Packing up home - the second!
It’s time to pack up my stuff again. My internship ended last Friday. Of course, it’s not over yet. Now is the time to truly travel India for one and a half months. Then, I must decide within the next days, if I want to do a second internship in China or come back home after this.
I spent the last weeks in the trainee house remembering all the moments we had in the trainee house and on the (mostly travel-)weekends. Even though the house was some kind of shithole, I am surprised that I got so attached to that house to honestly call it a home. What I will remember is not so much the rooms, the furniture, I will remember the people and the events, even the different eras in our house. The spirit in our house changed so often during my stay, just depending on which kind of people were there, that you can almost say, time goes faster here. But this is not true, it’s even the other way round: Life goes faster here.
Just as fast as the ice in the new deep freezer grew so big that it would block it’s cover and eventually became a giant block of ice, we welcomed and said (or partied) goodbye for so many people that after 4 months here I feel like an old senior, thinking about “the old times”… when we used to party more often, when India still felt so alien and unexplored and when I was (stomach-)ill all the time. ;)
As all Indian things seem to be, the house feels much older than it actually is. One time, I discovered a artifact from past times in the house which was a trainee-goodbye-book in which all trainees wrote something about their stay. It was from ’06/‘07… not even half a year old. Things will be forgotten much faster in this house since the generations here are so short.
It’s as if the house is full of ghosts. There are probably more than hundred people who left their impression and remember the house, but never saw each other. It’s true, the house is imprinted with so many impressions that it really is much older than it is. The memory and life of a house is counted by memories of people who were there and the impressions they left. Not the years since construction. An empty house is dead.1
Anyway. We had a big goodbye party in our house for even four people leaving in the same week: Saltuk, Jakub, David and me. Even some AIESECers, my boss and some other guys I didn’t know came! I don’t remember so much of the party but I remember that I had a discussion with a huge Australian guy from Opera India about the pain to maintain code of other people and three dimensional user interfaces when Sarthak (my boss) moaned about that we shouldn’t talk about geeky stuff at a party but party!!! ;)
My boss(es) gave me a classical Indian suit as a goodbye present. Wow, it’s so perfect – I think it’s the best present I could have imagined! :D
But – of course – punctually when I wanted to start my 1 1/2 months travel, my camera died. Fuck. This is the worst moment to happen for this. So, no photos. :(
P.S: On my last game of GO in the trainee house, I finally got beaten at Team GO for the first time since I introduced it to the trainee house. It was a close run, though. :D (Germany & Canada vs. US & China)
1 That’s why friends and family that died will never be dead. They will live in our memories and the impressions they made on us, influences future generations.
