What Do My Camera, Traveling, and Husband Have in Common?

This is personal and honest.

Life is packed with lots of useless but also useful things. There are often things I see in a store, or lately more often online, where I have to think “that’s a handy thing to have”. But there is a big difference between something that could be handy and something you actually do need in life.

Loads of advertisement papers are these days replaced with endless ads popping up on our screens. And I must admit they became scarily good with personalized adverts. Those smart guys know how to convince us about what we need in life.

But on my way to trying to live as minimalistic as possible (I’m far from living a minimalistic lifestyle, but I’m doing my best) I try to ignore all of those ads. Living for months in a basic clay hut in Ghana and traveling across the African continent has taught me a lot.

There are many things in life I learned to live without. Things I used a lot in my younger years and things I realized I don’t actually need. Such things are for example a hairdryer or a flat iron. I haven’t used them both in over seven years. Guess what? I didn’t miss them once.

Or a watch and a calendar. There’s no place for them in my life today. Those two things used to organize my life when I was a teenager. Today I don’t have them anymore. I don’t have the stress from back then either. And I have way more time. For everything.

But this isn’t an article about things in life we can live without. This is about things I cannot live without. It’s about passion, love, and materialistic items that make my life special.

Things I cannot live without:

1. My Partner in Crime

I would never have imagined myself putting a person on top of this list years ago. When I was an adventurous solo traveler I was convinced I don’t need a man in my life. Not to fulfill my life or to help me with anything. I was convinced I could do it all. Alone.

I wasn’t wrong. I’ve done a lot. Alone. I’ve achieved a lot. With amazing friends on my side and parents that always supported me. But for the last five years, I also had a man on my side who showed me I don’t need him to survive, but life is much more fun with him.

He had to fight for over a year to get my attention and finally my love as well. Today he is my biggest supporter in life. Whatever I do, if it’s sitting on the couch writing a new article or jumping out of a plane with a person that absolutely doesn’t trust a woman, he always stands behind me.

He gives me advice when I seem clueless. He tells me to rest when I’m exhausted. He tells me to push harder when I am lacking confidence. And he just gives me a hug and tells me to let the tears roll if I am sad, disappointed, or upset.

But he is much more to me today. He is the one I am living my dream of traveling the world, exploring unknown cultures, and the one that supports me in standing my ground in the male-dominated profession of skydiving.

He’s my best friend too.

The one I share everything with.

Especially an after-work beer after an exhausting long day.

2. My Camera

I just love photography. I’ve taken the first photographs as a kid with my parent’s good old Zenit film camera. Later I’ve gotten a smaller and more modern version of it where I once destroyed an entire film opening up the back before turning the film backward.

I owned the first digital camera in our family and was obviously proud of it. I loved arts back then and explored beauty in nature while other girls in my age learned how to apply makeup (which I didn’t learn until today according to my mother-in-law, but there you can see where my priorities lie).

I quickly progressed, taught myself a lot but also through books my parents bought me.

The first time I was really proud of something I bought with what was a fortune back then was my first DSLR. It was my baby. I took her everywhere. Literally everywhere. As much space as the camera took, I made space for it in every backpack. I never complained about its weight and cried for days when I destroyed her in the rainshower of the Victoria Falls.

Today, photography is part of my daily life and I’ve earned for a big part of my skydiving career my only income as a camera flyer. Having the huge DSLR attached to my helmet and taking pictures with my tongue while flying/ falling at approximately 220kph is a different way to grow attached to your baby.

3. Traveling

Something I was born with. Or let’s say something I’ve done already before I was even born. My parents traveled a lot. My mom hiked the alps carrying me in her belly. And once I’ve seen daylight there was no stopping for my big eyes to explore it all.

The world to my feet. As a kid, we took a lot of vacations. Not those expensive trips to the Maledives, Australia, and Egypt. No, we camped, we hiked the alps from left to right, north to south, east to west, and back again. And we swam in the Mediterranean sea while staying at a campsite on the beach.

I drove several times to Romania exploring my heritage and visiting the places my parents grew up in. I learned to ski in the alps before I could properly walk and looked down upon the world from a 3.000 meter (10.000ft) peak at the age of seven after having hiked up 1.500 meters (5.000ft) in altitude.

I flew for the first time at the age of 17 when booking a holiday together with a friend of mine flying 4 hours to the canary islands. My parents were left at home without a chance to contact me since I switched my phone off. I told them a vacation for me is only when I fully switch off. That included switching the phone off.

I might have sent them a text after landing on the island. Might.

What a horrible daughter I was! I do not want to raise a daughter like myself. I do know why my dad is all grey by now and have no idea how my mom survived stressing about me in all kinds of situations in life without getting a single grey hair by the age of sixty.

But I’m not even done yet.

By the age of 21, I left the European continent for the first time and disappeared to no other continent than the mostly-feared African one. I lived in Ghana while the Ebola Epidemic was killing thousands in West Africa.

Since it wasn’t enough, I continued to travel from Tanzania all the way down to South Africa. All on my one. Jumping off a bridge along the way, swimming on top of the dangerous waterfalls, and walking through the city of Johannesburg.

