here goes nothing

“A moment of impact whose potential for change is far beyond what we could have predicted brings some together, and others spinning off into untold adventures. You can’t control how they’re going to effect you…you have to wait for the next collision.”

As crazy as it sounds, tonight was one of the funnest and most unique/memorable nights of my life.

For some reason, I had a burning desire to go downtown, so at around 6:30pm, I took the SLO bus downtown with Kelly, Tricia, Michael, Arnav, and Kyle. We went to Kreuzberg Cafe for dinner, and we were lucky enough to get the window room! I ordered the same thing as last time, the Shel Silverstein. Waffle with nutella and bananas. I was the second person to order out of the six of us, but by the time everyone had gotten their food, I still didn’t have mine. By now, over 40 minutes had passed since I’d ordered, so I asked one of the workers about my order. The lady said she would check on it and be right back. Apparently the waffle maker was broken, and they meant to tell me, but the message kinda got lost somewhere in between. They were very apologetic and offered to refund my money and give me a new meal. So I picked something else off of the menu: The Dante. A breakfast of toast, eggs, potatoes, and bacon. After waiting a while longer, I finallyy got my food (while everyone else was already finished with theirs and waiting on me). Despite the mix-up, my meal was absolutely delicious.

Around 8:45, we walked out of Kreuzberg, where we were almost immediately approached by a very cute guy with a German accent. So adorable. Seriously ahhhh. He had that hipster hair and those hipster glasses and a black coat and converse. He looked like he was straight from a movie. Too good to be true. Anyways. This guy asks us if this Kreuzberg place is a bar, and we told him that it was a restaurant/cafe. He said it looked very cool and it would be good for a first date. Couldn’t agree more. Then I asked him where he was from, and he said Hamburg, Germany. He told us that in Germany, they add “-er” after the city name to say where someone is from…like “Frankfurters” are people from Frankfurt. “I am a Hamburger,” he said. hahaha. Arnav told him that he could speak German, and the guy was like, “Ah! My German friend!” and gave Arnav a hug. This guy was absolutely hilarious and adorable omg. When we told him that Kreuzberg was a German cafe, he was so excited! He was like, “What? Really??” And he laughed because we pronounced it “Cruiseberg”, but it’s really “Kroitzbearg” lol. We told him his English was really good (and it truly was), and he sounded so surprised and pleased. And he seemed to like saying “that’s fuckin’ crazy!” lol. Or more like “fooken cryzeh” hahaha. He explained that he was visiting America for the first time, and was only here for the day. He has been traveling up through California for the past three weeks, by himself. He decided to go by himself because “if you go alone, you can see everything there is to see…but if you go with a friend, you are always talking to your friend, so you miss out on a lot.” Wow. Eye-opening, really. This guy just set off on his own in a country he’s never been in, sleeping in his rental car most nights, to explore new places and see the world. How freaking amazing is that. I was so inspired by him, I can’t even explain it. He asked each of us what we were studying in college, and then he told us he was studying Media Management. After chatting for quite a bit in front of Kreuzberg, he asked us where the best bar in town is. We told him we’re not 21 yet, so we haven’t been to any of the bars. He asked us if we wanted to kinda show him around SLO if we weren’t busy, and of course we were happy to!! :) As we made our way down Higuera, we learned that his name was Jan (pronounced “yon”). He said he slept in a sleeping bag in his car most of the time, but sometimes in a motel for a night. How he stayed so clean and fresh…I will never know. He also told us he parked his car on the second floor of the parking garage, so hopefully it could stay there overnight. And he told us how he lovesss In-N-Out and he eats there every single day bahaha. We took him to Bubblegum Alley and his reaction was too great: disgusted but in awe at the same time. Kelly gave him a piece of gum so he could add to the wall. He took pictures with his iPhone and was so excited about it. I asked him if he wanted me to take a picture of him in the alley and he was ecstatic hahaha. He was like, “Oh! Yes!! What a great idea!” And so I took a couple pictures of him on his camera (which he forgot he had in his pocket at first). We then walked him to SLO Brew. There was a security camera in front of SLO Brew and Jan started dancing in front of the camera…it was too cute hahaha. And then Michael was like, “I had chicken wings here the other day…” And Jan was like, “Oh, chicken wings?” and started doing this little dance. And so I laughed and was like, “He’s talking about the food!” and Jan was like “Ohhhh…..the food.” LOL idek. Then we went inside and up the stairs to the restaurant area. We were gonna find a table to sit and talk at, but there were no tables left, so we just lingered around for a little bit. And this is where things unfortunately dispersed. Basically what happened was Kelly thought that we should leave…and so Arnav told Jan, “We actually have to go back to campus now…” and Jan was like, “What’s campus?” hahaha. And Arnav told him he should go sit at the bar and Jan was like, “With those old guys? No way!” bahaha. So he walked outside with us, and then we started to say our goodbyes. But then I was like wait! We should get a picture of all of us to remember this! And he was like yeah!! So we got a random stranger to take a photo on Kelly’s iPhone of the six of us with Jan. And when we were posing for the picture, Jan tried to get me to laugh by tickling me and saying “smile!” hahaha. Then he asked us if we sleep with our ass against the wall in our dorm rooms and we were like uhhh….what do you mean? lol. So he explained that in Germany, when you go to the military, apparently everyone “sleeps with their ass against the wall.” hahaha no idea. Then Jan was reading an email from his dad and he was like, “Oh, the Oscars are this weekend, yeah?” And we were like no, the Oscars were last weekend…they already passed. So Jan was like “What? Really? My dad told me it is this weekend!” haha. And not until wayy later did we realize that the Grammy’s were last weekend…and the Oscars were indeed this weekend. So stupid of us omg hahaha. Well I hope Jan doesn’t miss the Oscars because of us. :/ And then sadlyyy…we said goodbye and went our separate ways. I was soo reluctant to leave though. :(( I wanted to stay there and listen to his stories. I could seriously sit there and talk to him all night. There was something about this guy…I don’t even know. He felt like an old friend. For some reason, I felt like I had known this guy for ages. He was so so sweet and genuinely excited about life. And I admire him so much for that. I would looove to travel and explore the world someday. I thought I was the only one who didn’t wanna leave though, so I didn’t say anything since it seemed like my friends were trying to find a way out. We talked about Jan on the entire way to the bus stop, and on the entire ride back to campus, and on the entire walk back to the dorms. I really can’t put it into words, but I wish everyone could have been there to experience this and meet Jan. And we couldn’t help but think…what if the waffle maker hadn’t been broken? What if I decided not to order another meal? What if we didn’t eat at Kreuzberg? What if we never went downtown in the first place? We would have never met Jan. And we would’ve had no idea what we were missing out on. Damn. WHAT IF.

