One might think that my return to Hawaii, after weeks in the South Pacific, would have felt like a grand finale. A beautiful last chapter. A soft landing back into the world of leis, aloha, palm trees, and Tom Selleck-style shirts. Well… not exactly. My return to Hawaii began with an immigration officer. Not a …
It has been two months since my mother passed away. Two months sounds like a long time, but grief doesn’t follow a calendar. During the day, I am mostly okay. I keep myself busy. I do what needs doing. I write, I remember, I move from one task to the next. But when the day …
Another night flight. This time from Rarotonga to Fiji. On the evening of May 17, 1995, I left the Cook Islands and flew west across the Pacific. The flight itself was not very long, maybe around four hours, but something very strange happened on the way. I lost a whole day. Not emotionally. Officially. Because …
After leaving Moorea, I was still emotionally somewhere between paradise and heartbreak. From the window of the plane, I had watched the island slowly disappear on the horizon, and I had already made my promise: I would come back. The addiction had started. The German man from Fiji had been right. But the South Pacific …
The German man from Fiji had warned me. “Moorea is beautiful, Andi. But be careful. It can make you addicted.” When he said that on the phone in Germany, I smiled. It sounded nice, of course. A good sentence for a travel brochure. But after my first morning on Moorea, after the salty catamaran crossing …
I already told you about that famous Hawaii shirt I bought in Hawaii in March 1993, the one from the Tom Selleck Collection. Back in Munich, this became my newest fashion trend. Maybe “trend” is a bit optimistic, because I was actually the only person following it, but every great movement has to start with …
“Travel makes you speechless, then it turns you into a storyteller.” ― Ibn Battuta Travel Makes You Speechless — Then Annoying at Dinner Parties This quote of the day is painfully true. Travel has a funny way of first shutting you up completely — and later making it almost impossible for you to stop talking. At …
“If we were meant to stay in one place, we would have roots instead of feet.” ― Rachel Wolchin Thoughts about the Quote Of The Day That quote feels like it was written for everyone who has ever looked at a map and thought, “Hmm, maybe just one more trip.” It is the perfect justification for …
My 1993 trip to Hawaii did something dangerous to me. It did not calm my travel fever. It made it worse. Hawaii had opened a door, and behind that door was the South Pacific — that endless blue world I had dreamed about since childhood. Suddenly, all those old images came back to me: the …
There are photos from our younger years that do not only show how we looked. They also show who we were trying to become. This one is such a photo. There I am, standing on the rocks somewhere on Oahu in March 1993, surrounded by the Pacific Ocean, wearing shorts, flip-flops, sunglasses, a hat, a …