〔 AUGUST 1996 〕
For the first few months I was in Germany, the distance from home did not strike me all at once. It arrived quietly. It settled into the pauses between classes and the long train rides, into the silence that followed unfamiliar conversations. I would look around and suddenly remember that I was thousands of miles away from everything I had ever known.
I was far outside my comfort zone. Aside from my two friends, no one adjusted for me. Life moved at its own steady rhythm, indifferent to my hesitation, and I had to learn how to keep pace without falling behind.
Language reminded me of that every single day. My German had improved from knowing nothing at all, but fluency still felt like a distant shore. I measured progress in small victories. Understanding a cashier without asking for repetition. Forming a sentence without rehearsing it twice in my head. Still, I stumbled. The same nervousness I once felt in the Philippines crept back into my chest, only now the words were foreign and heavy on my tongue.
Outside the classroom, the adjustment became physical.
The food was not bad, only unfamiliar. My taste buds kept searching for the sharpness and warmth they had grown up with. Some meals were easy enough to finish. Others felt like quiet gambles, each bite uncertain. I kept waiting for my palate to surrender and adapt.
My stomach struggled more than my pride did. It had always been sensitive, so I expected the sickness. Even so, being ill in a foreign room, surrounded by walls that did not feel like mine, made everything seem fragile. Discomfort has a way of amplifying doubt. A small ache can become a question. A fever can become regret.
Guilt did the rest.
I thought about my parents often, especially at night when the world grew still. Sometimes I could not sleep because I imagined them moving through routines that no longer included me. I pictured the dining table. The familiar hum of the television. The empty space where I used to sit. I hated feeling like the child who chose herself over her family.
The irony was impossible to ignore. I had left the Philippines partly to assert my independence, to carve out a future on my own terms. Yet there I was, burying myself in books and chasing the very ambitions they had once dreamed for me. What I had called rebellion slowly circled back into obedience.
Heidelberg's weather offered its own lesson in humility. What locals considered ordinary felt biting to me. I carried a jacket and an umbrella almost every time I stepped outside, as if bracing myself against more than just the cold. The air held a sharpness that reminded me, again and again, that I was not home.
There was little room to drift. Every errand required intention. Every interaction demanded attention. I was acutely aware of my accent whenever I spoke, bracing for confusion, for polite nods that masked misunderstanding. Some people were patient. Their small kindnesses, a slower reply, a reassuring smile, softened the city's edges.
Ed and I often followed Jaime around town so we would not get lost. Heidelberg felt vast back then, its streets stretching farther than expected, its corners folding into one another. We stayed close to each other, bound by shared uncertainty.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the city began to take shape in my mind. The routes grew familiar. The tram stops stopped feeling foreign. Even the distant church bells began to sound less like interruptions and more like part of the background of my days. I was learning how to exist in a place that would never adjust for me. In that process, I felt myself adjusting too.
It felt like I had finally found pieces of a massive puzzle, pieces that slipped into the gaps I had been staring at for years. For the first time, things aligned. Even when I still felt like an outsider in certain rooms, I was having fun. Real, unguarded fun. That mattered more than I expected.
I was especially grateful for the two friends who remained beside me through it all. They were steady and dependable, the kind of presence you lean on without asking. They were not particularly warm. Not the type you run to when you need to cry into someone's shoulder. Emotions that ran too deep made them uncomfortable. Still, they noticed things. They simply chose not to point them out unless they were certain of what they were seeing, or what someone truly meant. In their own quiet way, they cared.
Occasionally, they offered encouragement. It was rare, and perhaps because of that, it carried weight.
Even so, I was still afraid of being alone. The thought unsettled me more than I liked to admit. So when I decided to apply for an available student researcher position in the second quarter of my freshman year, I dragged both of them with me. I needed their presence. I needed the comfort of knowing I was not standing on the edge of something new by myself.
I slipped a few coins inside my shoes for luck. I prayed every day. I even made Ed and Jaime "bless" me with whatever luck they claimed to possess. I stacked superstition upon superstition, as if rituals could tilt the odds in my favor. Deep down, I knew better. Acceptance would depend on skill, preparation, and knowledge. Coins and whispered wishes meant nothing to an admissions committee. Still, hope makes you reach for anything within grasp.
"You can do it, Kimi."
"You can always apply again next year."
They said this when they caught me staring blankly into space, lost in spirals of possibility and failure.
The waiting was agonizing. Thrilling, yes, but agonizing all the same. During lectures, my thoughts drifted back to the application. I take pride in every endeavor I pursue. Once I commit, I hold on tightly. Almost fiercely. Every word of encouragement, every reminder of competition, echoed in my mind until it became a single, relentless sentence.
I cannot fail.
I wanted this.
I wanted to discover who I was inside a cold laboratory, wrapped in a white coat and surrounded by glassware and chemicals. I imagined adjusting my goggles, handling delicate specimens, reading results beneath sterile light. I wanted to belong in that world. I wanted to prove that I deserved to stand there.
So when the acceptance finally came, when the green light turned real and official, something inside me burst open. I jumped higher than I thought I could and cried in a quiet, nearly forgotten corner of the building. I did not care who saw.
As soon as classes ended, I rushed across campus to find them.
I ran toward them with open arms and a face that must have been glowing. I hugged them tightly, nearly hopping in place as I spilled the news between breaths and laughter. They reacted the way they always did. Mild expressions. Simple congratulations. No dramatic cheering. No grand display.
Still, Ed insisted on treating us to pizza. Jaime paid for the taxi without a word of complaint.
And that pizza, for reasons I still cannot fully explain, tasted better than any I had ever eaten.
I think it was the best pizza of my life.