I had popped out to buy bread rolls when a recruiter called. The guys I was supposed to travel with were already on their way, so I had an hour to pack. A job at Rossmann was waiting for me, and I had absolutely no idea where I was going or even where the place was on the map.
A rough start
The beginning was fairly hard: tough conditions, rather strange company, and about a week after I arrived I also had to go for root canal treatment. That was how something that would last ten years got started.
I started in a warehouse and in quality control. For the longest time, though, I handled shift staffing in production plants: rotas, recruitment, transport and conversations with managers and staff. At one client it involved around 260 people in seven departments, and almost every day went differently from the plan.
Halle and Leipzig
The place I lived longest, on and off for almost eight years, was Halle. I have so many memories from there that it is hard to pick a few: the Halle city festival, parties, language tandems, where two people teach each other their languages. I met people from all over the world both at work and after it, and German was the language we all spoke, no matter where anyone had come from.
I also often think back to Leipzig, right next door, where I got to know lots of people my age. It is also a very musical city: Bach, Wagner and Mendelssohn all worked there. A friend from Argentina whom I met in Leipzig I saw again years later, this time in Barcelona, during my trip through Málaga, Milan and Malta.
Meppen, where Maradona made his debut
I felt at home in Meppen too, a small town near the Dutch border. On 3 August 1982 Diego Maradona made his Barcelona debut there in a friendly against the local SV Meppen. From Meppen, Paris was closer than Szczecin, although Paris is the one place I still haven't made it to. I did get to Amsterdam and Brussels.
Setting off from Germany
Living in the middle of Europe had the advantage that everything was close, and a lot of what I write about on this blog started there. In May 2022 I walked a hundred kilometres in a day at the Mega Marsch in Munich, and a month later, with a 9-euro ticket, I travelled half the country on regional trains. A year later came Koblenz, Bonn and Cologne in two days and a Rammstein concert in Brussels, and in January 2024 my first solo trip across several countries began in Düsseldorf.
From Germany I also brought back a Telecaster from a flea market, and I gave blood there at university hospitals, which, as I describe in the post about blood donation, at one point meant sending a language certificate to the management. Rome, Budapest and Prague also hold a special place for me, but those are stories for another time.
Why I came back
The immediate reason was a job offer in Pasewalk, not far from Szczecin, which I wanted to take. I also felt that ten years was enough. I wanted to settle down, meet someone, and then get married and start a family. I have already met someone, and our wedding is planned for October.