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22.08.2022

Back on the plane again. A slightly shorter flight this time. I’m just going to Amsterdam to visit my sister.

I’ve been back in Berlin for a year. My studies in Korea are already a thing of the past. It’s funny to come back here after everything that’s happened.

I still look back on my time in Jakarta with the same bewilderment as before. Now, at a full 25 years old, my 18-year-old existence still feels like a weird fever dream. Even after all the studying and completing an entire major, those 2 weeks are still a mystery to me. It does make sense why I wrote so much back then when I was in the thick of it. Somehow it must have been clear to me that what was happening was a turning point. Seven years later, the whole thing has been translated once from English into German and then back to English and sent to this writing competition. I don’t really know if it’s allowed to break the 4th wall to this degree, but I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

A moment later, the nice flight attendant from KLM handed me my coffee. I immediately asked for milk, because everyone who knows me knows that I and coffee without milk are arch enemies. However, she simply continued to hold out the cup to me along with the black liquid.

“Milk?”

I asked again, looking at her a little desperately. She nodded at me sympathetically and held the cup unchanged.

“Creamer”

she finally said, her smile, despite a friendly expression, now carrying a certain tension. Finally, I understood and quickly took the cup from her hand. “I’m so sorry!” I said quickly, as she handed me a packet of powdered milk. Her warm smile assured me that she had been through this very moment many a times before. Lo and behold, the same thing immediately happened again in the row right behind me. I have such incredible respect for flight attendants.

I don’t know what it is exactly, but whenever I’m on a plane, the words just flow out of my fingers. To be so far away from everything… everyone. Away from home and yet not at my destination. A kind of limbo. You’re practically floating between the realities that are waiting for you in both of those places. In the middle of the air and above the clouds, the connection to all that, what keeps us on the ground, no longer feels so intense. Adding to that is the soundscape of the airplane. An ambiance of white noise, the rustling of snacks and flight attendants clicking and clacking about with their carts, as well as snippets of conversation from other passengers that pierce through the roar of the plane.

Uh oh, the announcement just came, we’re about to land.