Dear C,

I imagine you smiling while you notice this envelope on the small table next to your bed. It is good to have someone thinking of you in this kind of big and unknown city. On this first day of your new life here. And they are some things that I would like you to know about this new life of yours. So that, when they will gonna happen, you may embrace them. Or overcome them.

I. They will gonna be a lot of mountains. Much more than you ever dreamed and hoped that you will ever hike. Enough so that they can feel week-ends, working days, holidays, days of joy, and day of sadness, day of fears, and day of victories. And somehow the mountains will be one of those very stable things that you may need and help in the stormy days.

II. They will gonna be a lot of people. New people from so many corners of the world, caring with them so many stories. Some of them will become your very best friends. They will fill your house, your cooking evenings, your board games evenings, your birthday parties. Somehow you will never feel alone because it is always someone at just one call/text message distance. You just have to do that first step

III. They will gonna be a lot of changes. Job changes, apartment changes, color hair changes. Some of them you can’t imagine at all at this moment while you are reading. Some of them will gonna scare you and turn your world upside down completely. But somehow you will gonna find your way out. And little by little, you will gonna learn that all of them are chapters of your story and pieces of that beautiful puzzle that will gonna see in all its beauty only at the end.

IV. They will gonna be many questions and not that many answers. But you will learn that asking and questioning only make you discover much more about yourself and make your beliefs stronger

V. They will gonna be nights without sleep and days when the only thing you would have like to do is to hide under the blanket and put on pause everything until you have enough energy and motivation to go out. But somehow, you will find a way to wake up and finish those days. Step by step. Little by little.

VI. They will gonna be many days of doubts. Days, when you will gonna, doubt your skills, qualities, strong points. Yourself. In some days more than in others. But you will learn how to deal with all those voices. And in some days your own voice will shout stronger than them..

VII. They will gonna be many moments when you will gonna laugh, sing, and feel loved. Like a compensation for all the moments of doubt and fears.

VIII. They will gonna be moments when you will gonna feel stuck. Or that you are completely failing. At all the possible chapters. But remember that you are in the middle of a process, not at the end of it.

IX. And last, the language. You will gonna have a love-hate relationship with it, but guess what. One day you will gonna read books in german.

Now, that you know that somehow, everything will turn out well, sooner or later, wake up. They are some places in this city that I know you will love them for sure..

German greeetings,

R