Growing up in Europe, I heard a lot of stories about Paris. About how romantic the city is, how the architecture will blow your mind, how lovely the culture is. All those stories fit the cliches perfectly (except for the story about a high school friend running away during a field trip - love that story). But I'm not a fan of cliches. Paris is a lot more than the decor for a perfect and romantic proposal. It's creepy, crowded and sometimes very cold. Most people wouldn't say such things about the French capital, but I like to keep things realistic on this blog. Truth is, there are so many weird and annoying things about staying in Paris that people barely talk about. So I've taken it upon myself to do that. Ready? Let's go.

Free walking tours are among my favorite things on the planet. They are great if you want to see a city on a budget or meet other people who are traveling alone. Especially if you're a broke college student, free walking tours are a life-saver. In a city like Paris, they're the best thing ever because you won't have to worry about missing out on any of the important highlights or getting lost. As you can imagine, I was very happy to find a company called Civitatis that organized free walking tours. I had to make a reservation, which I did, and showed up at the meeting point 15 minutes early.
15 minutes later, the tour was canceled. The tour guide was there, two other tourists were there, I was there, and still the tour was canceled. Why? Because they wouldn't do the tour for only three people. When we complained, we were told we shouldn't complain and be glad that a tour like theirs existed in the first place. We hadn't paid for anything, so why were we complaining? If we wanted, we could join the Spanish tour though. I'd never heard such bullshit before.
Civitatis organizes tours in a bunch of other cities as well. I'm never joining one again.

My hostel in Paris was located right at the foot of Montmartre. Every morning, the Sacré-Coeur was the first thing I saw when I looked out of my dorm room window. So of course, it was the first Parisian landmark I visited. I went there with a Chinese girl I'd met at the hostel, because I was still a bit nervous on my first day in Paris.
Going to the Sacré-Coeur was important to me. I'd read so many books that included scenes set in Montmartre and around the cathedral. However, my visit changed from a dream come true to a scary and intimidating experience soon enough. On the way up, I saw the words "the girls are thieves" in French spraypainted on a wall. Most of the graffiti was warning me for pickpockets. About halfway up the hill, a souvenir seller approached us with some bracelets. When I politely declined to buy one and walked past him, he grabbed me by the arm. I yanked my arm from his grip and walked on as if nothing had happened. On the inside, I was shaking though.
When we reached the top of the hill, the Chinese girl and I just wanted to enjoy the view. Instead, we were swarmed by girls with clipboards who wanted to scam us. We ended up fleeing into the Sacré-Coeur after a while. Our way back wasn't much better. We had to make a lot of detours, because the hostile souvenir sellers were literally standing shoulder to shoulder to block stairways and paths.
I loved Montmartre, I loved the Sacré-Coeur, but I didn't feel safe at all.


I love museums. Deep down inside, I'm a bit of a history buff. I also like to include a bit of historical background to my blog posts, and learning about the places I visit is much more fun when I'm actually there, instead of looking things up online. Naturally, I looked up some interesting museums in Paris and ended up looking forward the most to a visit to the Archeological Crypt, which holds the actual ruins of ancient Paris. I'd read online that I could buy a combination ticket for the Crypt and the Catacombs, but when I wanted to buy one at the Catacombs, the lady behind the counter said she'd never heard of such a ticket. I shrugged and thought she was just a French lady being French, ie fed-up with non-English speaking tourists.
After my walk through the Catacombs, I went to the Archeological Crypt, the entrance of which is on the square in front of the Notre Dame. I walked down the stairs - and was greeted by a piece of A4-paper with the word CLOSED on it. Not knowing what to do, I walked up the stairs again, past the police officers who were now keeping an eye on the staircase while holding enormous rifles. I sat down in the middle of the square. Checked, double checked and triple checked the Crypt's website. It was supposed to be open. It said so everywhere. Except for the sign and the locked doors, which told me the place was definitely CLOSED.

This wasn't the only time I was confronted with closed doors. My first attempt at visiting the Pere-Lachaise cemetery failed because of half an inch of snow on the ground. Which was already melting rapidly when I arrived at the cemetery, but it remained closed for the rest of the day. Other cemeteries were also closed, even when the weather was fine.

