firecrackers and more

as so often writing this blog seems to be catch up with whatever happened which happend so fast I had no time to record it.

I did get home in the end, and I am very thankful.

Reading your blog entry I was reminded of how I spent those few spectacular, wondorous and quite overrated few minutes in which another year silently and inevitably slips by. I was in Berlin, again, and the first time with Jürgen. having walked through an hour of 30cm snow and a street full of quite slippery ice, I was quite unhappy I realised I would not only be increadibly cold and wet (feet) but also very much in danger by the masses of vacuumeheads which decided they would all squeeze onto the Oberbaum bridge in berlin, fire lots of fireworks, and get very very very drunk. I was not amused. I was even less amused when an ideot firing a firecracker had the face of the kid next to him so close that they got some of the flame which sets the mini rocket off into their face. So we decided we would get away and that super quickly. we found a niche next to the river where you could still watch the firecrackers all around, but were surrounded by less ideots.

It was a wondrous spectacle. As I was standing on snow, the icy coldness and wetness slowly seeped through my shoes into my socks and feet. At the same time, I was curious to watch. I am still amazed at firecrackers and find them great and special every time. All around, 360° you could see firecrackers rise en masse in the 10 minutes before and especially in the 15 minutes after midnight. Then there was also the sparkly wine bottle we had organised earlier, which we now, quite unstylishly, shared between us directly from the bottle. And through the conglomerate of freezing, getting more and more tired, alcohol and busteling people trying to get a decent place to watch or fire off their crackers I realised several distinct things. Things I would never have anticipated a year ago:

I live in london. I realised how much has happened: interview, offer, IB, summer, moving in and freshers and now in jan my first exam. I still feel like a tourist.

I travelled to Costa Rica and organised all of it and learned quite a lot of spanish. I realised how much more self sufficient I have become. I organise many new things by myself: travelling, washing, cleaning, cooking, shopping. and it works!!! I am amazed (and so is my mum)

Jürgen is still around. This is the second new year we have spent together. How many more to come?


The rest of the night is a blur. There is no distinct border between 2010 and 2011, no countdown and no second of "now its the new year". Maybe I have stopped to really make a big deal out of it? Then home to the hotel to change soaking shoes and heat me up. Then back out (people in berlin go out very late) to dance in one of the most famous techno clubs in the world, the tresor. home with the tube in the morning at 5:30, bed at 6:00. Thats not something I do on a regular basis.


happy new year!!! (clinks)
and I will see you soon

another year comes by

it's new year. crackers bursting, and the clinks of sparkly glasses usher in the new year all around as i sit in my bedroom, with the intense desire to be left alone. I'm overwhelmed by the year that went by, cos in my life it has been my most significant and richest year. the year i recognized friendship, love, respect and most of all a renewed desire to live. from this time last year, i have grown immensely (though i continue my existence with a below normal height).

i no longer fear sleeping alone. i am stronger around people and am not carried away by the things they say. i have discovered that the one i love the most in this world is my mum,

i have learnt to stay focused in pursuit of my goal. it's the first time in my life that i have single-mindedly pursued a dream (however unromantic my dream of getting into iit is - - it will lead to greater, bigger, lovelier things I'm sure). it's also the first time that i have sacrificed things i love for a greater cause.

i have discovered the love a third person can offer. its so wondrous to know that even without the bounds of obligation, there can be so much care and love. i have experienced friendships that will last for life and have met people who'l stand by me, no matter what.

i have come to realise that other people have lives as intricate and delicately f****d up as mine and that those sorrows that linger on are nothing but withered flowers that have no place in my beautiful garden.

my dreams have been woven a million times as i rested, sometimes uneasily, every night and woke up in the morning glad to see the sun shining through.

this night as i usher in the new year with the beatles playing in my head, i raise my own imaginary sparkly glass and say , here's to the memories of this year... and to our dreams...May we never stop believing in them. And taking the actions that will make them a reality.

to new beginnings (clink)

wish you a happy new year.