Let’s do it the Cuban way: grab a cup of café con leche and sink into this beautiful, heartfelt, and reflective memoir—a journey through Havana, memory, and identity. The book is a loose travelogue, organized more by themes than by timeline. We move in and out of Havana alongside Barbara’s journey in January 2017, walking …
“Me and the horn are history.” After one disastrous concert, Cate made that decision. She walked away from the horn and reinvented herself as an English teacher. For ten years, her life was ruled by trauma. Instead of facing it, she spent those years in denial, chasing pleasure, traveling the world, partying in Italy, skiing, …
“Now she’s here, on this balcony: ‘It was the flowering season of the year.’ Buenos Aires in September. Everything is repeated and out of place at the same time.” – Clara Obligado The book begins with a spiral conch shell, the middle of the ring expanding outward through the stories. As Rainer Maria Rilke wrote: …
Do you know where butterflies go in the fall? The monarch butterflies are heading from Canada and the U.S. to Mexico right now for wintering. To be exact, they long to rest at their home – the oyamel trees in the Sierra Madre mountains. After making their 3,000-mile journey, they discover that their habitat in …
“How easily we forget – we in the business of storytelling – that life was the point all along.” – Amor Towles, The Lincoln Highway With The Lincoln Highway, Amor Towles did what he preached in the art of storytelling. As though this book could read my mind, put my feelings into words, and understand …
“… most of my life I have found myself standing alone, fighting for my corner. Thankfully I have had the resilience and determination to stand by my beliefs, and now I also have Lance as my wingman, supporting me, as he promised when we got married.”– Ruth Shaw, Three Wee Bookshops at the End of …
“Lange lieb’ ich dich schon…” — Friedrich Hölderlin “I have loved you for a long time…” wrote Hölderlin in his poem Heidelberg. But how long is a long time? How about twenty years? It was in 2005 when I first visited this enchanting, romantic city with my sister. We were tourists then, right before I …
The concert at Aula der Alten Universitt Heidelberg at 19:30 was the 100th anniversary commemoration of the singer Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. A significant figure who contributed greatly to the cultural landscape after the war, especially in the German cultural heritage of Kunstlied (Art Song). His last pupil, Benjamin Appl, curated the programme using Fischer-Dieskaus biography as …
In five minutes, the train was supposed to arrive at its destination. Suddenly, an emergency occurred, resulting in at least an hour of delay. This real-life travel experience mirrors my current life situation—filled with pauses and unexpected turns. The Malaysian embassy in Germany once told me, “Please be patient, your new passport is coming.” I …
How long does it take to get back into the rhythm of your life after travelling? This time, it took me three weeks. I changed the light bulb, swept away the fallen leaves on the path, at last, my laundry mountain piles has gone, I know where the forks and knifes are placed again, bedsheet …