A personal journal
Essays and field notes on life between cultures — food, language, family, and the small daily negotiations of a cross-cultural marriage.
Latest essay · Dialogues
The kitchen is quiet at last. I am still in my jacket, sitting at the table, while my wife pours a final cup of tea. Sixty people, one foreigner, and I spent four hours auditing myself.
October 2026 · 3 min read
I was doing the dishes, half-listening to a German psychology podcast, when one word made me stop scrubbing: flourishing.
26 August 2026 · 7 min read
My wife looks at me across the kitchen table, chopsticks suspended mid-air, her expression somewhere between curiosity and gentle disbelief.
June 2026 · 3 min read
This morning, over jasmine tea and Schwarzbrot, my wife waved her phone and announced with visible delight:.
April 2026 · 2 min read
This morning I was skimming China’s new Five-Year Plan: growth of 4.5–5%, steady fiscal stimulus, a big push for technological self-reliance, higher defence spending and, a nice touch, a more “childbirth-friendly society”.
9 March 2026 · 3 min read
This Chinese New Year’s Eve, I joined roughly 600 million other viewers in front of the screen for the big live gala from China.
18 February 2026 · 4 min read
In China, food is never just food.
April 2023 · 5 min read
It has been three months since I moved back from China to Germany.
March 2023 · 3 min read