Not alright

at one point our paths crossed in the sky.
but we did not know how to stop moving forward.

Helsinki, December 2008.

find a song that makes you happy. whenever you'd play you'd feel this joy in you. even if only briefly. post random messages around your hometown. leave a note in the bus saying 'I'd like to be your friend, but I'm too scared'. go to a tourist information and speak in English with a strong foreign accent. ask ridiculous questions. apologize every minute. tell them that you are from Moldova. smile. be sad and be happy and be joyful and be jealous and be whatever you want to be as long as you are not afraid of being what you are. it is hard. if nothing else, then be alone. and be what you want to be. write a letter. write about yourself. things that you like about yourself. things that you like about the world. things that you like. things that make you happy. pick a telephone directory. browsed until you find a name that you really like. take the address and send the letter to that person. one morning wake up earlier than your mother. make breakfast for her. ask your mother what was her dream when she was young. what did she want to become? what's her favorite color? did she have her own room in her childhood? take a local bus that you have never taken. take your camera and preferably your friend. talk about the things that you did yesterday. keep your eyes on the view. get out of the bus at a random stop and take another public transportation. get lost. wonder. be with your friend and get to know him/her. don't worry about what will happen. (take a phone, too. just in case, but turn it off.) go through your old photos. see what you used to be. see what you are now. embrace yourself. love yourself because you came this far. it has been a rough, difficult journey but do realize that you're still standing and breathing and living and that if nothing else is already an accomplishment. when someone compliments you don't start arguing with the person. accept it. say thank you if you cannot say anything else. imagine that the person was being serious. picture a scenario where a person really enjoys you and likes your work. feel good about it. feel amazing about it. feel free to be a good person. write a note to yourself. 'everything will be okay' and put it somewhere where you'll see it all the time. because everything will be okay.

Everything should be alright. Yesterday I found out that my new university will offer me a full scholarship covering the tuition fees and the rent.

Yet everything around you & me crumbles.
And the sad man is left to pick up the pieces of things that existed a second ago.

What is happening?

Take my hand &

you will be safe.

It has been impossible to write lately. Four years ago I wrote stories every second night, because there was nothing else to do. I had no other life than fictional, containing of words that never existed anywhere else than in my mind. I would bring the unreal world alive artificially, but no matter how hard I would try, it would be nothing more than imagination and painted images in a place, which is visited only by few. Since meeting S last year, I had had too much happening in my life. There is always something that takes my time, either it's me sobbing for not being with him or it's me being so happy for being with him. I ceased writing long time ago and I am afraid that I will never be able to write ever again, that stories, the fiction, the imagination slipped through my fingers. My only reason to write so I can live in a world that would be only mine, that would be my creation and that no one else would be able to touch, perhaps I was too afraid of living in this place where everyone else seems to live, too. When I was with my ex-boyfriend, I still found time to write my miseries and worries down, everything was under control. Things have changed since I met S in Strasbourg over a year ago. And I think I should be happy about the fact that I have no need to escape anymore. However, I miss it. There. I said it. I miss escaping.

I have lived in Croatia for six months now, a bit more than that. I moved here, because I was in love with a Croatian man who had finished his university-degree when I only started my high school. There has been a lot of tears and bashing heads against the wall - literally. Sometimes I wonder what happened, at what point I decided to take the control for real. Everything was fine previously. Studying with a full scholarship at a prestigious university in the United States. Getting drunk with people who enjoyed life more than they enjoyed misery. Flying in the clouds with friends who would call you at 5am after a long night of partying, wanting a friend next to them, worried for themselves and not knowing what to do. Studying hard in order to get an A in Arabic and making the dreams come true, the dreams you thought you still had at the moment. And still with a full confident I can say I have never been happier than in my current city. I am happier here than I was last fall in Paris with him. I am content, although worried very often. I get anxious from time to time and I pick up fights with him, because I am insecure. I am afraid and there are too many things that make me feel sick and keep awake in the nights. I wonder what life would be like if I had not come here. I think that maybe I lost my freedom too fast, too early, perhaps I committed before I should had. These thoughts do rush in my mind and then I doubt my happiness, my decisions but I have realized that there will be always things that are not as you wish them to be. There will be an endless number of things you want, it is a cycle and no one is able to escape from that, no matter how much you write, dream, sing, reminisce... Even after everything, I know I am happy. Even with every single doubt that I have in my mind.