When we got back to the dorms, Kyle, Arnav, and I went to Arnav’s room to hang out…and of course we were all still talking about Jan. There’s really no way to explain it, but he left an impact on all of us. I don’t know how to put it, but he wasn’t just some random guy who stopped to talk. He left a mark on all of us and had such an kind heart and effortless charm to him. We tried finding Jan on Facebook, but no luck. A first name and city don’t get you very far haha. So then I was talking to Kyle and Arnav, and found out that they had wanted to stay and chat with Jan too, but Arnav had made up the excuse because Kelly didn’t want to stay, so he figured everyone else thought the same. If only I had known, though. We were all beating ourselves up over it. Seriously though. We were thinking of all the things we would have done if we could go back in time. We would have stayed and chatted for hours, Arnav would have offered for Jan to stay in his dorm for the night, we would have figured out how to find him on Facebook, we would have asked him what school he studied at and how old he was…..ughhh sooo many things. So as we were sitting there reminiscing on everything and wishing we would have done things differently…Arnav proposed that we go downtown and see if we could find him on the second floor of one of the parking garages, which is where Jan said he would most likely be spending the night. As insane and ridiculous as it sounds, we all agreed to walk to downtown SLO, which is nearly half an hour away. I hope that makes you realize the magnitude of this experience. We were willing to walk nearly half an hour there and back in the cold at 3am, just to maybe possiblyyy find a German guy we met hours earlier. And we went through with it. We bundled up in jackets and made our way to downtown SLO in the wee hours of the night. We searched one parking garage…nothing. Then we walked by SLO Brew. Then a second parking garage. And finally the third and final parking garage…still nothing. Heartbreaking and disappointing, but I can’t say we expected to find him. There was just a little flicker of hope that was worth checking. And we made quite the adventure out of it. I realize we sound completely insane and creepy for going back to look for Jan, but I guess you just had to be there to meet him. I don’t know what else to say. If I could ever have the chance to meet Jan again, I would definitely take it, even over finding the blondie with the blue shirt. Yep.

(This picture doesn’t even do him justice…)