Revisiting Strasbourg

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The nostalgia of revisiting Strasbourg

Strasbourg, 10-26 May



Seeing Strasbourg again over six years since I first arrived in 2007 was an intensely emotional and nostalgic experience.



We stayed with JB’s parents in Colmar for a few days after Paris and by then I was itching to see Strasbourg again. The second we dropped our bags at JB’s sister’s place in Neudorf, just north of Strasbourg, we were out the door ready to see the city. It was only about a 30 minute walk, and despite having a tram stop directly downstairs I wanted to experience walking back into the centre the way I always used to.



I was excited because I couldn’t wait to see my old place, to walk down those familiar streets, to revisit bars and cafes where I spent my time in 2007 . What I wasn’t prepared for was the giant lump that appeared in my throat the second I saw the tip of the cathedral pointing out from a distance.



As we got closer to the centre of town, my throat closed tighter and tears started welling up in my eyes. Walking through Place d’Austerlitz, crossing Pont Corbeau and finally standing in front of my old apartment where I spent one of the happiest years of my life. By that time tears were streaming down my face and I could barely speak. I didn’t know if I was happy or sad or what I was, I was just completely overcome with emotion.



It was the strangest experience. Walking through those cobblestone streets filled with so many memories transported me back to 2007. It wasn’t as if I was in 2013 revisiting Strasbourg, it was if I had stepped into a time machine and was standing there in 2007. I felt the thrill of discovering the city for the first time and the amazement of knowing I’d be there for a year, as if I was right back there on the first day I arrived all those years ago. But at the same time all the memories of the year that passed were flashing through my head at a speed, memory upon memory upon memory all flowing back at once. It was like reliving an entire year every moment I walked through the city, every second I stood there looking at my apartment.



And at the same time I felt all the happiness and excitement and remembered the amazing memories, I also felt sad. Sad that I’d left and it was all over, sad that I couldn’t actually go upstairs to my apartment and sit on my lovely red and white bed. Sad that all those memories were in the past and even though I felt so strongly that Laura still was just around the corner and we could go and have coffee, she actually wasn’t. Time had moved on and even though it looked and smelt like the Strasbourg I knew and loved, it was different now.



It really was a beautifully nostalgic moment. And every time we went somewhere new during our stay, I felt those feelings again. Not as intense as the first time but they were there, every time I revisited a new place.



I guess I don’t really have anywhere else I can compare to Strasbourg. Nowhere that would make me feel like that. Moving from Adelaide to Sydney was one thing, but revisiting Adelaide brings back a lifetime of memories. Good and bad. My year in Strasbourg was about as perfectly positive as a year in one’s lifetime could be. I have only good memories from there, all condensed into one little bubble. It almost feels like revisiting it has taken away from its perfection, because now I’ve created new memories from another time, and it’s almost tarnished the pureness of those first memories because now I have to make way for new ones.



But at the end of the day, I know I’ll come to Strasbourg many more times in my lifetime so I can’t see it like that. I just need to make sure my memories of Strasbourg in 2007 remains intact and untouched. Perfect.

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