I feel like writing now, because he's sleeping the next door, snoring and I am awake, because there are worries and nostalgia keeping me away from resting my eyes. My friend, who became my friend four year ago when we two were selected as the UWC-scholars to Swaziland, visited me here. She is the first friend of mine who ever saw him and I have been with him for one year, three months. Everything felt suddenly real and I became nostalgic, craving for the past, wanting life to be easy. I remember how simple things were when I lived in Swaziland, although at the time it seemed as if everything was collapsing and there was no way to cope with the problems. My time in Croatia is coming to end; I am moving next fall to the Netherlands to start my Bachelors-degree once again. He is trying to find a job there, but most of the time life gets in your way and you and everyone around you becomes sad. People ask me aren't you a bit too old to start university, aren't you afraid that you did the wrong decision last December by dropping out from the college? In a year I have seen the United States, Canada, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Austria and Hungary. In the next following two months I will see Spain, Bulgaria and maybe Slovenia and Turkey. I live with the man who is more than the man of my dreams. I am content and I can tell everything to someone who is there for me literally all the time. I have experienced more life, more feelings and emotions that I had ever witnessed before making the decision that brought me here. I am alive in the real world.

That's what is happening.

Paris is not the love of my life

It had been five months since I saw him & everything that I had believed in finally became real, they were just not a story after a story. He kissed me in the metro, took my hand and told me that he loved me and this all happened over and over again. Our fingers kept reaching to each other even when children were looking at us with a smile, even when a Muslim person walked by us in bright daylight, even when someone yelled after us. We took a metro from one place to another, he took the lead as he had been to Paris many times before and this was only my second time. I noticed that he liked to see at what station we were each time the train would cease moving, he was calculating all the time how long it takes us to our final stop. A man came to us, offering us a silver ring in exchange for two euros and as we were too happy to care, we gave him the coin and he left us happily. We would buy breakfast every morning from the shop next to our hotel, baguette, hummus, yogurt, ham and cheese, walk to the river and sit there, eating, kissing and witnessing the beautiful world. One morning a woman came to us while I held him in my arms, said something in French and I understood absolutely nothing, but he spoke with her and she was smiling, bursting into happiness. When the woman left, he told me that she had just said you two made my just day and everyone, everyone around us knew that we were in love. We kept holding hands even when had been holding hands for several hours, construction works yelled at us who is the woman in the relationship, in French obviously, I again understood absolutely nothing, but he translated everything to me and I just smiled, kissed him and we kept walking around the streets of Paris, walking in love.

The day before the departure day we took again a metro, the Parisian horribly old wagons squeaking, to the landmark of an emotion that has manifested in us. Under the tower, him holding me in his arms, he says one more times those three words and I reply with exact same words with all my heart, feelings rush from one place to another and everything is too good to be true. He looks at me with his green eyes that speak as well -- if not better -- as his tender words. He holds me tighter and asks will you marry me? and the only thing I could say is yes.

We celebrate; Martini Bianco bottles open & and a moment after they are empty. Happiness, I jump onto him, kiss his lips, his neck, his ears and people around us keep looking at us, American tourists practicing her French and commenting: l'amour! A police car comes by and calls for us, my beloved collects all the empty bottles and goes with them to the police offer who kindly asks us to go to a hotel room. He comes back, slightly confused with his bottles and I tell him I am engaged to the silliest man in the world, aren't I? He smiles and kisses me gently, telling me it is time to go up, the moment we had been describing to each other in emails for past five months.

When there is you & your loved one, a recently engaged couple up in the Eiffel Tower, over-looking lit up and traffic jammed Paris and chilly wind blowing into your ears, knowing that this is the last day you two will spend together for another three months at least, the feelings are too overwhelming to be remembered and felt ever again in your life. Your loved one's tears falling from the Eiffel Tower to the ground, laughter becoming more and more silent, things slipping through your fingers, it is all too confusing when reach the moment of such a happiness that you cannot be happy, because you are afraid of losing the joy. It is all too scary, they say.

