Moving On
The only problem with trying to relive four years in five days is that, well, it simply can’t be done. I’d packed a lot into my week so far—arriving in Aachen, visiting Maastricht, touring Bonn, Köln and Düsseldorf, and catching up with a friend in Roermond—but I had originally hoped to see even more.
There were two cities in particular I would’ve liked to revisit—one in Germany and one in Holland. The train from Aachen to Düsseldorf hadn’t terminated there but continued on to Dortmund, just shy of an hour away. It was somewhere I’d only been once before, on a school trip to the Christmas market, but which I had enjoyed very much. I was sure I’d find just as much to admire as an adult.
An alternative, having already spent most of Wednesday on the Rhine, had been to continue downriver into Nederrijn, the Dutch Lower Rhine, and visit Arnhem. As the home of my favourite zoo, Royal Burger’s, it was somewhere I knew much better—having visited on a number of occasions with either my parents or neighbours we’d been particularly friendly with. Arnhem is obviously famous (or infamous) for other things as well.
Most of all, however, I was disappointed not to have made it to Belgium. Aachen sits on the tri-border, and in different circumstances I’d have loved to spend an afternoon there, a country I’d neglected in the years since leaving the continent. Maaatricht, too, borders Belgium—and together with Aachen it forms a Euroregion with the city of Liege. However, Liege wasn’t somewhere I was desperate to return to, our one uninspiring visit enough to make it the butt of family jokes ever since.
At Three Country Point, though, the only thing stopping you from having a foot in Germany, Holland and Belgium wasn’t geography or politics but basic biology. I’d brought my telephoto lens with the hope of photographing green woodpeckers in whichever country they landed, but late winter didn’t seem the optimal time to visit a country (or three countries) park. Instead, save for photographing a cormorant in Köln, I hadn’t used the heavy lens since arriving.
Alas, it wasn’t to be. Despite my hotel room being comfortable enough and free from many of the discomforts associated with my more traditional dorm life, it had been too hot at night and I’d struggled to sleep. As such, my early starts were never as early as I’d hoped, and waking after dawn I hadn’t wanted to waste too much precious daylight travelling. Everywhere I’d visited had been close-by, whereas Dortmund and Arnhem would’ve almost doubled the distance and travel time.
Most frustrating of all, however, had been the forecast. As I packed my bag on the last morning, I still had a full day ahead of me before my flight home from Eindhoven Airport. I’d plotted an elaborate detour to Antwerp that, if I departed Aachen early enough, would have given me the best of the day. One of my favourite photographs had been taken in Antwerp, of my teenage self on a foggy bridge—the only other feature being a signpost for the city. And yet the album contained no other evidence of our visit. A real shame given how beautiful it appears to be.
In the event, the forecast was for clouds and rain, and the thought of spending hours on a succession of coaches or a fortune on expensive trains only to be rained indoors just didn’t feel worth the time or money. What’s more, I still felt I had unfinished business in Germany and Holland. The dull days had resulted in disappointing photographs and I wasn’t ready to give up and move on just yet. What if I could have another chance at seeing Roermond in a better light?
In Aachen at least, conditions had improved. And so, after retaking all my pictures of the Altstat under a brilliant blue sky and waiting for the bookshop to open so I could have one last slice of cheesecake, I made my way to the train station—and then to the coach station, for the line was still closed from last night’s storm damage. Suddenly the previous evening’s inconvenience seemed like a blessing in disguise, as I knew exactly what I needed to do. That said, taking the bus to Heerlen would eat into my remaining time.
Roermond wasn’t any brighter that afternoon but it was still nice to be back. Approaching the afternoon with fresh eyes and a genuine desire to appreciate the town’s remaining merits rather than holding any changes against it, I found both churches to be handsome sights, while the designer outlet that had so depressed the high street was nevertheless well presented and equally well attended. It also took me down to the river, where I sat contemplating the recent past, alternative presents and possible futures as the sun burnt its way through the clouds above. Given more time, I might even have seen it.
But I didn’t, and as I travelled north to Eindhoven the clouds won out and the heavens opened. Accepting reality, I made no frantic, ill-fated attempt to see more of the city and instead spent the last of my time in the station, at Coffee Fellows. I’d been on the lookout for branches since I’d arrived, it being my favourite European coffee chain after France’s Paul, but always seemed to spot them as I was racing for a train—in Köln, in Düsseldorf and here in Eindhoven.
And that was that, at least for the time being. I love Germany and know I’ll be back at some point, whether it’s to reconnect once more with friends, another break to Berlin or a trip to one of the cities I’ve still yet to visit. In fact, if everything goes to plan, I’ll be back on the Rhine in December, at Strasbourg Christmas market, likely travelling through Freiburg to get there. This wasn’t the end; as I said in a previous blog, this supposed nostalgia trip had already morphed into an exercise in renewal.
Shortly after returning home I caught the Oscar-nominated Past Lives on Netflix—a story about a woman who, having left South Korea as a child, reconnects with it in later life, eventually hosting a childhood friend in New York—which stirred up many of the same feelings as my recent trip, not just in relation to Germany but all of the places I’d previously lived. I knew the hold the past could have and the melancholic weight of nostalgia. One line in particular stuck with me, however: “It's true that if you leave you lose things, but you also gain things, too.”
And I had lost something when I left Germany: cherished friends I’d wept over on my final night, soon to be relegated to Facebook; the security that came with living and schooling on military bases, bound instead for a civilian school in Stevenage I’d barely recognise; and continent-wide horizons, my world to subsequently shrink to fit the borders of the British Isles. But much of this would have happened anyway, simply as a result of growing up and the world changing around me.
Perhaps more had endured. It turned out the people, places and even person I’d been were still there, not exactly as I remembered them but recognisable enough that we could pick up where we left off. I couldn’t relive four years in five days but I didn’t have to. It was still my life, and I was still living it.