The Thief of Joy

I began practicing a dangerous habit sometime last winter. Like all habits, it’s very addicting and hard to break once you start. It consumes you and doesn’t let you live life the way you want to. Thankfully, however, I do indeed feel myself coming out of it as of late – maybe it’s the spring weather. At any rate, here’s my experience with comparing myself to others over the last few months. 

I suppose it began when I really started to notice that I am no longer in lock-step with my peers. I saw that some friends and acquaintances have been progressing in their careers, while others are earning impressive academic titles. Some have gotten married and started families, while still others have purchased homes. A select few have done all that and then some! All of those things are truly great things and I am, on an intellectual level, very proud and happy for those people. Yet on an emotional level I often found myself wondering, what the hell are you doing with YOUR life, Ryan? 

And to that I would answer (most recently): I’m living in a student dormitory yet again with a shower that zaps me from time to time, a ‘kitchen’ the size of shoebox, and having tortellini pesto for the umpteenth time for dinner in a locked down city where I know all of five people. 

But I’m finally – and thankfully – realizing that life really is NOT a race. There is no right or wrong way to live it, and, well, when shit happens you gotta deal with it. All you can do is be the best version of yourself that you can be, when you can be, and nothing more. When friends and family back home reach milestones they are doing just that, and they certainly don’t deserve any ill-will for it just because I feel that I am “falling behind”. 

As a note to my future self (and to anyone else who cares): life’s a journey, not a race. Make the best of where you are and when you are – even if that’s a run-down student dorm during a pandemic. If nothing else it’ll make for a great story someday, like that time the Hausmeister ensured you that your shower is okay to use because – despite the electric current that sometimes runs through the water – you “won’t die in the shower.” 

Much love y’all and get vaccinated!

Ryry

Die Reise geht Weiter

Well, here we are, another two years gone by. In keeping with my biennial tradition this of course means it’s time to pack up shop and move somewhere else – this time to Regensburg as I begin my internship in international mobility and business travel. (Ahh yes, Bavaria, the Land of Lederhosen, giant pretzels, and the Weißwurstfrühstück.) As I’m done with all my seminars in Fulda at this point, I won’t be returning after my internship concludes either. It may well be the last move of my life lived abroad. Who knows?

It’s hard to describe how I feel at the moment. On the one hand, I’m always happy to try out something new and experience a new city. But on the other hand, I feel like I never got to know Fulda the way that I did Ulsan. While my first year here was exactly how I had imagined it, the second one just sort of had the wind taken out of its sails. Officially I’ve been a student in Germany, but it’s hard to feel like a student when you never step foot in a classroom for a year. It’s just like that second year just went by without me even realizing it. 

Yet, I still do have plenty of fond memories from my time here during the pandemic – whether through ultimate frisbee, bike rides, sending memes during online seminars, or deep conversations with some great new friends. We certainly made the best with the cards that we were dealt. In the end it’s all you really can do, I suppose. 

Pandemic or not, I’m learning that life does indeed go on. So, here’s to new relationships and experiences in Regensburg – and hopefully some sense of normalcy this year! 

Side note: If you happen to be reading this, I’d like to ask you to consider donating to my aunt’s gofundme page, if you can. She was recently diagnosed with a very serious illness and will be facing lots of extra expenses due her treatment. Any donation helps! Link: https://gofund.me/1fe59213

An American Abroad

Und wie heißt du? 

Ryan.

Ah, und wo kommst du her? 

Aus den USA. 

Oh, should we just talk in English then? 

What does it mean to be an American? Is it loving hamburgers, guns and freedom? Or is it being a radical left-wing socialist? I’m not sure I have an answer to this question. Whatever it means, it’s something I’m often confronted with abroad, as I’m sure many groups of people are when not part of the majority in a given context. 

Due to its sheer political and cultural weight, I get the impression sometimes that simply coming from the U.S. is a statement in itself loaded with connotations, presumptions and questions. Whether in the media, economically, or politically, the presence of the United States is indeed almost unavoidable. As an American abroad I thus become a de facto representative of this presence, and I often wonder if it’s possible to be perceived independent of my nationality at all. This seemingly inescapable identity is, after all, something I’m often ambivalent towards and something I’ll try to keep hidden if possible. Because, once my nationality comes to the fore, I feel myself become Ryan-the-American instead of just Ryan. 

Yet, I don’t necessarily harbor resentment for often being seen as an American first and an individual second. After all, humans constantly use categories to make sense of this world, myself included, and my nationality is just another, rather stark, category. We use these categories when encountering a new situation or a new person, reaching back into our preexisting knowledge of a given subject to help us interpret it. Thus, when my actions or personality are interpreted through the lens of my American-ness, it’s simply an attempt to understand me with the preexisting information available – even if that information is sometimes flawed: did I just eat that hamburger because I’m hungry and it was on the menu? Or did I eat it because I’m an American? 

Importantly, though, the categories I fall into (white, American, male, straight) are very privileged. While my actions being reduced to my nationality is noteworthy to the extent that I’ll write a blog entry about it, other categories reduce people to the point of systemic exclusion, or worse. Sure, I might get a little peeved if Germans immediately switch to English upon learning my nationality, or when it’s assumed that my childhood pastimes included chowing down on Big Macs and shooting rifles. But I’ve never been perceived as a danger or detriment to society due to the categories I was put in. 

It’s critical therefore to always be reflective in your interactions with others, especially with those that don’t share your identity – national or otherwise. Categories help us understand the world, but in reducing others to preconceived notions of who they are or should be, categories also prevent us from understanding the individual. 

Much love, 

Ryan (the American)