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Closing doors

When one door closes, another opens…right? I hadn’t known that the famous quote from Alexander Graham Bell goes on to add: “…but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.”

Being able to close some doors and open others, to look ahead and not back should be key skills to have when one leads the nomadic life. Isn’t that a large part of what we do when we move constantly from one place to the next – dismantle our existence and
rebuild it, in a slightly different way, somewhere else; close one door and open another?

Does this mean that all of us who choose the mobile life have what it takes – namely the ability to let go and move on in absolute smoothness? Is there hope for those of us who are not naturals and find it extremely difficult to close doors – despite being excited about the ones that open? Even though we do get better at it with every move, it is always hard. And painful. Sometimes heart-breaking.

It helps not to see it in absolute terms. Yes, we should be getting better at closing doors, but we don’t need to close them all the way. We should be developing our proficiency to
bravely and skilfully move on to a new life, but there are elements of our previous life that have become part of our identity and make us who we are. We don’t close the door to those the same way that we don’t close the door to the people from our various past lives. That makes it easier – at least when you are an adult and can reason that way.

It’s different for kids. They see things in much more absolute terms. They don’t think in terms of the big picture.

When we left Vienna last summer, we were not sure how long we would be away, so we asked the schools to “reserve” spots for our children for
another year, in case we came back. That year has passed and yesterday we had to officially give up those places. As happy as I am with our new life here and all the new doors that it has opened, it still felt strange to close the last “old” door that was still open.

I’m not sure how the children will react when we tell them. They could see this as a sign of stability in their new life; less uncertainty. But it could also be that, in the back of their mind, those reserved spots were a silent promise that they could always go back; a secret outlet for when they were not too happy with their life here. Do we take away that outlet? Or do we wait until the excitement about the new doors becomes more powerful than the regret about the ones that are now closed? Even if, in the grand scheme of things, they are not really closed.

expat, home, transition May 31, 2013

It’s raining outside but I don’t care

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There must be something wrong with me.

The only word that can capture perfectly what goes on outside my window right now is: yuck. This feels like the chilliest, wettest, stormiest, most miserable November I have ever experienced – in May. After over a month of consistently rainy and cold weather, everyone around me is at the end of their wits – not just the foreigners, but also the Swiss, who, I thought, should be familiar with this kind of weather (turns out that many of them are not, since this is the worst May in thirty years). The weather has been part of every single conversation around me for weeks now.

So there must be something wrong with me, because it hasn’t gotten to me yet. The fact
that the probability of rain is 90% throughout the day today and the temperature in the single digits leaves me untouched. Though I do feel bad for the kids not being able to take advantage of our garden or the so many wonderful outdoor activities this city has to offer, personally, I don’t mind. To say that this is highly unusual for me would be an understatement.

I may have mentioned, a while ago, a (mild) addiction I have to Japanese matcha green tea. When we left Vienna, one of the things I knew I would miss the most was my daily ritual of walking over to my little neighborhood Japanese café and ordering my matcha
latte – or rather, not even ordering any more, since they would know what to start preparing as soon as I walked in the door. I knew there was no such thing in Zurich. For months, I have been trying, unsuccessfully, to find something similar, until a couple of days ago, when I walked into another favourite café and had something that tasted exactly like my favourite drink. My eyes lit up. Could this be a sign that I’m almost there? It’s funny how something so little and so trivial can mean so much. Yet, aren’t sensory experiences, like tastes and smells, closely linked to our emotions? If a matcha that tastes “just right” makes me feel at home, that’s not trivial, at least not to me.

So at the nine-month mark, I am starting to feel at home here. And with home, like with friends, you have to take the whole package: the good and the less good. You learn (and like) to live with both. That’s why I don’t mind the weather.

I also don’t mind it because – if one excludes its depressing quality, which I have already moved beyond – it is perfect weather for writing. I love being able to concentrate on my work without being tempted, constantly, to go for a walk or a bike ride or an ice cream along the lake by a glorious sun shining on my beautiful surroundings (I know, I’m strange). As long as I can hear the birds – and it seems that most of them didn’t get the memo and are, stunningly, still tweeting away every morning, even under the pouring rain – like them, I will keep pretending that spring has come.

Does the weather get to you?

If you are in the same
corner of the world as I am – or even if you’re not – here’s a little something to make your day.

expat, home May 15, 2013

Something in the water

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We leave something of ourselves behind when we leave
a place; we stay there, even though we go away. And there are things in us that
we can find again only by going back there.
Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon

As excited as I was about going back to Los Angeles, where I spent three years of my life some time ago, I was also very down-to-earth about what I would find there. After all, it had been twelve years since I left. So much can change in twelve years. So little can change in
twelve years.

