A while ago, I read an article on some kind of semi-dubious internet site introducing a study on the latest posts of all WordPress blogs out there (at least, that’s what I remember the article being about). Interestingly enough, two thirds of all the blogs out there had their latest post starting with “Sorry I haven’t posted in a while”. I immediately swore to myself that I would never start I post like that. If only to not appear in this kind of statistics. But well, sometimes, life simply gets in the way of writing and creativity — and I am indeed sorry that I was not able to stick to my writing routine lately.

My last few weeks have been filled with endless apartment interviews, then finally with moving, and starting my new job. I’m overwhelmed with the responsibilities of the new job, I’m overwhelmed with the opportunities of living in a new city. So many things to do, so much stuff to organize, so much to learn, to understand, to get to know.

I thought a lot about how I should justify my move in Germany on this blog — after all, Sateless Suitcase is supposed to be a travel blog. At least, it started out as a blog about travel. However, I know that I won’t be a permanent traveler anytime soon, and I find myself writing more and more about the everyday struggles of a recent grad school alumna searching for her place in the world.

Obviously, travel will always be one of the best ways to find answers, and ultimately, to find myself. But does this still legitimate writing a travel blog? Especially if I just moved to a small, pretty much entirely un-touristy town in Germany to work a real (albeit not a 9 to 5 office) job?

To finally spill the beans: I moved to Göttingen, a famous university city in the German state of Lower Saxony. It’s not a big city with only 116,000 inhabitants, but it has a long history dating back to the Middle Ages and a massive university founded in 1734. One fifth of the city’s inhabitants are students and the whole city is buzzing with intellectual, academic energy. Göttingen has one of Germany’s largest libraries and a big foreign exchange student scene. Also, I have never seen that many book stores and bikes in any other city before.

Oh, and Göttingen has excellent train international train connections and Hannover airport is not too far away. It looks like Göttingen is a city I could fall in love with.

Of course, I can’t promise I’ll stay in Göttingen for good. I can’t promise I will ever use the term “home” for it, or that this feeling of constant restlessness inside me will ever decease. But for now, moving to Göttingen was the challenge I needed: Starting over from the start, working harder than ever, learning something new every day. I have a feeling that this was good for me.

Have you heard of Göttingen?

PS: All photos in this post are instagrams I took in Göttingen during the last weeks. You can find me on instagram as JulikaSarah.