Last day, he bought a ticket that was hundred euros more expensive in order to spend one hour more with me and travel through Brussels. At Bruxelles-Midi station everything crashed -- I had four minutes to rush to my train and say goodbye to him. I ran away, I literally ran away from my happiness and it all was becoming real, I was actually losing my joy, it was too much. From Brussels to Amsterdam, I cried more than I had cried in my entire life. Strangers bought me wine for comfort. One woman told me goodbyes are never easy. Another man grabbed my shoulder gently and said, everything will be fine. And I realized -- even without him being next to me, people know that I am in love. Madly, crazy, infinite. I am in love with him -- and that will never change.

The man was right; today everything is fine. I live with him in Croatia & I am happy.

Another love story

Things changed last year; there was no going back anymore. An acceptance letter to a study session in Strasbourg. An early flight from Helsinki to Frankfurt and terrified feeling taking over me as I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. I had became a smoker a few weeks earlier and craved for a cigarette after a short flight; I was petrified, because I had no idea what I was doing. When I arrived to Strasbourg, I was exhausted and terribly panicky. I wanted to go back to Finland & be comfortable with my surrounding. And then something unexpected happened -- I fell in love.

he came and talk to me on Monday when I was presenting United World Colleges to our conference. we talked but I thought it all was harmless because I assumed he was straight he invited me to their party and our group went there the first thing he does he greets me and serves me alcohol I drank different kinds of alcohol from Balkan and I'm starting to feel dizzy. a Macedonian guy from my group kisses me, but my head's exploding because the only thing I want is to kiss the Croatian guy tell him how beautiful he is so I escape to him and we got to his room drunk and exhausted. I wake up next to him he smiles gently and I fall in love with his eyes he kisses me I'm reserved and torn apart because never before I had ended up in a bed with a stranger. I tell him I'll ignore him that day I don't give him a reason and he thinks I'm just joking. everything starts to fall.

we didn't talk to each other for three days after that. I had left my food coupons in his room, but he never returned them to me. he tried to talk to me the very first day but I was too embarrassed so nothing happened. we try to meet each other I stay behind so I could meet him but he comes with someone else I wait for him in the dining area but he's delayed and even his friends poke me and say hi and text him that 'come down Slaven, he's here alone' but nothing happens. on Friday he grabs me out of the cafeteria says he's tired of games we used Marija from Serbia as our communication tool he asks if I wish to watch movies with him that night I tell him yes he kisses me gently no one sees us.

that night I went to his room again found myself in a situation that was everything else than I was losing all my principles even when I was sober. kissing him the sound of his breath his gentle touches on my neck everything made sense at that moment.

he took me to Strasbourg for lunch. we went to Mc Donald's as it had became some kind of a joke between us two he bought my meal and I felt slightly awkward about it and I didn't know how to eat in front of him but I loved watching him listening him speaking about his country telling about the situation between Slovenia and Croatia learning about his past current future. he speaks fluent French he's good with people he held my hand in Strasbourg in front of anyone we kissed publicly in the city and I felt as everything that I had ever wanted I had gotten now with him. we spoke about children he asked me if I wanted any I said yes he said me too we dropped the conversation, but in my head I started imagining and painting pictures. the lunch in Strasbourg was beautiful we tried to ask people to take a photo of us two but people were too busy they didn't have time to stop we wandered around and I felt good with him. we ran to the tram without tickets and obviously we got busted and fined 26 euros. I'd have paid more just to be with him.

I spent some parts of Sunday night with him went back to farewell party then again to his room around at 3am and decided that I'll travel with him to Frankfurt at 6am although my originally plan was to leave at 9am. we talked kissed spoke touched danced looked played listened things you do things you enjoy but we didn't sleep because suddenly his alarm clock began to buzz and I'm like you're kidding me you're seriously kidding me and it was 5:30am and I hadn't even packed yet. so I run to my room pack everything lost my friendship-book and took a cab to the train station with his group. I felt grumpy and restless no cigarettes in a long time and I was doubting myself again. and then something really strange happened. I realized I don't wish to leave this guy. no. or tomorrow. we kissed in the train. we actually kissed from Strasbourg until he checked-in. people children grandmothers aunts policemen ticket-inspectors black everyone stared at us but we continued kissing holding hands feeling good about each other making the world understand that we don't care. he fell asleep on my arms for a minute or two I loved him his smell his breath everything about him we changed trains three times and on the last one we didn't have any seats so we just sat in front of the door and kissed and held hands we went to the airport café for breakfast he wanted to buy me breakfast I told him no but ended up buying hot chocolate I sat next to him kissed him while he was eating his breakfast he fed me potatoes and smiled and I told him I might be falling for you he said I love you and asked me if I wanted a boy or a girl I said a girl and he was me, too, we wouldn't survive with a boy because neither of us knows any sports and I laughed. I said that he could teach her cook and then he said I could give her fashion advices and I grinned and kissed him again.

