More than four months have gone by since I arrived here from Guwahati this summer. It has been a summer filled with many new experiences. And now as I get ready to return to India for the winter, I need to recount to myself all that I have done and experienced this year.
The big thing this year was travel. There were three international trips, the biggest one to Mongolia for three weeks in August, then a 10-day trip to Albania and N. Macedonia with Kumkum in September [I am still waiting for my suitcase to arrive :-)] and a shorter trip to Amsterdam to meet friends and to see the once-in-ten-years flower event called Floriade. Then there were shorter trips to Koeln, to Bremen (twice) and to Hamburg and Moelln [from where my friend Thomas and I went for a music performance at the Elfie in Hamburg, my first time there]. I did make a lot of use of the 9-euro ticket in the three summer months to see a bit of the nearby areas as well and to meet friends living in the pretty villages nearby. The trip to Mongolia was a once in a lifetime experience and I have written more about it elsewhere. It was a good test of my physical fitness (or the limits of my fitness) and was good for the soul. My first trip to any of the Balkan states was an eye-opener in many ways, as I had not understood the full extent of what happened when former Yugoslavia fell apart. I came back with a wish to know more.
Then there was music. I discovered that the final year performances of the students of the Music University in Wuerzburg are open to the public and are free! Since the University and the halls where the performances are held are all less than a few hundred metres away from where I live, there was no stopping me; there were many evenings in May and June that I did nothing but go to listen to beautiful music performed by young talented musicians. The best by far was an all women's saxophone quartet and a whole orchestra of saxophones -- never heard anything as enchanting as what they produced. There was also had a special series called 'WeltMusik' where I heard amazing performances from top notch Israeli and Afghan musicians and composers. So my evenings were by and large filled with lovely music and it made me very happy. And once the university auditions ended, there were many other music events in the many churches in the old city where I live. One particular performance stands out -- on the 16th July, 2022, I witnessed an incredible musician called Alex Jacobowitz play on an absolutely fantastic instrument called the Marimbaphon [a huge instrument which has a keyboard like a Xylophone stuck to pipes like that of an organ] in the very spectacularly built Gethsemanekirche in Wuerzburg Heuchelhof. I have never seen a more natural musician than him, and never an instrument more difficult to play. That was an absolute master class.
Going to all those music recitals made me overcome my hesitation to go alone to attend a cultural event. Since I love theatre, I decided to go to a play on my own one evening but was not too sure I wanted to do it all alone. And just as luck would have it, I met several people from the University I knew there, so that I was not alone, and even got a lift back home. So that was the beginning. Since then I have been to several plays in the various theatre-stages in the city and have enjoyed myself. Till the last moment, I must say, for I shamelessly went to see a play, also last evening! Movies did not happen this time, I'll explore it next time.
Then there was meeting up with friends and family. Of course there was Inez's death and her funeral that filled the first month after my getting here. Her funeral in Bremen was a beautiful event and that helped me to get over the pain and guilt of not having been with her in her last days. She told me to come for her birthday, I bought my tickets but then cancelled at the last minute when I heard that she was back in hospital, she never came home from there -- I will regret that decision for evermore. But the funeral also gave me the chance to make new friends and to realise how lucky I am in my friends. My diary is dotted with invitations from friends to meet up or to go out to do something, to have dinner together or to visit a museum. And whenever I needed help with carting things with a car, one or the other of my friends always came forward to help. Many came to have a meal in my tiny little home as well, and I had a steady stream of visitors who stayed overnight. Fills me with gratitude and with joy. There is yet another thing about friendship that I learnt this summer -- that one can fall out with people you thought were your friends, that some friendships are not forever. Perhaps it is good so.
As for my German family, with both Stephan and Inez now gone, my contact with the others have really gone down drastically, sadly. But some facts of life are best accepted, since one cannot do very much to change them. I am simply grateful that I still have contact with Stephan's eldest grandchild and to Stephan's younger daughter, and through her, to her children. But this time I did not keep going, unless there was a big reason, to Volkach. There is no need to keep hurting unnecessarily. Having to close down Inez's home, the place that I had begun to consider as my German home after Volkach, was bad enough. I am trying hard to make the little flat I have in Wuerzburg into a nice and cosy home -- I did manage to get some essential repairs done to the bathroom and kitchen this time. I also made some big steps with respect to getting matters sorted after Stephan's going away more than three years ago. It took much longer than usual because of Covid and everything else, but again with the help of a very good friend, Cornelia, I did manage to get his bank accounts closed, finally. There are moments every day that I miss Stephan, now also times that I miss Inez, and there are times when one feels intensely lonely and at a loss, and has no idea how best to proceed. But I have also understood in the Covid period that I am luckier than most people and that my problems are small compared to the problems many others have. And that it will not do for me to feel sorry for myself. So I have forced myself to get on with my life and to find things for me to do.
There has been some big news from England during this time -- suddenly, almost out of the blue, in a rapid turn of events, Priscilla and John Truss's daughter Liz Truss has become the Prime Minister of the UK and this news is so big that I am still trying to understand it. I wish her well although it is not clear that her policies are really the right ones for the present crisis facing the country. Only time will tell.
Other events in the world -- what happened in Afghanistan last year, the ongoing war in Ukraine, the present unrest in Iran (over some idiotic headscarf wearing issue) and the many crises all around the world -- will not let one be in peace. And now as I prepare to return to India for the winter, I am not sure whether I will be able to travel back here at all, and if yes, then what world I will find waiting for me here next year.
Everything seems to have turned upside down and Germany is no longer the place where nothing ever changes [although to my intense regret, Cafe Michel, right in the heart of town closed down rather suddenly], it is no longer the place where one can be sure that things will happen as they should. And when I look at myself in the mirror, I can see that I look different, and although that difference seems to increasingly mean more and more, not for my friends and acquaintances, thank God for that, but for strangers I meet on the street. For example, yesterday at the Chambinsky theatre, most of the other members of the audience gave me this look which said 'not sure that someone like you can understand comedy and satire, that too in German'. Or maybe I am just imagining it all, because nobody said anything to me. But still it is a feeling that I cannot get rid off.
Now as I prepare to go back to Guwahati a new set of worries assail me, for there are many problems that I will need to address and resolve when I get home. There is Sishugram that will need a lot of doing -- Bettina is coming with me to spend some time in Sishugram. I hope she can cope with the difference and will have a nice time there. Then there is my 90-year old aunt, and other senior relatives who I will have to be there for. And only this morning I heard that our beloved artist Neelda is gravely ill and in hospital. And here too I have many friends who are aging and have multiple problems. And today I got the news of a good friend's passing away in India. It is hard to let go even when one knows that some things are inevitable.
These last four months have given me the time to do the things I like doing most. Has given me the chance to be on my own, to live life on my own terms. Going back to Guwahati will force me to do the things I have to do, and that is a difference. But I do look forward to the long morning walks by the river, meeting my old school friends, and connecting with relatives and family. And there are a couple of books in the anvil that will be published soon, and we shall have to organise another award meeting early next year and so on... I will keep you posted... For today, I just hope my suitcase comes back home soon so that I can pack it and get ready to leave for India on Tuesday... Ciao for now...
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