By Fabrice, France I do not hesitate much before asking a question. But direct does not mean rude. There are rules, and the first one is respect. When Janita asked me about the things we hesitate to ask, there was already a problem. I do not hesitate very much. The Mayor had warned her before…
Babette’s family holiday has not started yet, but the adventure already has: expired passports, four-train journeys, three essential blankets and the promise of a piña colada beside the pool. There are 18 days until Babette goes to Egypt. Not approximately 18 days. Babette has done the calculation properly. She knows the days, the hours and…
Ralf has bought the mobile home, Manfred has twenty years of camping behind him, and Martin is beginning to wonder whether he should start playing the lottery. Ralf and his wife have bought a mobile home. Not because they want to park it somewhere and create a smaller version of the life they already have,…
Four weeks in Bangalore. Four weeks in Campo Grande. The real question was not what to see, but how to live in somebody else’s world. Imagine that Ritesh and his wife leave Bangalore and spend a month in Ismar’s apartment in Campo Grande, Brazil. At the same time, Ismar moves into their apartment in Bangalore,…
Sometimes the biggest changes in our lives begin with something surprisingly ordinary: asking, “Why do we do it this way?” Curiosity is often described as something children have in abundance, but I think adults need it just as much. In everyday life we become used to routines. We work, cook, clean, organise our homes, help…
Curiosity often begins with a passport, but it doesn’t always need one. Sometimes a new world is only a conversation away. The conversation began, as many good conversations do, with the weather. Monica described a chilly Australian morning, Fruitloop laughed about frozen toes after South Africa swung from two degrees to twenty-two in just a…
At two o’clock in the morning, the music stopped at the Crémant Festival in Cleebourg. For many people, that was probably the end of the evening. At a village festival, around a fireplace and over thirty apple trees, Fabrice discovers that curiosity depends not only on the question, but also on who is asking it….
An Anti-Handbook for receiving instant answers without becoming an idiot. By Martin Imagine that the government creates an Emergency Question Department. Before citizens may ask anything, they must prove that they have already thought about it for at least thirty seconds. I believe this could improve society. Unfortunately, the longer queues would become the first…
I have always believed there is a line between being interested in another person and entering a part of their life that does not belong to you. Then I started dancing, met new people and discovered that sometimes curiosity opens a door rather than crosses a boundary. By Ismar When I was a child, my…
At 65, I am not sure that I will become a good dancer. But after spending a great deal of time alone, ballroom dancing has brought new people, movement and fun into my life. By Ismar My sixty-fifth birthday contained two surprises. At lunchtime, I went to a restaurant with my mother, my aunt and…
