Recap: Holidays at Home

So that was nearly it. My first real holidays at home. By saying this I do not mean staying at home over the holidays, or visiting my parents just for a weekend. No, this time I really spend a 2-and-1/2-week holiday in Germany to visit everyone and to get all pampered and celebrated by friends and family after living in Brazil for now more than 7 months.

So how was it? Holidays at home? First of all, it is weird to use the word home. Even though in many languages, such as the German or Brazilian language, we make a difference in words for the home where we live and the home where our heart, our soul, our history lies, I do not find specific words for that in English. Maybe I could ask Lucky, or Amber, or best maybe Kristen who studies that kind of stuff. But really, I think the fact that in English, which is the language I use more and especially more regularily than German by now, I can call 5 or maybe even 6 places home makes moving in between them a lot easier. The word home gives a warm feeling, a sense of "I am going where I belong".

My parents house, Leverkusen, where I spent these Christmas Holidays is more than home and those holidays were really awesome. My parents house is not "where I belong". Not anymore. But it is the place where I can always go, the place that always will be there, and the place where I can hide when things go rough.

These holidays were passing really fast and everyday there was something I needed to do. Somewhere to party. Friends to visit. Family to see. I probably saw more of my friends and family, I partied more and I was out more than any other random two weeks I have spend in Germany ever in my life and I had a blast.

I arrived on Saturday night, delayed, in Cologne, and already my parents, my sister and my closest friends were waiting for me at the trainstation and took me right away to a nice, typically colonian bar at the Rhine river. Later on I moved on to my friends Christmas Party and in the end I had managed to travel 27 hours, party another 8 hours and then finally sleep for 12.
The next days I had fun in the snow, enjoyed the lovely cold, picked up my grandfather at his place (280km south of here), had coffee with the family, enjoyed Christmas Eve, met with my aunt, uncle and cousins, saw a Rock Concert (Die Toten Hosen), went to my friends birthday party and was surprised how easy and unproblematic it was despite my ex being there, I played what felt like 100 games of Scrabble with my family (and a dictionary), I drove 230km to my best friends house, saw a Ska-Concert (The Busters), drove another 360km spent a wonderful, snowy New Years Eve with a bunch of really great (new) people in Berlin, had a nice walk on the river Spree, went back to my best friends house and talked all night, drove then back home to my parents, met with a kindergarten friend, went for dinner in Cologne with my parents and my sister, stopped on the way back at Lucky and Toni's place, happened to spend the night there because of the snow, back to my parents the next day with the train and one hour walking as there are no buses on sundays (what a tiny poor little village!), I had Cheese Fondue for the second time and well, now its already monday and I leave this house in 24 hours.

The time passed fast, and it was stuffed with fun. But it won't be long before I am back, as I think it is reasonable to at least show up at home for a couple of days every half a year, and Hurricane Festival in June is just the right spot to mingle with all my friends.

That being said, it also fits into my Resolution for 2010: Travel. Travel. Travel.
First travel for this year: Back home to Goiânia, Brasil.