Travel Diaries - Germany, Week 2

und nun zu etwas ganz anderem

I could list off all the places I’ve seen since I’ve been here in eastern Germany, or all the things I’ve done so far. Would that make for an interesting post? I’m not sure.

Maybe it would be fun to explain about the 500-year-old pub we’ve eaten at twice, or describe the streets of Grimma, where my mom spent part of her (apparently mostly unhappy) childhood. The surface stories of how the “new” city government building in Leipzig was built in 1900 and has a really crazy staircase, or how Grimma has built huge metal doors along the river side of the city that close when the waters of the Mulde threaten to flood the streets and submerge the first floors of all the buildings, are neato, but those are only part of the story.

What happens when you go abroad and steep yourself in another culture, that is actually one of the cultures you came from—and so it is actually part of you yet foreign? What happens when layers of inter-generational trauma swirl in the ethers and you realize the inexplicable sadness you feel isn’t yours, but really belongs to someone else? What’s the subtext when going shopping at the giant (and I mean GIANT) grocery store in a part of the world that still, in a way, wears its we-made-due-with-nothing badge with great pride?

The stories about the cool new shoes I bought and the Family Thanksgiving for eleven people that three of us cooked in one very tiny kitchen are nice travel diary entries. But there is more than all that here, and while this Substack is a place for me to impress you with my dazzling writing, I’m still not sure how to put it all into words.

I have one week left here; I think it’ll be quieter, with fewer castle visits and building tours. And that is great, because sometimes I still need to lose myself in a different story, like the book I’m editing while I’m here. And sometimes I still need to listen to the electric lawnmower next door or the crows in the backyard and remember that I’m still the same person … only more.

#1: Grimma, the house my mom lived in. 2 & 3: Leipzig city government building. 4: Old town hall. 5 & 6: Family Thanksgiving. 7: My great-grandfather’s plot. 8: Me getting new shoes. 9: Leipzig, view of the train station.

---