The minute we touched down at LAX, I was overcome by a feeling of familiarity and comfort; I had come home.

Over the next few days, the connection I used to have to this amazing place was recovered fully, seamlessly and unexpectedly. I was thrilled to revisit my old haunts and show the children a piece of our past; to spend time with dear old friends, missed for so long; to bike on the boardwalk between Santa Monica and Venice and take in the freshness of the breeze and the vastness of the ocean; to sink my feet in the hot sand at the end of an afternoon on the beach and watch the sea as it turns silver under the most magnificent light of the day. LA had charmed and overwhelmed me once more.

But it was not until the day of our departure, that I realized just how deep that connection was. We were flying out in the evening, so sometime in the late afternoon, I decided to take a walk along the beach, my favorite thing to do when I lived there. As I was mentally saying goodbye to all the things I would miss about this place, knowing that I would not be back for a while, I was overcome by a deep, inconsolable sadness. It made sense to be sad, but I could not quite grasp the extent of it. Why did LA feel so much like home after so many years?

I was watching a movie last night and the quote above brought everything home [pun intended]. I had to come back to this place to realise what I had left behind. LA felt like home because part of me had never left.

What I found in LA was a piece of my soul. I also found a phase in my life when I felt exceptionally happy and fulfilled. Beyond the usual cliché of
being young, carefree and in California, it was the first time that I felt excited to wake up in the morning and do something that I was passionate about. I enjoyed every dimension of a life full of vitality and passion. And of course, I found again my eternal connection to the sea – the glorious endlessness of the ocean, the captivating mix of wildness and calm.

Now I know that every time I come back, all that will be waiting for me. And every time I leave, I will stay.

I take a part of you with me now and you won’t get it back
And a part of me will stay here; you can keep it forever, dear
Sunrise Avenue, Hollywood Hills

expat, home April 16, 2013

Fit for the soul

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Sometimes you have to let a place surprise you.

When you move to a new place, it makes sense to go prepared. If you are a bit on the nerdy side like I am, you don’t leave much to chance. You do your homework diligently: you research, you read, you ask around, you join clubs and forums, you watch movies about the place you are supposed to call your new home. You learn about the environment, the culture, the people, their language and traditions, the way
they think and behave. In your mind, you have a pretty good idea what to expect. You also have a pretty good idea who you are: what suits you and what doesn’t, what fits with your personality, what you are comfortable with and what puts you off. You are not a novice.

But then – not every time, but sometimes – something unexpected happens while you make the transition. Just as you are starting to settle in and get to know the place, you find that not everything fits your well researched, painstakingly formulated expectations. You may have done the math, but reality surprises you.

That happened to me in Switzerland. I did not expect to love it here. I was realistic about how much of a cultural “fit” was possible between my Mediterranean soul and a country
where one can go weeks, sometimes months, without catching a glimpse of sun. The cultural contrasts were too big. How can someone who comes from a place where people are temperamental, chaotic and moody, and where nothing is predictable, feel at home in a country where the culture is characterised by “a passion for rules, deadlines and quality” (not my quote, but among the many similar ones on Swiss culture that can be found on expat websites such as this one: http://www.expatious.com/guides-categories/expats-abroad/)?

One of my “rational” expectations had to do with rules: I was convinced that I would feel constrained by the much stricter way rules are followed here. But in fact, instead of growing annoyed by them, I noticed that rules were growing on me. As I was driving back from a doctor’s appointment the other day, I noticed that it had taken me 45 minutes door-to-door to go through an elaborate examination and the ensuing consultation. Then it occurred to me how much I actually enjoy the neatness, precision and passion for perfection with which almost everything is done in this country. A lot of it has to do with the fact that everyone, without exception, feels compelled to follow some simple rules. So the rules that I was dreading have freed rather than constrained me. By removing several potential sources of friction from my daily life, this passion for order – which may not be part of my native culture – has made that life so much more enjoyable and satisfying.

This is just one example of an assumption being proven wrong. There were several more. Those experiences have taught me that, while you should always do your homework, you should also be prepared to part with your cherished, preconceived assumptions and associations – if needed. You should be open to being taken by surprise by your new experiences. After all, isn’t this kind of flexibility an essential survival skill for those of us choosing to live the nomadic life?

Has a place ever taken you by surprise?