every time he smiled this ghost in me switched on feel good-emotion. every time he kissed this paranoia in me switched on you're in love-emotion. every time I saw him the world looked wonderful everything was amazing nothing could have gone wrong and I couldn't stop thinking of him soon. when he left I felt sad. but honestly it's better off me meeting him for a week than never meeting him. I just think that he'll be the one for me. the one that will tease my mind for the rest of my life. even after six years if I meet him and I'm happily with someone my feelings for him would be stronger than for anyone else. yesterday we were planning to meet again. I was imagining us two moving together. things that I shouldn't do. things that you do when you're in love.

- N, March 3, 2009

take my hand come closer and kiss me when everyone is looking at us.

in the tunnel speaking words saying goodbyes crying because nothing else make sense.

running running running forgot your ticket and inspectors demand for money you say I'm sorry I was in love.

we go to the cinema and the only movie I'm able to watch is you.

in hurry in rush madam please can you take a photo of us no sorry I'm not in love and don't wish to take a photo of love.

the only thing that the tree desires is to be a James Bond and in love. you don't need both I say. love is enough.

apples red green yellow which one is your favorite it used to be green but now it's your.

people come and go they enter your life and find a door out. you took me to Mc Donald's and I never find my way out. but I had you.

the train station had never said I love you so many times. neither had the train.

the stars up there and you down here with me.

this story is read only to few. it started with he's the only thing in my mind. it ended with he's the only thing my mind and I'm the only thing in his mind.

speak a little more so I don't have to stop listening to you. strasbourg 2009.

A few days after we had departed, I received an email from you that makes me heart tremble every time I read it.

Dragi N,

Everyone likes you too N, I heard so many nice things about you, but I don't need to hear about your qualities, I can see them myself. Besides being the best looking man I've ever seen, I enjoy you so much, I love your smile, I love that you are international as I am, I like that you are not like other guys, you are warm and giving. God damn you, N, I really can't stop thinking of you. I think of you whole day, days already. I don't think of anything else, absolutely nothing, just you, and our reunion. My friends are shocked how I act, since they've never seen me so euphoric before, so happy, so sad, so emotional. Some of them even compared me with a woman during PMS :) See what you are doing to me.

I would love to see us by the end of the year living somewhere in the world, me working in some NGO/political international organisation or whatever, you studying. We would live together, I would cook for you (as I am a really good cook), we would walk down the street every day and hold for hands, kiss in metro, train, plane....where ever. And later having children together, you would be an amazing dad, we would be so happy.... damn you N, I already picture you as my husband. I really do.

I look horrible now, no sleep, haven't shaved for days, I am totally lost, I am not productive, I don't do ANYTHING on the work, I don't have my usual hyperactivity, creativity, all my energy is invested into you, and I am soooo disappointed I did not chat with you N, I am so disappointed, I am afraid I won't be able to sleep at all :( I just want to hear your voice..... so badly.

I love you.

s

We were not suppose to be together; I booked tickets for Budapest in March to see him, but my parents found out about us and stopped me. He booked tickets for Helsinki in May, but he was unable to come, because at the same time my relatives from the Netherlands came to discuss my "situation". In summer, I left for India and stayed there for seven weeks. We only met in August -- five months after -- and one week in Paris & Strasbourg was more than I had ever imagined. However, then I left for the United States and he was suppose to move with me. Everything failed.

In December I decided to drop out from college & move to Croatia. Last weekend we celebrated our one-year anniversary.

And I am more than happy.

Planning the future & forgetting the current

I am strong enough to tell you

I love you very much.

We plan future, we discuss what we should do today and tomorrow and next month and perhaps even what we have drawn for next five years. You talk about having children & so do I, but it really is irrelevant, because they are the ones who do scribbles on the walls of cities.

You are the reason why I undressed in the harbor

naked in front of the whole world

in front of

you.

Helsinki is in a total chaos; buses come whenever they are able to reach the destination; trains miss their stations, because they are too exhausted to carry frustrated passengers who are filling their guts; airplanes say we have had enough, we need to make love so we will be unable to forget how it feels to be in love; boats and ships break the ice in the sea, two lovers separated with force. And we plan the future.

