2,822 kilometres from home...
Exactly one year ago today I started what I believe has been the best adventure of my life so far. That was the day I packed my bags and moved to Krakow. I would pay to feel the feeling of "not knowing what's coming" again. To go on an adventure, to bathe in an unknown culture (where I didn't know anyone either), with my house on my back (but without a house) and wanting to experience something new. A mystery that ended up being the best decision I have made in a long time.
Negative point... from today is when Facebook will start reminding me all the time: "a year ago that...", "a day like today blablabla..." and a little photo there, and a little photo there and another little photo there; and memories here and more memories here... And I either delete my account or I don't know what I'm going to do.
I would like to take this opportunity to tell you what I did around this time last month. I went to Krakow to spend New Year's Eve. Before you think I'm an idiot for doing that, 1 because of the cold and 2 because I was away from home, I'll tell you why by putting it in context and going back 7 months:
June 2017
I will never forget my last day of Erasmus. The dinner I had with everyone at my favourite place in the city, the farewells in Banialuka and the awkwardness of falling asleep and almost missing the plane. The fact is that, during the farewells surrounded by tears and Soplica, everyone said: Pati, we will have a get-together and see each other soon. A French friend added: Guys, on New Year's Eve we'll all be here. Aham, promises that 90% of the cases remain in the air... Intentions are always good, but the availability and time outside of an Erasmus is very limited, so I said goodbye to some not so close friends knowing that I might never see them again.
December 2017
Almost a month ago, still in the now distant 2017, I decided to spend my New Year's Eve away from home. It was something I had always found strange, almost impossible for me. I consider myself a family person and Christmas is a sacred time. But like everything else in life, until you really consider something, you don't know how much you are willing to do it. Sometimes I get cold and calculating, so at the time I thought: It's just one night. The family bond is shown every day of the year, not on the last night. It was a couple of weeks after I got curious, before I said, I'm going. And then I started looking for flights. Where? What an obvious question... to my beloved Krakow.
I didn't go alone. From Spain yes, although at the last minute my friend Nico joined me. We had an Erasmus meeting, where 25 people got together, each one with their mother and father, (from a different country) but all of them with the illusion of living again an Erasmus night in our Krakow. With a little bit of intention and desire we were able to live a few days at home again.
Bittersweet feeling
The 6 days were dedicated to seeing my house again, already inhabited by a Polish woman; to giving our all in Cuban theatre; to spending the dead hours in Banialuka; to sitting in front of the river chatting; to thinking over and over again how incredible it was; to forget I was passing through and to experience again that kind of happiness I told you about in the previous entry 🙂
On the 31st of January we bought grapes that I did NOT eat because of my clumsiness. I had two pieces of sausage for dinner, breadsticks and that's it. The priority, rather than dinner, was a party in a flat before celebrating the chupinazo in the Plaza at 00:00h. How did the night end? We dispersed, danced at a festival in the Plaza and at about 5am we ended up in a flat owned by some Polish people. Random night like all the ones that define my Erasmus. We spent two more days there until we returned to Madrid.
At this point, I would like to say goodbye with a thoughtful sentence from Wednesday:
"Every opportunity shapes the course of our lives, even the ones we let go" - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Have a nice day!
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