Ein Anfang

The title of this log translates to "travel stories, freely offered"- and that's what I hope this little project will turn out to be. Let the world (or rather, whoever I'm lucky enough to get as Vorlesern (readers)) be my judge.

This coming summer will be my return to Germany for the first time in more than two years. By the end of my two weeks in Hilden, Nordrhein-Westphalia, I felt a strong desire to hide myself away in the basement of my Gastgeber (host) until the world forgot about me, so that I could start my life anew in this strange and wonderful continent. Coming from a small high school in rural Pennsylvania, where the passage of time sometimes still seems to drag its feet, the newness of Germany and the friends I made there fueled my desire for change more so than most other things I had experienced in my life.

Part of myself still lives on in the Altstadt (Old City) of Düsseldorf, the massive Dom (cathedral) in Cologne, and the wild urban cityscape that is Berlin, a furious Mixgerät (blender) of old pains and new dreams for this country. My senses still remember what my first Diebels Alt tasted like, the bite of the morning cold on my hands as we rode to Gymnasium (high school) through the woods, and the reverberations of the club where I first saw the Ohrbooten (http://www.ohrbooten.de/).

The German word for ‘metamorphosis’ is ‘die Verwandlung.’ Despite also being the title to a rather shocking Kafka novella, it’s also what travel can cause in people. In this space I’ll try to regularly share my Erfahrungen (experience) with you. My reflections are my own (poorly constructed) opinion, and I will try to give you the essence of my reactions to this land as directly as possible. I want you to travel with me, so expect (what I hope are decent) pictures to come. If you’re still with me after the garble above, hopefully you’ll continue to enjoy the ride.

Let the waiting begin…