Bell is broken, shout for stop 12/17/2009

On my very first day in Dublin, I wonder, whether I’ve mentioned it once or twice, I was thrust into the middle of things and found myself coping quite well, measured up against the fact that I am neither outdoorsy nor outgoing nor especially outspoken it surpised me. Measured up against the fact that I’ve already had the chance to grow into a number of unknowns, it didn’t quite come as a shock to me that if I’m looking for some place to belong I might as well look in an unlikely place where I would know from the very start that I didn’t, couldn’t belong and after a while start feeling like I did.

I have learned so much here that school cannot teach you, that life in a bubble cannot teach you, that you cannot teach yourself. The world outside of my head is pretty scary and pretty big but I’ve come to embrace it in a way I never thought I could, in a way that is addictive, makes you want to see more. Yes, I will be back home by tomorrow and yes, I look forward to it because this is not reality. From now on I need to work harder on being who I want to be, here it kind of came naturally after a while, I need to work hard to keep the friends I’ve made here somewhat of by my side and to make my absence up to the friends that I have left in August. This may be goodbye but I know that it’s more of a beginning than an end because in contrast to every other time I had to leave, I have no regrets. I only have memories, a lot of photos, thousands of good stories to tell, a handful of close friends to call on skype and a new perspective on life. I’m endlessly thankful for the people who helped me get here, both those who supported me in coming here and those who did their part here.

When I leave this time, if I cry, I know why, because I know what I leave behind here and because now, I also know what I left behind in Germany. If I cry it is because I know what I have gained, because I am happy to have found so much, because I know I will not loose a thing. The pain, the joy, it was all worth it. That’s the greatest gift anyone could ever ask for.

A bad name 12/07/2009

So here I am again. I would ask all of the people looking for regular posts here that they excuse my absence but I do really have to balance a lot of stuff here. You can’t try and soak up every last bit of the city and the people here before in less than two weeks I’m gonna have to go home. By now I’ve come to accept the fact that I’m gonna come home and I’m happy to do so. Part of it is also that I can see now that only if you leave a place  you can appreciate it, that if you leave a person you know what you’re missing. So if I appreciate home more now, it also means that I will miss Dublin when I’m gone. And if I missed my friends and family at home, and I did, I will also miss the crap out of the people I met here. Because the truth is, the people you attract reflect to a certain degree who you are and in all honesty, the guys who were over at my place for a lot of PizzaHut pizza last night….awesome people.
Some of it might also be that through all of the things here, and it certainly was an emotional rollercoaster, other than the dear people back home, I had one great friend here with me who made my life so much more bearable when things sucked and made it so much more awesome when things were going good. I honestly had never expected it but that’s the cherry on the ice cream sundae that is my stay in Ireland.

For now I’m gonna close by saying that I’m doing fine but that I am tired both physically and mentally. Physically because my sleeping rhythm has assumed some weird dimensions, mentally because at a certain point your brain just starts suffering from overflow of stimuli and it shuts down….not good premises for exam weeks, I see. I will write one exam this Tuesday, two the week after so I should get into gear and finish this thing properly. That being said, going to bed.