The Right Words

by Garima Behal (India)

Making a local connection Germany

“Use German! German always has the right words.” Braving the Indian Summer of 2019 with a glass of cool lemonade, I was intrigued by the comment left by a stranger on my Instagram post. German is the language of poets and thinkers. It is the language that took my incredible longing for new places and people and gave it beautiful, wistful names like Wanderlust, Fernweh and Sehnsucht; the language that quite literally opened the doors of the world to me, enabling me to bag an all-expense paid study abroad semester including an internship in Munich, Germany. So, I concurred with the stranger, liked her comment and replied, “Yes! I know.” What I did not, could not know at that time, however, was that German would also be the reason I’d meet this Instagram stranger 6,212 kilometres away from my home – in Cologne, in a city I had wanted to see since I was 10, right next to an 800-year old cathedral and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, on the banks of the mighty Rhine – and begin calling her my friend. After replying to her comment, I texted her, asking her if she was a native German. Of course, she was! As a keen enthusiast and learner of the language, I had found someone to trouble with my difficult questions – the accusative and the dative cases; reasons why synonyms were, in certain contexts, anything but; and an explanation for why German behaved so predictably one moment and equally erratically the next! In return, I became her English tandem partner. Come autumn, I received a scholarship to pursue a fortnightly advanced language course in south-western Germany. On a whim, I asked her if she would like to meet me on a layover, near her town. And to my utter joy, she said yes! Days passed and the night arrived quickly enough. But her train was late by 15 minutes. Soon, I saw that she had posted a story, announcing her late arrival and her excitement, and had tagged my handle. I smiled. I, myself, find it hard to believe we hadn’t exchanged numbers. Hadn’t needed to. We were just two strangers, who happened to be so fascinated by their respective second languages, that they trusted one another to keep an appointment made over Instagram. “Where are you?” I replied to her story. “Right outside the station, in front of the cathedral,” she texted back immediately. I suddenly realised that there wasn’t a single picture of herself on her Instagram profile. How would I recognise her in the thickening crowd around the cathedral? “Uh-huh, could you come to the Information Centre close to the exits? I’ve never seen you!” I messaged and waited. I was a little anxious. What if she wasn’t actually who she claimed to be – a soul sister of sorts, only a few years my junior? A moment later, however, the anxiety vanished. I saw a tall, lean girl come over to the booth and look in my general direction with a tentative yet warm smile. She would have seen my picture, I concluded! I went ahead. “Anna?” I asked. “Jaaaa!” she affirmed and lifted me, my backpack in tow, into her arms. “You’re so tiny!” she exclaimed and I could glimpse the combination of childlike wonder, amusement and happiness in her glittering eyes, when she, after a lot of embarrassed insistence from my shy Indian self, put me down! With two hours to kill before my train came in at midnight, we headed to the in-station McDonald’s and ordered two steaming cups of hot chocolate. The minutes flew by. The tables around us emptied. The shops outside began closing down for the day. The lights in the houses began dimming. Yet, our conversation flowed. University and grades. Words and silences. Love. Poetry and window seats. We talked about everything. And then, sadly, it was time to go. As a poet, she hoped I’d leave her with some words. Here’s what I wrote for her: But, if fate treats us well, then, we will meet again. Somewhere, someday, when the timing is finally right. After all, in German, there are no goodbyes. Only Auf Wiedersehen (till we meet again).