Recommended music to listen while reading: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkHFGL1NOfA
Three years and one day ago, I flew from Madrid to Hamburg. I woke up at around 5 a.m. to take a plane that left me in the city of the moin and the Franzbrötchen around noon. When landing, the plane dived into the thick ocean of clouds that we had been hovering above for some time, and I found myself in a dark, rainy and dull city. I felt sad and alone. But before I could lose myself in that scary place, Olga came to pick me up from the airport. I still felt sad, but I was no longer that alone.
The next day, Kirsten met me just to show me the city centre, and again, under that continuous canopy of clouds, I felt slightly less alone, slightly more wanted. At that moment, I was scared of everything: my English, the place, my boss, the culture… Everything. And I am sure I was a very annoying kid who couldn’t stop complaining about the rain, the clouds and the wind, because it was easier to dislike everything than to stop and take a look at myself.
With time, more and more people came into my life, making, each of them, my life more worth living. First it was Vishesh, then Homero, Jonas, Roberto, André, Julia, Lukas, Jannis, Ali, Tim, Eva… And many others. With them I learnt how to live in another culture, how to be part of the world. I already knew how to live far away from my hometown, and also knew how to live in a big city! But I didn’t know I still had more to learn. Now I understand I will never stop doing it.
My PhD comes to an end. Not right now, as these Hamburg people cannot get rid of me so easily, but soon. I will most probably defend my thesis at the beginning of next year, but I will never leave behind the people I have met here and everything they have taught me.
I am now a less annoying kid than the one who landed on that 28th of August of 2021. I am a kid who has learnt to appreciate the rain, the clouds and the wind. I am a kid who knows that wir sind nichts aus Zucker.
So, this is not an attempt to say farewell to meine Perle, this is just the last stop before our final adventure together. This is just the beginning of the end.
