July
2006
Friends I knew ; friends I’ll never know
I’ve met recently two of the girls I called “best friend” in a portion of my past. One encounter was two weeks ago; the other was yesterday.
The one I’ve met yesterday is called Horiana. She was in the same class as I was from first grade to 7th. We shared the schoolbench, and exchanged countless lunches, books and ideas . She was just as big of a bookworm as I was and God only knows how many of one’s books ended up on the other’s shelves . We had conversation booklets in which we wrote during school hours so that the teachers couldn’t punish us for talking. She was the one that saved me when my mom forbade me to bring books to school, since “Comrade Bintintan” (the teacher) was exasperated by the fact that I was reading during classes. Poor mom looked into my bag in the morning - there was no book. She looked into it when I came home - still no book - yet my reading continued. The explanation? Simple. Horiana carried her books for me to read to and from school. Neither mom or the teacher discovered the sistem, so they had to give up after a while. We were both skinny, gifted and apparently serious. After my leave from Cugir we wrote each other long letters, full of allusions and witty word plays.
The other was Ana . I’ve met her near the end of my 7th grade, a few months before moving out of town. She was my hopeless love’s classmate (a diabetic genius asshole called Bogdan, who mocked my poor 13 years old feelings without remorse - I still have nightmares sometimes about being a 7th grader). She played tennis a lot, spoke english fluently and looked beautiful in my eyes. I unconsciously took her as a model - listened to the same music, immitated her clothing style and later fell for her boyfriend. To my defense, neither of them found out about the last part - and when they broke up later I sincerely wished them to be together again. You see, I think I only loved him because she loved him and he played the guitar beautifully, not because I wanted to be with him. I was left with a lifelong liking for long-haired guys, accoustic guitar and Mircea Eliade. We grew apart when she finished highschool, as far as I remember.
The feeling I had while talking with both Horiana and Ana was pretty close to the one you have when you meet an ex-boyfriend you didn’t “stay friends” with - a mixture of unease, slight embarrasment and just a wee bit of sadness. I shared everything with them at a time. I don’t have common conversation subjects with them now. In a way, we outgrew each other - the friend they had is not me, the woman I am now, nor are they the girls I loved during growing years. Horiana is preparing to leave the country for England; Ana looks tired and worried and I couldn’t bring myself to ask if the reason was her dissapeared dad, her kid, her husband or her job. You see, we just didn’t knew each other that well now.
The friend I’ll never get to know is called Kinga.
She was one of the pillars of Hospitality Club, embodying everything HC stands for - free spirit, love for travels, kindness and hospitality. A delicate-looking yet strong polish woman in her thirties, she traveled four continents and wrote two books when she decided to go to Africa. She kept a travel blog of her itinerary which I visited sometimes because I liked her writing and perspective. I forgot about the site for a while and stumbled upon it in my bookmarks yesterday. However, when I saw her site’s frontpage, I learned that her journeys have ended before we had a chance to meet in real life. Kinga died a month ago from cerebral malaria she caught while being in Ghana.
Go read her site. You’ll catch a glimpse of a life lived to the fullest.
That’s very sad.
How is Europe w/ making sure that you’ve been vaccinated before you leave for 3rd world countries?
I know that I had to jump through hoops w/ vaccinations to go to India, and I had to take Malaria pills every day.
That’s just horrible. It seemed to be so fast.
I have no idea. A weaker dose of vaccine, a missed pill ..who knows.
You explain what its like to catch up with old ‘best friends’ perfectly. Last year my best friend from my teenage years came to visit me after not seeing eachother for 15 years. She stayed with me and my family which I was nervous about but excited none the less. What came through from the visit was how much we had moved on. She had travelled all the way from Europe to Australia to see me and all I felt was flat. I tried so hard to be as friendly as possible and hide my inner angst (guilt - how could I not be grateful for her travelling all this way etc.)that I it only compounded my disappointment.
What a blow about your friend.
Well, I was planning on ‘not commenting on any more posts’ today, but I did have to thank you for the Kinga link. I skimmed around a bit and saved it for later, because it looks like very interesting content.