s luck during monsoon season. I am sick of eating meat but that doesn’t mean I want to be vegetarian! (If you lived in Germany you’d know what I mean.)
Perhaps the frustration of settling down again at a new city overtook the better of me. É said, “This is what globalisation does to us, honey.” and I pondered upon that for a while; much to say yet absolutely speechless. Are we winners to that, victims, or neither?
On the brighter side, I am highly adaptable and easily inspired by the right things. I’ve made a list of interesting activities Berliners do on weekends and hopefully, I’ll get to visit other new countries nearby. With these reasonings, I stopped questioning my existence because everything that we are, is a state of mind, isn’t it? In this post, I’m sharing with you what would be our house these couple of months. And I guess I can’t complain!
