A new beginning

Every arrival is followed by a departure, every road comes to an end, each dawn is followed by a sunset and every welcome is followed by a farewell.

The time has finally come for me to gather my belongings and prepare to move to another place and head in a different direction.

When I first arrived in Greece, I did not expect to stay for so many years; years filled with difficulties but also many delights, years that left enough marks on me to strengthen me mentally and enrich my experience. This experience helped me realise that with effort, patience and self-assurance, success is always possible.

The birth of this newspaper is one example. When we started, we couldn’t possibly have imagined how successful we would be.

When I first settled in Greece I faced many hardships, but instead of trying to adapt and tackle them, all my thoughts were focused on finding an escape route. This attitude made my life even more disagreeable.

It took a while for me to pull myself together and abandon this desire to flee. I became braver, which helped my quality of life as well as many other things.

I met a lot of people and I made friends, some of which are now my favourite people in the world. 

Yet, now the time has come to abandon this place and those people and move in a different direction. To continue the journey that began on the most treacherous paths imaginable. Had I known then, when I first set off, that I would end up here where I am now, I would have been unbelievably happy. Things are not as they were. I now have feelings for this city and for its people and my “goodbye” is proving rather difficult.

I have packed both good and bad memories in my suitcase. Those memories were created during the best years of my life, where people who had the greatest influence on me played the biggest part.

Life is but a crossing. We all need to try our best to overcome any obstacles in our way, both the easy and the difficult ones, even if this means, as in my case, abandoning a country, loved ones and memories. One thing we should never do is cease trying.

I wish to end by saluting Greece and its people.