I was not surprised that I had to let security check my bag at certain Parisian landmarks. After all, a lot of terrorism-related incidents have taken place in the city over the past couple of years. What did surprise me was the extent of these security measurements. I had to walk through metal detectors multiple times and handed my bag over to security guards on a daily basis. I didn't really mind, because it's for my own safety and the weirdest thing I carry around is an unfinished friendship bracelet. But when my camera bag had to be pulled out of my backpack and triple checked, I couldn't help but roll my eyes.


Let me end this post on a light note: We're going to talk about the metro. From the get-go, my plan was to go everywhere by metro. So upon arrival, I went to buy a ticket for 10 rides, which would be a lot cheaper than individual tickets for every ride. Now where I'm from, we have a ticket system similar to the London Oyster card, but ours works nationwide for all forms of public transport. Before that system was put into place, we had tickets that would last for multiple rides. Based on my experiences back home, what with still being in Europe and all, I thought I'd get a ticket that would expire after ten rides. Instead, the machine gave me 10 slips of paper the size of my little finger and I couldn't help but laugh. For the rest of my stay, I had metro tickets flying around every time I took my jacket off, opened my bag or even moved. I looked like a character in a cartoon and it was hilarious.

Long story short, Paris isn't all it's been made out to be. It isn't all bad either, but sometimes it's better to know what's up ahead. I mean, who wants to scramble around on all fours, trying to find all the metro tickets that the wind blew out of your pocket while you were waiting to cross a busy Parisian street? I'm not a fan of pretending that stuff like this doesn't happen just to keep the idealized version of Paris alive in our imagination. That doesn't help anyone going to Paris for the first time. So I've kept it real today and hope this post will help someone, someday.

My blog went silent in March. I posted once in April. Nothing went live in May and June. The biggest reason for that, as I've in my previous post, was my grandma's passing after four weeks in hospital and three weeks in a hospice. That wasn't the only reason though. There were other, more cheerful reasons, such as completing my first year of university. Making friends who kept me entertained with top-tier memes. But most importantly: I spent a lot of time traveling.

Let's go back to February. After visiting Paris, I chose the Dutch city of Dordrecht for my next destination of the Twelve Cities Challenge. I went there by boat on the first sunny day of the year. and explored the city center. In March, I took the train to The Hague and did the same thing there. We did the things a typical tourist should do: we visited a medieval jail and the Binnenhof, where the Dutch government resides. We were good stereotypical tourists.


I never got around to writing about Dordrecht and The Hague, because I had to survive my third block at university. Once finals were over, I got on a plane to Austria. I spent a full day in Vienna, where I watched the marathon and walked along the banks of the Danube in search of street art. The next day, I took a boat down the Danube to Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. Bratislava became city number for out of twelve for the Twelve Cities Challenge, as well as the place where I added another scare to the collection on my knees during a mountain biking trip that one-upped my Lao cycling adventure in terms of bizarreness. It was an awesome trip.

Upon return from Slovakia, I unpacked my bag only to pack it again the next day for a trip to Ireland. I was going to meet up with a friend on the Emerald Isle, but things didn't go as expected. I ended up third-wheeling my way to Cork, then found myself in Belfast with two Slovenian girls whom I met on the day that we left for Northern Ireland. The three days I spent in Belfast flew by, filled with good music, bad ideas and endless shouts of "Oh, me wee legs! I need to rest me wee legs!"


I returned home only to rush to the hospital and visit grandma. Traveling was put on the backburner for a while, but I did manage to visit Ella from Ella Was Here in Ghent. We had a Eurovision viewing party in an Airbnb, I hid under a blanket as the results came in and did the "Mezdi dance" after watching too much Ex On The Beach: Double Dutch. City number five was firmly in the pocket after that weekend.

In June, I visited my only true friend from my college days. We spent the day in Breda, where I kept getting distracted by street art in the alleys branching off the main streets. It was a relaxed, fun day that brought me one step closer to completing the Twelve Cities Challenge.

In all those months, I didn't blog about any of these trips. Not even once. You know what that means: This blog is going on a digital trip all over Europe. Buckle up, it's going to be a weird ass ride full of random nonsense and bad ideas. In other words: Your regular Lost in Translation content will be back soon.

