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| It was a foggy day when I arrived to Budapest, five years ago today. |
Five years ago, the Toronto Blue Jays seemed like a lost team, years away from a playoff appearance. Stephen Harper was Canada's prime minister. Rob Ford was Toronto's mayor, and we only knew about his penchant for racial slurs, drunk driving, and public intoxication, not the crack smoking – we were so innocent then. It was also the year the European Union won the Nobel Peace Prize, and the year I moved to the EU
And it was on this day, five years ago, that I boarded a plane for Budapest, a city I only knew through history books and google images.
A job at an ad agency working for a tobacco company. An opportunity for some international job experience. A rare chance live and travel in Europe. Those were the reasons I made the move. Just a year, I figured, and I'd be back to the grind in Toronto.
But I stayed.
This blog has been a chronicle of my Euro-adventures and my misadventures integrating. That's been the larger story. At some point during my time here – when I got serious about a lovely Hungarian girl – I stopped being a temporary guest worker and became a resident.
In some ways, I started integrating not long after I arrived: taking language lessons, trying and loving the food, making friends with some locals. That city, that I only knew through google and books, gradually became home.
I worked hard for that commitment a little later. Kata had gone to Berlin to work and wait while I searched for a job in Germany. That time was tough. Monthly overnight trains to Berlin. Dozens of job applications, emails, check-ups, follow-ups. All while the ad agency that offered me this opportunity sank. Colleagues were laid off in waves. Goodbye parties became weekly events.
It was the end of an era for some people, especially the expats, who packed their two allowable checked bags and returned home. It was the end of a chapter for many Hungarian friends, who moved on to new jobs or started their own businesses.
For me, it was the beginning of something else. I found work in Düsseldorf. Kata followed. I had committed to the idea of staying in Europe months ago, and the concept became very real. We moved in together, bought furniture, and made plans. It's still an adventure, but it's become bigger than myself. A relationship does that: makes you think beyond yourself.
As I lived the evolving adventure here, life moved on for everyone else. After my first year, I came back for a best friend's wedding. I met their son during my next visit. I streamed another best friend's Vegas wedding over the internet. Other friends bought houses or bright yellow cars. Jobs became careers. Girlfriends became wives. Wives became mothers. We all moved along, maybe not in the same stream, but certainly parallel to each other.
Putting it all in perspective, I've been lucky. I wouldn't be here if it weren't for a few chance meetings. If I didn't join an ad industry boxing event, I wouldn't have met Joe. If I didn't take a job at an agency some years later, I wouldn't have met a former employee of that agency (Joe), who offered to tell me about any job openings, which led to a job offer, which led to moving to Budapest, which lead to meeting Kata, which led to moving to Germany together, which leads to... And on it goes.
Taking one opportunity leads to another – that's the way life goes.
It's easy to get nostalgic during a big milestone. I think about the nervous lead-up to that flight to Budapest and the strange, exciting feeling I had driving through the city in the fog to my hotel in the Buda hills. It was something I had never felt before, not even when I was traveling in Asia. It wasn't just about being in a new, strange place, but it was an excitement about where it will lead. And so today I find myself thinking about the next five years, and what opportunities lay ahead for me, and for us.
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| Berlin |