'In Tarot, the Fool is the card with infinite possibilities. The bag on the staff indicates that he has all he needs to do or be anything he wants, he has only to stop and unpack. He is on his way to a brand new beginning. But the card carries a little bark of warning as well. Stop daydreaming and fantasizing and watch your step, lest you fall and end up looking the fool.'
So there I was, staying for a few days in a youth hostel and wandering around the city I had previously visited just once, 10 months earlier. I wasn`t feeling lonely or lost, but a little confused about my own apparently inexplicable decision to move to a land I had nothing in common with. Humans develop this resistance to change even if they longed for it, expected it or planned it in detail. Humans do not like changes , but somehow they feel change is necessary and fill their lives with small decisions and sometimes major changes. I must be a gipsy at soul, since I never felt I belonged someplace and could adjust pretty much everywhere. I must admit, this ‘citizen of the world’ state of mind always makes things easier for me. Indeed, freedom is comfortable when you are The Fool and everything you own you carry with you. Inside, mostly.
I started to doubt about my decision to change countries when the previous tenants of the apartment I was about to let announced me that it had been some sort of misunderstanding. They were not to leave but two days later than the agreed date. No big deal actually, but it can become a huge deal in this city packed with tourists during the summer. The picture was like this: a goofy woman with a toddler son in an unfamiliar city, without friends and facing the possibility to sleep under the great blue sky for two nights. A sky like this:
I went back to the hotel praying that someone canceled its reservation. Bad news. The blond lady at the reception informed me shortly that it was impossible to stay for two more nights: ‘We are packet’ she said. Somehow fascinated of her cold beauty and her British-flight-attendant English, I insisted: ‘Maybe you can still find a room’. She glanced at me for a second and decided to be professional, in spite of the irritation I obviously caused her: ‘I can check one more time’. This ‘one more time’ lasted maybe for 20 seconds but felt like a plain fat smelly hour to me. With a steady voice as if announcing that we are approaching our final destination and sit belts must be bucked up, my flight attendant said: ‘Unbelievable, someone just canceled its reservation 10 seconds ago, so yes, you can stay for two more nights’. My heart almost burst with joy. I am so honored to receive this room, I must thank ProfilHotels chain, my parents, my friends and everyone who supported me in this endeavor. I am proud to be the chosen one who sleeps for two more nights in this shitty hotel, in room 212.
‘Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?’ asked Glinda, the Good Witch of the North.
‘I'm not a witch at all. I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas.’
But as you all know, Dorothy was wearing the witchy shoes. I kind of felt like her on that day, except my Converse trainers and the lack of the yellow path which is usually a good indication that you are heading to the Great City of Oz. So I headed to the Central Station.
I`ve always liked trains and train stations. When I was about two, my grandfather was taking me to the train station, spending there hours and hours looking at the trains coming and going. I can still remember and feel the same excitement and trill when a train approaches the stopping point. Trains are magic. So are planes, but that was a later discovery in my life, since most of the people never traveled by plane during the ‘70s in Romania. I always lived close by a train station. My grandparents were living just opposite the Central Station, my parents were living in a different town close by the train station, later on I bought an apartment from where I could hear the trains coming and going to and from Bucharest North Station. It wasn`t a choice, it was a sign. Central Stations from all over the world are my home, so I headed to the Uppsala Central Station on that turbulent day.
The sign I previously ignored was there. It reads: ‘Welcome here. Welcome home’.