My grandma was hospitalized in early April. My family and I weren't too bothered; Grandma had been hospitalized quite often in the years since her younger brother's death, which pushed her into a state of apathy towards life in general. Yet every time she was hospitalized, she looked Death in the eyes and said: "I don't think so. Not today."

While my grandma was recovering from pneumonia, I traveled to Austria. Slovakia. Ireland, Nothern Ireland, Belgium. While I was in Belfast, my parents were called into the hospital to say goodbye to grandma. But once again, grandma looked Death in the eyes and said: "I don't think so. Not today."

May rolled around. I spent a weekend in Ghent with Ella from Ella Was Here. I woke up in the early hours of Saturday morning, thinking there was something wrong with Grandma. My parents didn't call me though, so that night I watched the Eurovision Songfestival with Ella as if nothing serious was going on back home. Australia's song struck a chord with me. Its lyrics were based on the singer's experience with postpartum depression. "It feels like zero gravity". In the weeks that followed, that line would describe my entire emotional state.

My grandma turned 86 on May 19th. She'd been transferred to a hospice three weeks earlier, her health deteriorating every day. I refused to say goodbye to her on her birthday, although grandma had already made up her mind. "You guys have to clean up well today," she told us, "because I won't be here tomorrow."

The next day, my grandma passed away. She passed away in the town where she was born, on her own terms, on the day she had in mind. And we were left behind. I cried in lectures. I missed seminars. I addressed almost 50 envelopes with mourning cards. I arranged the pictures for the funeral. I wrote a eulogy. I did more to organize the funeral than my family had expected. I floated through the days. It did indeed feel like zero gravity.

Time stood still for me, but moved on swiftly for everyone else. I remember standing next to grandma's coffin, more than 80 pairs of eyes on me as I read the eulogy out loud. I remember my nose starting to drip and tears streaming down my face as I told about grandma singing me songs about horses and saying "So!" when she was proud of me. I remember falling sick after the funeral. I remember breaking down from exhaustion.

Three weeks after the funeral, I was far behind on all my university assignments. Once I'd finished those, I finally had time to cry and mourn. It didn't help much. My grandma and I had a strained relationship. She never truly acknowledged my achievements, instead changed the topic to those of my cousins. I never truly tried to connect with her, because she preferred my cousins anyway, I thought.

Almost all of June was spent in my zero gravity state. I was angry. I tried to forgive my grandma for the way she'd treated me, because I know she was a product of her time. But I spent nights crying and asking an empty room why, just why couldn't she tell me that she was proud of me, that she loved me, that I mattered. Why?

I crashed down to earth after handing in my final university assignment. It signaled the end of the ordeal that started in April. So here I am now, not knowing how to start over again, where to go, or how to deal with all the unresolved issues that grandma left me with. I guess, as always, that this just means I'll continue posting on my blog to escape life. I guess, for now, that that'll do.

It's 2005. I'm nine years old and I love athletics, especially the high jump. Today, it's not going as well as I'd hoped though. I'm doing something wrong, but I have no idea what. My trainers are nowhere to be seen. An older man comes up to me. On his jacket, the logo of athletics club Ilion from Zoetermeer can be seen.
"Try to start your run-up from this point instead," he advises me. I put my marker on the spot he's pointing at. In my next attempt, I jump to a new personal best.
"Well done!" the Ilion trainer says when I tell him I just jumped a new PB. I go on to find my own trainers. When I tell them, I hear that it's "cool, but Kimberly jumped ten centimeters higher".

It's 2008. I'm 11 and my interest has shifted to the long jump. I'm not the best jumper around, but I've improved a lot over the past year. For once, a trainer of mine actually sees me jump at a track meeting. "If you jump over 3.5 meters, I'll buy you ice cream," he says. I'm elated. He's often made this deal with his other pupils. Never before with me. In my next attempt, I fly to 3.52. I never got my ice cream.


In 2009, I meet Lisa in the pouring rain. Like me, she does not have a big group of girls to train with at her club, AV'47 from Boskoop. We become good friends in no time. Soon, I'm dumping my spikes and clothes near her stuff and often sit with the AV'47 group during track meetings. I feel welcome there. I've never felt that way with people from my own club.

