Month: October 2025

I used to see moving abroad with such rose-tainted glasses before. Thought I’d come here, have a good job, friends, learn the language, and be at peace. I thought I’d feel one with the world.

But I feel like perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps people discriminate against me because I’m not from here. Perhaps it is hard for me to make friends here. Perhaps my life has been too hard to ever fit in anywhere.

These perhapses, more than anything, drive me crazy. They make me question if I’ll ever find the things I’m looking for, and experience the life I’ve dreamt of. So far, everything has constantly been so much worse than I ever thought it would be. So perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps my life will always be terrible.

I am 26 and a half now. But I feel like for years, I’ve only managed to stay afloat. To survive. I’ve done everything to feel a little free. But in the end it hasn’t been like that. In the end I’ve always been the prisoner of circumstances and worse, other people’s lack of care. Every time I have tried to change something in my life, even if I’ve succeeded, it has only brought a new wave of pain and suffering. And nobody has ever been there to help me with it, except superficially.

I used to have parents who at least cared a little bit, who at least did a little bit to improve my life, even if they themselves were causes of this prison around me. But I lost them too soon, and I have no frame of reference as to what happens to people like me. What happens to this weight of loneliness and never-ending responsibility regarding my own life. I have no idea how many more years I can try alone before giving up. Sometimes I would rather cut it short sooner anyway. Not that anybody would do anything to stop me.

When I was a child, my dad sometimes took us on these trips to places I still don’t know. There was a village near a river which we went to twice, which never had any tourists other than us. There were chickens with their babies walking around, and once one of them got stuck on a pile of cow poop. It was hilarious and sad. Another was a vast, green space close to a road, where we camped under the trees and ran around as kids. And I never learned where these places were.

There were also times back then when I interacted with people I don’t remember. There was the girl in a park in a small town we stopped at on the road, whom I was mean to. And then there was the girl who gave me a kiss on the cheek in kindergarten, which made my mother laugh, one of the only times I remember her genuinely laughing before the accident. Perhaps the only time.

I often wish I could go back in time and write about these memories, or take pictures of them, or make videos, or post Instagram stories. But back then life was different, and now it seems like a dream. My past always feels like a dream.