You said

dress up, you will get cold.

I told

I won't, you keep me warm.

This story is a short one; when things go according to other person's plans, there are new opportunities for everyone else. Unfortunately we see only the shattered imaginary future in our plants instead of the seeds of something new. I wonder constantly where I will be next year -- maybe I continue living in Croatia. Perhaps I have shifted to the Netherlands. I never think of the United States again, but the truth is that I would like to go back.

The following morning I woke up next to you

still naked, clothes laying two feet away from us.

You opened your eyes and said

even the sunrise is not as beautiful as you are.

Things you do for love, they say.

When it was warm in Helsinki

I wish to learn to be everywhere all the time; to be here in Helsinki while my fingers make love to my fiancé's soft skin; study in the Netherlands while I kiss the dust of Sahara under the exploding sky; my heart desires to be here and there and even though they say nothing is impossible, people meet their limits in one way or another. I came to Helsinki last week for the first time in six months & at first I was afraid, no idea where I had arrived, left behind my love in Croatia, entered unknown and now after four days I'm bitterly disappointed that I am unable to stay in the city longer than just a week. No matter what I ever say, Helsinki & her people will always be my home, this is the city where I was raised; where I witnessed my first snowflakes, sunshine, birds and hawks; where everything for me began. Helsinki is a city that never expects anything back, she keeps giving and giving and after awhile you are bored of everything new you receive -- only when you leave and new ceases, you begin to appreciate the moments once again.

My current visit to Helsinki was the shortest in the history; I came here last Thursday and I most probably will leave day after tomorrow which makes me very sad. This is my city; I never imagined that I would actually leave the Nordic (sometimes mistakenly also Scandinavian) Queen for good. Funnily enough I never miss the city when I am away; however, whenever I come and visit Helsinki it gets harder and harder to leave it. Especially as it seems that my visits are getting just shorter and shorter; at this pace, it will soon become a stranger to me.

HELSINKI 2008; AUTUMN.

I like to disco I like to party I like to groove, but more importantly I like to

all the things mentioned above with Helsinki.

The bay of Toolo said that Helsinki is a poor dancer;

he told a lie so only he would have a glimpse to disco-moves in Heaven.

Autumn told me that the bay and she had been lovers once, but when

Helsinki danced with the leaves, it all was over after that

-- they both fell for the city.

I take trams in the city.

I take buses in the city.

I take metros in the city.

I take walks in the city.

And when I do things mentioned above

I am more and more in love with Helsinki.

The Bay of Toolo, autumn and I watch Helsinki constantly, non-stop.

And she watches us, always with love.

And we all are happy.

Swaziland & Two years ago

To all those boys and girls and female-to-males and males-to-females and Lady Gagas who never thought they could never fall in love; to all those people who wonder the world and its stars and space and universe and seek for an answer to a question that can rarely asked in a company of two or more people; to all those birds flying across the sea determined to reach their destination in the stormy blizzard of winter; to the lions in the sea; to myself who is finally alive.

It has been three years since I moved to Swaziland, a country where in last four years I have spent most of the time. I came there with full of ideas and as a boy who was intolerant towards drugs and alcohol and aimed at changing the world in seconds, preferably quicker than in just seconds. I wore glasses every day in order to see the hilly landscapes of the traditional African country and I studied in a language that was foreign to me. I met people from countries that I had only read of on the Atlas when I was six-years-old. I was face to face with HIV/Aids and yet even with my glasses I was unable to see what was in front of me. And fairly soon the world was mocking me for dreaming of teaching Russian and Finnish in an American high school, to a few selected students who had a passion for awkward languages. The world stayed still; the changes happened in me.

By the time I left Swaziland, I had began to drink alcohol in amounts that I could had never believed was possible to drink. I kissed men and girls (not boys and women) and I enjoyed it. I lost my glasses and it was not the only thing I lost when it came to my appearance. Cigarettes were soon introduced and smoking only tobacco was barely enough, needed something else & better. For very long I was ashamed of every change that took place in me; disgusted and afraid. However, I realized now after reading my old entries from history that I constantly keep thinking only the bad modifications. Something good happened, too. Something better than good.

For the first time in my life I understood that it is fine. It really is fine.

-- Memories from Swaziland,

when everything was fine, too.

I just did not know it then.