2011. At fourteen, I join the training group for older teens. I regret it within a month. Whenever we have to do something in pairs, I'm always the one left alone. Everyone is focused on the shot put and discus, so I'm always doing my long jump exercises by myself. At track meetings, there's no one there to give me advice. No one, except a trainer from AV'47. Sometimes I wish I was a member of that club.

It's now 2013. I've been practicing with the javelin for the biggest track meeting of my season: the heptathlon on my home track. I break the magical barrier of 20 meters that summer. Suddenly, the trainers are very interested in me and my progress.
"You did so well today!", one of them says.
"Thanks," I say crudely, knowing this interest is temporary. At the next track meeting, my javelin falls just short of 20 meters. No one even looks at my final attempt.


Two months later, I twist my ankle while playing soccer at school. I can't run, but I can throw a javelin if I wear my high top sneakers, no problem. When my trainer notices, he says: "What are you even doing here?"

I fall off my bike in 2016. My toenail turns blue and wearing shoes hurts. I start a 3000-meter race anyway, because I love to run. I've given up on jumping, as no one wants to be my trainer. No one wants to train a runner at this club either, so my dad has taken that upon himself. I have to be fair though: there's one trainer who would train me, but my college classes make this impossible. Secretly, I don't mind. I remember the way the group treated me in 2011 and this trainer hasn't even asked what's up with my current injury.
My toe makes me give up on the race after less than 1000 meters. The only person who asks me what's happened is, once again, a trainer from AV'47.

July 2018. I've decided that enough is enough. No one wants to train me, no one wants to train with me, no one respects my decision to stick with running. Why am I still a member of this rotten athletic clubs? Go where you're celebrated, not merely tolerated, right?
I decide to switch clubs in April, so I can run one last 5000-meter race in October, possibly attack my PB. I never run that race, since I'm still recovering from the antibiotics that ravaged my body after my wisdom tooth surgery. Six more months of being a member of a club that won't even acknowledge my existence. I count down to April 1st. I buy a top with the AV'47 logo on it. I fill the forms on their website out. I tell Lisa we'll soon be members of the same club. Mentally, I distance myself from my old club as much as possible over the course of the winter.

Today. April 13th, 2019. I've officially run my first race in my AV'47 jersey. Where, you might ask? On the track of Avantri in Schoonhoven, the club I joined 14 years ago, the club that treated me like shit for 14 years. I took the bronze. It felt like I'd given them the finger. I'm moving forward, away from Avantri's arrogance and cliques, and I'll never look back.

Source

The Charleston Church shooting, US.
Bataclan, Paris, France.
Zaventem, Belgium.
Manchester Arena, UK.
Christchurch, New Zealand.
It's happened often this decade: a brainwashed madman picks up a firearm and shoots people like fish in a barrel. Sometimes it happens close to home, sometimes a bit further away. But it never happens in your city. Right?

On the 18th of March, I get on the bus at 7.39 am. I'm annoyed. I usually catch the 7.22 on Mondays, but the bus drivers are striking and this is only the second bus passing through town today. I'm going to be late for my 9 am lecture at Utrecht University.
After 20 horrible minutes on an overcrowded bus, I get off at the subway station to catch the B-line to the train station. I'll be able to get on a train to Utrecht at 8.15 am. Then I see that the subway personnel is on strike too: the next subway won't leave for another 17 minutes. I think about my options, my two Monday lectures, the 4.5-hour break between them. Then I do something I normally wouldn't do: I turn around and go home.

It never happens in your city. After all, your city doesn't even make the news often. If it does, it's because the local football club is doing well, or because the university has won another award. Sometimes there's an article about chaos at the busy Central Station. Your city is doing quite well. Good things happen there.

"There's been a shooting in Utrecht," mom tells me, her eyes fixed on the screen of her phone. We're having a coffee at the kitchen table. I desperately need it; I've been working non-stop since my failed attempt at going to my morning lecture.
"Oh," I say, not too surprised. I'm used to Rotterdam, where shots are fired every now and then. "Where?"
"24 October Square," mom says as she looks the address up on Google Maps. "Is that close to university?"
"No. Uni is here." I point at the screen. "Quite far away actually."
Mom puts her phone down. "Maybe you should call grandma."
"Why?"
"She'll get worried when she hears about this."
"You think?" I know mom is right. Grandma does worry a lot about me whenever something like this happens. "Okay, I'll give her a call."

