Departure Diaries: Echoes of Friendship and Farewells in Erasmus

1) Newsletter - Today's Erasmus Wednesday Bar

Hello Stars,

There is luggage that needs to be packed. Goodbyes need to be said. Friends are leaving. All the new faces. I know all of that. There are dozens of reasons for not being here today.

But if you can show up once, Show it up today. Show it up now. Show it up for yourself.

Why does Wednesday Erasmus Bar exist in the first place?

We are not strangers. We don't party with everyone. We do parties with those who believe in what we believe. We believe in the values of Friendships. In the times of jingoism rising, we stars are here with a purpose. We have to shine brightly to spread the light of humanity. The spark of friendship within you will slay the dragons of homophobia, xenophobia, and jingoism.

Warrior or a victim? Your choices now will decide the future of the world. If you can show it up once, show it up now. Show it up to make new friends and take your inner light to form new constellations. Don't let it become just another meetup happening somewhere. Show it up for yourself. It's on you. The choice is yours.

We are not strangers

Your's Abhinav.....Abhi

2) Topic - Last Newsletter

Time to read - 3 minutes

Hello Stars,

This letter is for all the Erasmus people and their friends from 2019 to 2022 and beyond-

I started writing this newsletter during the corona pandemic.

You inspired me. Because of you, I survived and thrived.

I love you all.

You are Berlin to me. I had seen Berlin through your eyes. Every time you go it hurts. A void remains in my heart that I will never see you again. Without you, there is no Berlin. You are the streets, forests, museums, and lakes. You created a Berlin for me and I found my first friends. You show me a kind of Berlin that I had never known before.

Now the time has come to say goodbye. I am not going anywhere. I will be in Berlin. I will keep on loving you all. I will be there at events. We learned a lot from each other. I have nothing new to offer. We have outgrown ourselves and become a better version.

When we became friends with Erasmus, people asked me:- Why become friends with people who are going to stay for 3 months? We transgressed the boundaries of the time limit. The group stays alive way longer than Erasmus standards. New leadership is grown to organize the events and will do that better than previous leaders. We partied in forests. We created the dorms as a party hub.

MOST OF ALL WE REMEMBER:-

“Party is a state of mind and we created the vibe of togetherness. We partied with those who believe in what we believe. We partied with belief that everyone needs to be treated as a human, however small their stay on earth is. That’s how we rock.”

Our parties are not just another meetup or club party. Through our effort, we had achieved a group of friends. Party is a state of mind. one can be alone with hundreds of people or can find the whole world in a bunch of people. So keep on creating the state of mind where no one is treated as an object. It is better to talk and negotiate than to dream different dreams in bed. So keep going.

Now new challenges are waiting for us. I wanted to focus my energy on new challenges. We will come together, somewhere, sometime to illuminate the parts of the world. I called you stars because we met in the astral bars, partied in Alle der cosmonaut, and will form our galaxies soon to illuminate the darkness. You have risen up to the challenge. Showed me the mirror of my flaws and made me a better human being. You become leaders.

In 2010 I helped to create the first group of leaders. I published my first newsletter as Current times in India. After that, I started the TU Berlin Mobility club for creating new leaders. I always leave a legacy from where I left. This time I am not leaving a tangible legacy but an intangible one. I hope, I inspired you enough to tackle the challenges of the future. Thanks for taking up a stand against me. If we don’t fight, how are we going to master the things that we learned? I left the group some time ago because there is always a time to leave, even when there is no place to go.

Thanks for loving me. I love you all. It is love because we strive to become better than we are. You will find me smiling and loving you when you meet me again. The things that could be and not - Are gone with the winds. It is not about hope for the future. It is about recreating the past. Now I have to move on to a new challenge, a new Cinderella, maybe back to India. Whatever is it, I am ready.

I Love you all. As in that great movie Casablanca, " We will always have Berlin". I see you walking on the streets, on the trains, and in my life because in Berlin I saw you. I will make it a better place to come. Now I have to focus on new challenges.

(Movie- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC_kfwa5-kg )

Recreate your past, and shape your future while you remain foolish and Hungry. I will end again with the Casablanca dialogue - It is the start of a beautiful friendship.

Bis Ciao

("Till we say hello again")

Thanks for reading

Abhinav

Ciao Means hello and Bye in Italian.

"Bis Ciao" here means till we say hello again. We met through the words that I had written.