My luggage was late. I was going to be abroad in Germany for a year. I had packed all my most important belongings in a backpack and a box. The box was the kind you ship bikes to stores in. Of all the things I thought I’d need in the next year, half of them were in that box. I had taken my bike apart enough to pack it into a box and put it on a plane stuffed with half my things… whatever I could fit in and still stay under my weight limit… and a week after I got to Berlin, that bike box still wasn’t there.
I was planning on using that bike to get around. I felt stranded without my bike. I had to get it.
I was 19 and about as clueless about life in a big city as I was fearless. I didn’t know enough about what I was facing to be afraid.
I set out for the airport. I had a map. I could speak some German. What more did I need?
I could see the airport on the map. It wasn’t far from a subway station. I rode to the station nearest the airport and started walking.
It didn’t seem like a long walk from looking at the map…
An hour later, it seemed like I hadn’t gotten any closer…
I could see planes landing and taking off. I knew the airport was just on the other side of the fence…but where was the terminal? But what?
I had been walking a long time. It was August. I looked up and saw clear blue sky. The pavement was hot. Every time a car went by, the wind blew little rocks at me. The rocks kept hitting me…
Grit in my face. The heat was making me sweat. The sweat was making the grit cling to me. Then there were the exhaust fumes. This was a lot less fun than hiking in the Smoky Mountains…
but the road I was on was below ground level with high walls on either side…how do I even get out of this?
It turns out, exits from the Autobahn only come up once every few kilometers. If you walk past one, it is a long walk before you get to the next one.
When I finally got out of that trench of a road, everything around me was industrial…
“Where are all the people?” I thought.
I walked another several blocks before finding anyone I could talk to.…
and the only place I could find anyone was at a bar. You might like bars but…
My parents had gone through a messy divorce a few years earlier. My mom had indoctrinated us kids that my dad was an alcoholic. If we drank alcohol, we were sure to become alcoholics, too.
I was so embarrassed. I was afraid to order a beer, because I thought it would turn me into an alcoholic! But I didn’t know what else to order at a bar, “Hello, I’d like a milk with a large straw, please…” No, that wouldn’t do.
I couldn’t see walking in and asking directions right away. It seemed like it would be rude…
and I wasn’t sure even how to ask, “I can see the planes flying overhead. I know the airport is close by, but how do I get there? The more I walk, the more fences I see.” And ask it in a foreign language…
When I got up the courage to buy a beer, they wanted to know what kind! I’d never ordered a beer in a bar before, much less a bar in Germany. “I don’t know. A beer.”
I confused that poor bartender . “What do you mean, you don’t know what kind?” I’m sure he could see the fear all over my face…without having any idea what I could be afraid of.
I sat there and drank my beer for a little while before I got up the courage to ask what I had done wrong. (Well, I tried to drink my beer…I hadn’t learned to like it yet, so that was hard, too.) He told me I didn’t need to buy a beer to ask directions! The EVIL bartender was…nice?
I don’t remember much more about the conversation. I did get my luggage back…after another week…
Now, when my kids remind me of the things I did when I was their age, it is hard to stay upset with them.
Maybe you’re thinking I should have talked to my host in Germany…or I should have discussed my strategy with a teacher at the school I attended. You’d be right. I should have…but I didn’t know.
You might think I shouldn’t have walked for miles along the Autobahn trying to “get to the airport”…and you’d be right…
but I didn’t know it was the Autobahn. The sign didn’t say, “Autobahn.” It was a picture…an icon without any letters at all. If you didn’t know what the picture meant, there wasn’t any good way to figure it out. I hadn’t been to driving school in Germany, and we hadn’t covered it in my German classes. So, how would I know?
I did a lot of things I shouldn’t have…but I didn’t know what I didn’t know.
I learned a lot through going to Germany. There’s value in going out and doing things…
but there’s also value in talking with older, wiser, more experienced people before you go and get yourself killed doing something dangerous.
So, do both: have adventures. Try not to get killed doing it.
Let me know what happens or, if you have adventure stories you’d like to share, send me one. I’d like to hear about it.
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