When the news breaks, you don't think much of it. Of course it's awful, but your city is still a big city. Shootings sadly happen. You just hope this incident wasn't inspired by Christchurch. More news trickles in. The situation is more serious than it first seemed. The shooter gets away. People are dying in the streets. The T-word gets thrown around: was it an act of terrorism? Do we have a terrorist attack on our hands?

My phone starts going crazy. My grandparents and dad have been called. They were very calm when I told them I was safe at home - that was before news outlets reported that the shooter is still on the loose. Now, everyone is worried. Classmates are checking up on each other in group chats. I get messages from the UK, Belgium, and of course Utrecht. My friends tell me how lucky I am that the strikes kept me from going to university today. Still, I'll have to go there today: I have an assignment to hand in during my afternoon lecture. I don't want to go though. I don't feel safe. I feel sick.
I text a friend who's in lockdown in a university building to tell her that I'll be coming over.
"Like fuck you are," she texts back. "You're staying home. I'll fight them if they penalize you for not handing a hard copy in while there's a shooter on the loose."
She's right. Of course she is. I'm staying home. I send my teacher a quick e-mail explaining the situation. Then I go back to what's most important now: texting everyone who's near and dear to me.

You sit down on the couch, phone in hand, and turn the tv on. You text your family and friends.
"Are you safe?"
"Where are you at?"
"Is there anything I can do for you?"
"Don't worry about me, I'm home."
Some reply immediately. Others, those who don't live or study in your city, bombard you with questions. A few haven't heard the news yet. You put your phone down a million times, only to pick it up the next second in hopes of seeing a reply from that one friend who hasn't answered yet.

Mom's skin is showing red patches. She says I have them too. We don't know what to do with ourselves. I guess we are in shock. We try to understand what's going on in Utrecht, but news comes slowly and half of it turns out to be false within 10 minutes of its being shared. The police are searching for a red Renault Clio. The license plate numbers are shared in a university group chat. The shooter is expected to head towards campus. Utrecht University officially closes its doors.

You slowly lose touch with reality. You're just sitting there on the couch, watching an endless loop of the Prime Minister saying that the situation is unsettling, that he's going to a crisis meeting. You see anti-terror units burst into houses, police officers pulling their weapons near a bank. There's talk of shots fired near mosques, multiple shooters, shouts of Allahuakbar. You just want it to stop. You become numb to the sight of the dead body under a white sheet next to the tram in which it happened. It's vehicle number 5014. You wonder if you'll find yourself on board number 5014 in the near distant future. You wonder what the shooter's motive was. You want to know more. You want to know less. You break.

Just before I can start crying, I get off the couch. One death has been confirmed, there are possibly as many as nine wounded. The city is in lockdown. I've been watching the news for four hours. I can't take it anymore.
"Mom, shall we sow some seeds?"
I just want to do something productive. Something positive. The seeds for our vegetable patch need to be sown anyway.
Mom and I fill tiny pots with soil. The tv is on in the background. We hear that the suspected shooter has been identified, but not found. We focus on our deeds. With every seed I sow, with every new life I plant, I think of the victims of the shooting. This is how I commemorate them.

You try to get away from it. You try to do something else. It doesn't work. You can turn the tv off, but your mind is still there, in the chaos of your city. You look out of the window and fail to understand how everything outside seems so normal. You ignore the news for a while, but you still worry about your friends in lockdown. You try to distract yourself. Nothing works.

At 6 pm I watch the news once more. Nothing has happened, nothing has changed. I see the deserted streets of Utrecht's city center. I hear my university's name. Sadness washes over me again. Then, in the middle of the news bulletin, the reporter is interrupted: the suspect has been arrested!
I sigh with relief until my lungs hurt. My friends can safely go home. We'll finally know what exactly happened.

As I go to sleep on the 18th of March, the suspect's motives are still unclear. Three deaths have been confirmed. I am still in shock. I don't fully understand what's happened, but I soon will. The shooting had characteristics of a terrorist attack, but the nature of the shooting hasn't been confirmed yet. It's a dark, dark say for my city, my people, my country.

It never happens in your city. Until it does.