A Self-Fulfilling Prophetrip

I was having a virtual catch up session with my college friends on a late April night when I mindlessly said that I really wanted to travel to Europe. The world has been slowly entering an endemic, so I thought I could have my annual overseas holiday again anytime soon, though I wasn't quite sure if it was already safe enough or not, and who the heck would be willing to accompany me anyway.

Until I realised that Amindari aka Cici was still in the Netherlands to pursue her master's degree -- in fact she's still there now that I'm publishing this story. Not to mention a couple of lecturers back from my uni days currently having their doctoral studies, and a few colleagues who just moved to work there. Solo travel to Europe suddenly felt highly possible. And so I bought flight tickets to Amsterdam a week after to depart in two months, with a mindset that I did this to mainly visit friends. 

Without me knowing, this would become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I arrived in Amsterdam after a 16 hours flight. No jet lag whatsoever. Felt surprisingly calm, but I guess it was because I was still processing the fact that I was in Europe. It turned out that I was so unconsciously enthusiastic to explore the city; I walked around 3km to Rijksmuseum the moment I stepped out of the central station.

Then I (stressfully) walked around 2km the next day from Amsterdam Oud-West to Prinsengracht to catch my museum schedule.

Another 2km to Paleisstraat and back to catch the tram..

Additional 3km the following day to/from Kasteel de Haar, from/to its nearest bus stop..

Not to mention all the walks I did inside the museums, parks, and train stations on my first 3 days there.

The next thing I knew, my right foot was swollen so bad. I wasn't able to walk properly because my ankle hurt like hell. I could practically just throw my sneakers out of the window because they did not fit anymore.

This changed many things. I was supposed to stroll around Utrecht after my visit to the castle, take my sweet time in the Louvre, visit Arc de Triomphe and Montmartre, and spend a full day in Antwerp. Instead, I went straight home and skipped seeing Utrecht's canals, cut short my Parisian itinerary, and cancelled my Antwerpen trip. Antwerp was only 30 mins away by train from Tilburg, a town in the south Netherlands where I crashed on Cici's apartment almost the entirety of my trip. Given my situation, it was so close, yet so far.

Of all things that could happen in a trip, I did not think that swollen feet would be the one disrupting my journey. I brought various medicine from home but not a freaking Counterpain or Thrombophob. I mean.. swollen feet.. is so grandma lol. No wonder my friends call me Nene. I was pretty chill at first because the whole situation felt hilarious, only to realise that I got sadder and sadder as time passed by, since it became so clear that I was missing so much. I could have seen and explored more of Europe. We middle class Indonesians do not visit this continent every day.

On the day I was supposed to travel to Antwerp, Cici and I spent our morning chilling in the apartment. We talked a lot: about life, loneliness, and happiness. About that indescribable "stronger connection" that we somehow feel when we converse with people with similar psychology background. About those times when we wanted more, or longed for something we normally had, but couldn't.

That very moment, I remembered what my father always said to me. God always gives us (and will always give us) enough. Insya Allah, apa yang dibutuhkan, Allah akan cukupkan.

When I looked back at how my trip progressed.. I actually got all the essentials: Anne Frank Huis, Kasteel de Haar, seeing Monet's water lilies in Musee de l'Orangerie..

And the most important thing, I met my friends.. 

It was exactly the main reason I went to Europe in the first place; the same reason that I officially used in my visa application. So far, up until that sunny afternoon in Cici's studio, it was a mission accomplished. I had such a good time catching up with everyone, naturally moving from one topic to the next over various meals.. They were enough.

Cici and I continued our day riding bicycles around town, doing some shopping in Westermarkt and Centrum, then having an impromptu picnic by the lake. Come to think of it, I did not want to visit Belgium that much; I wasn't even sure what to see there when I created my travel itinerary. Antwerp was just randomly squeezed in to fill some gaps. I had seen Brussels and Antwerp on my way back from Paris anyway.

Not gonna deny that Antwerpen Centraal is EXQUISITE. Praise Europe and its architecture. My biggest regret was for not taking its picture from inside the bus.

We went to Maastricht the following day to visit Mba Nunu. All of a sudden I was in a Citroen hatchback heading to Drielandenpunt 😂 Mba Nunu and her family brought me there to make up for missing Antwerp. And folks, that was how I had technically visited Germany as well. 

My European trip ended up being uniquely special, rather funny even. It was an unconscious expectation coming true -- an objective fulfilling itself. It was to visit friends, and it was enough.

Extra story: Even the process of going home was just enough, too: just enough time to breathe before boarding my plane in the crowded and understaffed Schiphol airport, and just enough time to catch my connecting flight in Istanbul because the departure from Amsterdam was delayed for 1.5 hours, which were almost all the time I had to make a peaceful transfer. This trip really kept self-fulfilling its prophecy till the very end.