lifeinblueofhank

[lifeinblueofhank]

February

   After a successful trip to Germany in January I had set my sight on going to visit a friend in Barcelona this month. I had never visited Barcelona, nor Spain for that matter, so when G moved there to follow his girlfriend in her studies I figured I definitely should go and visit him if I had the chance. 

I met G while on my internship in Indonesia in 2018. He was kind of my mentor, but to be honest he was more friend than anything else from day one. Everything is always easy with G, he is a go with the flow kind of guy. The kind of guy who does not need much to live and values the simple things in life. Spending time with G brings you back down to earth, to the true values of life, to what really matters.  At the beginning of the month I received a call from a head hunter telling me they might have found the perfect job for me. A tech job in a startup not too far from where I live. The first interview is set for the Friday before my trip to Barcelona. The interview matched my expectations and was truly the change of career I was looking. It was a sideways move but it would give me the freedom to be more technical and have more responsibility. I got the call just before boarding my plane: “They loved you and would like to see you again”. Great start to what promised to be a fantastic weekend. 

A short hop later I was sitting in restaurant eating tapas and getting to know what had they both, G and his girlfriend, had been up to since the last time I saw them leaving the villa we shared in Semarang a year ago. They told me about their life in Bali first, then about their new life here in Barcelona. And so the weekend went on between visits during the day and partying at night, we reconnected and I re-centered my life towards true value. I thanked G for the weekend and got on my plane back home. A week later, after another round of successful interviews I heard that I could start at my new job on the 14th of March. Which would coincide with the first day of lock down in Belgium. But thats for another story

[lifeinblueofhank]

Looking back

2020 has come and gone. It was definitely an odd one. I started the year while being 30 thousand feet in the air over the Atlantic coming back from a good friend’s wedding in Michigan. I remember expecting a little gesture or just a message as we passed the date time during the flight, but nothing special happened. When I landed in Paris, life gave me preview of the year to come, the train I was supposed to take to take me to my final destination had been cancelled due to the “yellow jackets” strikes that were happening at the time. This would delay my very anticipated reunion with a shower and my bed. 2020 was going to be a good year for me, and in hindsight it has not been completely bad. Socially wise, I planned to travel one weekend per month to visit my friends across the world, work wise, I finally had gathered enough knowledge and confidence to apply for developer jobs and quit my not so fulfilling consultancy job.

Halfway through January I texted one of my long time American friends, who was serving in the Airforce in a base not too far from me, to see if was up for a catch up weekend. I would drive down there on a Friday afternoon after work and back up Sunday in the evening. We don’t see each other much but when ever we do it is like nothing between us has changed. Over the course of the past 13 years that we have known each other at each of our reunions it just directly pulls me back to our swimming team days. Back to high school where our nights were filled with pizza’s, laughter and video games. The only thing that changed over time is what we drink with those pizza’s. Our greasy fingers covered in sauce and oil from the pizza’s now grab craft beers instead of our beloved pop: Mtn Dew. The weekend was just as expected, catch up on each others life, video games, drinks, lots of food, and plenty of cheeky banter that replenished our friendship until the next time we could see each other.  On the highway I found myself thankful for the friendships I had been able to cultivate throughout my life. The sun was setting on yet an other typical cold, but bright, winter day and the Covid still seemed an otherworldly issue that would not reach us.