Time to say goodbye

Time to say goodbye to Jan

And the day arrived when Diplom-Ingenier Herr Jan Trautmann M.Sc., arrived for us to say goodbye to each other. And it came to pass yesterday!

He looked better than I thought given a series of all night parties taking leave of all his many friends in and around Berlin. I noticed he drank only tea – in fact two teapots full which says a lot about his condition, but he managed a couple of cakes with the relaxing liquid. See the photo.

It was great to see him and catch up on events in Rhode Island after I left, then his adventures in Spain, Prague and Hungary. He is flying to the north of Spain tomorrow where Arancha will meet him and they will live together in a flat owned by her parents. He has booked a Spanish course already and has contact to a large company for a job on a local highway project.

He will be okay for he just needs to fuse theory and practice in a successful career as a civil engineer. I value our short time together yesterday and am not worried about the future. We have computers and e-mail and skype and telephones so lots of means of contact even if not face to face in the immediate future.