A week in Jablonec nad Nisou (Czech Republic). The first of many to come. So, here we are again in a foreign country with a foreign language. Although I can derive some words and although some of the locals know very good English, I feel insecure outside. I don‘t want to get in contact with people, because I am scared of not being understood. I also feel foreign, but not unwelcome.

This is so different from Germany where I grew up and spent most of my life. I still feel foreign there and unwelcome. Not everywhere and not always, but in many crucial circumstances. I don't know which part is more responsible for these feelings, the daily racism, apparently common in a small town in the middle of nowhere, that I had to grow up with, or the family and cultural racism of not wanting to be part of the society you were in, because we were better than them. All this and more merges into a feeling of being lost and not being part of society. This is one reason why I want to spend as little time in Germany as possible.

What‘s the point of being here in Jablonec? We found this accommodation on Airbnb, a flat in a villa, built on the hills of the city in 1906 and renovated a few years ago. You can still find a picture on google maps where this house is surrounded by a scaffold and without facade, only bricks. The photo is from 2017. This must be the year when the house became what it‘s now, when it was new born, freed from the old and broken cloths, that were put on it, when it was built more than 100 years ago.

Now it looks and feels modern. It‘s not one of a kind, it‘s one of many in this town from a period when architects built with beauty in mind. This period is called Art Noveau or in German Jugendstil. Not all buildings are renovated like this one. Many have continued to decay, eaten up by time. This one appears in a new splendor. 

Here and there it does not look quite perfect, the facade was painted with two different colors and the plaster inside already shows slight cracks. But it is spacious, open and we have room to breathe. There is a small garden with two benches, shrubs and trees. It's a good place to be. A much better one than any we have had in Germany. 

I was thinking about what makes a place interesting for me. It could be a lot. But it‘s something I didn't recognize in the first place. Maybe because it’s so obvious or because it‘s very unusual. It is the smell of a place. This one smells neutral. It calms me. And that is what I need the most now.