Sitting here in my apartment, blanket scarf wrapped around me, and the kettle soon coming to a boil for another cup of tea, I'm quietly listening to the sounds around me. The distinct clamour of church bells and an overbearing siren alarm suddenly reminds me I have had some fairly drastic news as of late and have neglected to share it. So... Ummm... I moved to Germany.
Direct, blunt and to the point. There really isn't any other way around it, and I figure I should just get to it. I'd say the bug to move to Europe really bit me a few years ago, about 12 years ago, now. After high school, I moved to England for my Gap year, and even at the time, I think my mom suspected I might never return.
After my time in England, I did in fact return and bounced around Post-Secondary Institutions like a Ping-Pong ball in a badly played game of beer pong. Various life events happened, and I felt more inclined to stay close to home and family. In my mind, I told myself I was staying close in case anything happened to my family or friends, but in reality, I was just being lazy, and letting life happen to me, rather than living my life. 
Fast forward a few years, and I not so reverently drop on my amazing and loving boyfriend that I want to live in Europe. Cue crickets. I think he was less than impressed that I was dropping it on him with such a lack of finesse. As seen above, I'm not great at finesse. I can't remember exactly when we had this less than pleasant conversation, but it was followed by me researching possible jobs in Europe, only to find that I was drastically underqualified for all of them, no doubt thanks to my eloquent Post-Secondary bouncing. Plan B emerged out of interest, but also necessity. I began to research Universities in Europe and remembered a distant factoid about university being free in Germany. At first, I thought it was too good to be true, but upon further research, I actually found German Universities that had programs that I was interested, in English, and the 'tuition' consisted of a nominal €200-ish fee for student fees and the semester train ticket.
Skip forward a few more months and on my 30th birthday, I was standing in a FedEx after work, sending my various application papers and documents to Germany. The entire process was surreal and didn't even feel real after I landed here.
I stayed with my cousin down near Mannheim for the first few days to get over jetlag and adjust to the insane decision I had just made. As I now approach my almost three-month mark, my feelings still waiver between, 'What the hell have I done?', 'I love it here and I never want to leave.', and 'I seriously miss home, but it's only for a few years and I can go back.'
While keeping touch with everyone back home has been a challenge, I do tend to drop little tidbits and Instagram posts every once in a while. Much to the chagrin of all my loved ones, I'm terrible at updating them and even worse at noticing the various culture shocks as they come up. I tend to take them all in stride, and when in doubt, I shake my head in dismay and chuckle, "Oh you silly Germans."
While keeping touch with everyone back home has been a challenge, I do tend to drop little tidbits and Instagram posts every once in a while. Much to the chagrin of all my loved ones, I'm terrible at updating them and even worse at noticing the various culture shocks as they come up. I tend to take them all in stride, and when in doubt, I shake my head in dismay and chuckle, "Oh you silly Germans."
