I grew up in Cleebourg, a small village in Alsace. Maybe there were 700 people. For some people, this is very small. For me, it was home. But when I was already five, six, seven years old, I had something in my head. I wanted to see the world. At school, my favourite subjects were…
The conversation began with a very Sarah-style emergency: a forgotten laptop, a long weekend, and the calm reassurance that everything was safely locked away at school. But very quickly, the real headline arrived. Sarah had received her marks, and the results were worth celebrating. A 13 in math felt especially satisfying because, according to Sarah,…
In Babette’s house in Germany, the day began with a very special guest: birthday girl Hannah. Janita, joining from South Africa, started the conversation with a cheerful birthday song, and suddenly the lesson felt more like a party than an English conversation. There was excitement in the air, because Hannah had a busy birthday plan…
It was supposed to be a table for four. Instead, today’s Lunch became a beta lunch for two: the Mayor, Frank, standing bravely alone at the table like “a roast pork on a spit,” and Fruitloop, Janita, armed with questions, laughter, and absolutely no mercy. Rosii overslept after her phone ran out of battery, Natalie…
The sun was shining that morning, but it was not warm. That is how the conversation began. The Mayor asked me if the birds were singing in my world, and I said yes, they were singing, but it was windy, and we only had five degrees. He told me he had ten. It was a…
She came back from holiday and the work was waiting for her. Not politely waiting. Not in a small pile. It was sitting there heavily, already late, already complicated. The banking system had not worked properly the week before, and now it was only just starting to behave again. Since yesterday, it was better for…
There’s something cinematic about catching someone in the middle of a life transition—half-packed bags, a friends couch, and a future that’s equal parts thrilling and terrifying. When Fruitloop (Janita) checks in with Maxime, she finds him not in a tidy apartment, but in the in-between: crashing at a friend’s place, waiting for a final inspection,…
There are many elegant stories about first jobs. Stories about ambition.Stories about discipline.Stories about a young person stepping confidently into the world of work, ready to learn, grow, and become a productive member of society. This is not one of those stories. This is the story of two men who entered working life in very…
It begins, as these things often do, with an image. Not an abstract idea of “a farm,” but two very specific landscapes—two childhood worlds that happen to share the same word, and almost nothing else. If you arrived at Ismar’s farm in Brazil, you would first notice the house. A wooden structure, painted yellow, standing…
I remember that morning quite well, sitting there and talking with The Mayor. He had this question in his head—how to make work more fun—and I could already feel where this was going. I told him straight away, “Sometimes difficult… better we leave that topic.” We both laughed. But in general, yes… in general, it…