Flying back home just to say I’ll go back. Back to Africa. Starting a new life on this unknown continent. Doing more adventurous things like rock climbing, surfing in the dangerous currents of the Atlantic, and jumping out of a plane.

No, I’m convinced. I do not want to raise a daughter like me. Sorry, mom for all the stress I put you in. But I know I’ve survived it all because both of my parents gave me a lot of responsibilities from a young age on teaching me how to stand my ground in various situations.

And you know what? I’m not done yet. There are still many places I want to see and things I want to do. Norway, Iceland, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and whatever else is getting in my way.

Yes, travel is a passion of mine.

4. Writing

I guess my high school teacher would not have imagined seeing this on my list. The one that complimented me for my efforts in the German subject after handing in another exam telling me in the same sentence “that I just never become a writer”. Which is okay. Not everyone has to become a writer. And I for sure never intended to.

He might have been the reason why did become in the end a writer and an author of a published book in the very same German language.

When I planned my first trip abroad to explore the African continent I didn’t know yet how to stay in touch back home and for sure did not know that Ghana had a better network coverage and faster internet than Germany. But I somehow read some travel blogs and decided to keep my family on track by writing one myself.

Every single evening I sat down and wrote in my diary. And then I typed on my tablet. I wrote down my thoughts. Just as they were coming to my mind. I described what I saw, felt, and did every day. Some days I wrote until late at night. Sharing those finished articles the very next morning. Without proofreading even once.

I received my first positive feedback about my writing within the first few days. From aunts, cousins, friends, and people I wasn’t in touch with for years. Don’t ask me how and where they got my website from.

I was thrilled. And excited. I was excited about how many people were interested in my life. My life was thousands of miles away from them. In a different world.

I realized how much I enjoyed writing down my thoughts. Not thinking of grammar rules, sentence structure, or any other quirks of the German language. I wrote short sentences. Just as my thoughts were. Short and crisp.

Those thoughts I captured in the moment and in the freshness of my feelings on an unknown continent became the basis of my book. Last year I published a book about my time in Ghana. Many have read it, some have complimented me on it and others have complained why I didn’t write it in English.

Once again, I thought I wasn’t good enough.

I started to write in English in 2017 and I’m running since then a bilingual blog. I’m writing every single article on my website in both languages, German and English. It takes a lot of time and effort. But to me, it is worth it all.

Because of my loyal readership. Because my readers gave me so much. Especially confidence in myself. Confidence in the fact I can write and people do want to read what I write.

Today I am writing less often on my blog, more regularly when I am traveling. I’ve since expanded my portfolio and started to write on other platforms as well. I’ve lived exclusively off my income from writing for three months this year.

Dear high school teacher, did you hear this? I earn my income with writing.

And yes, I probably only ever came that far with writing because I never intended to turn it into money. Because I knew I couldn’t write. I just wrote for myself. But others listened.

And today, I can’t go without.

Writing.

5. Nature

I love nature. I love the great outdoors and I love being active outside. I could spend my life exclusively in nature as long as I get sometimes a plug to charge my camera (to be able to follow my passion for photography) and a plug to charge my tablet (to be able to follow my passion for writing).

I was lucky since my parents loved the outdoors. I spent my childhood days climbing trees, playing soccer on the fields, skiing down the slopes in winter, and hiking the mountain ranges of the alps in summer.

I was never the one being told I had to leave the TV. I played in the rain and swam in the Mediterranean sea just after the storm had stopped and waves were still raging.

Today, I love nothing more than camping in the vastness of the desert. Just placing the mattress on the ground is enough to put me asleep while staring at the endless African sky at night.

When I talk about my passion for traveling I don’t talk about visiting cities. I might have spent a day or two in Bangkok, I hated the city of Dar Es Salaam and have never visited the capital of my home country Germany. Berlin is a foreign word to.

I don’t dislike city travel. I just prefer nature.

I prefer traveling to the mountains or the sea. I love exploring rainforests around the world and will never forget my first night out in the desert. Because I think there is so much nature has to offer, I will never be able to see it all.

It is very sad that we’re destroying a lot of it. But it is somehow part of our culture. Unfortunately. I am trying my best to preserve and protect nature as much as I can with recycling, shopping with reusable bags, and avoiding plastic as much as I can.

It’s small things. But I do believe every step counts. And I hope everyone does his or her best to protect nature.

Because I cannot live without it.

6. Exercise

I don't know. This point should have come higher. I was struggling a bit with the order of this listicle. All of these items/ passions I cannot live without. Not sure how to prioritize them.

I’ve always been an active girl. As a kid I used to swim once a week, taking part in competitions on the weekends. Later I started to play handball which was at one point in my life more important than school or my studies. I loved playing handball and was really sad about leaving it behind when I went to Africa. Shockingly, most people I met didn’t even know the sport of handball. How was I to describe them then my passion for it?

I also played volleyball because my mom did and wanted me to play a contactless sport. I became a coach and trained a young volleyball team for a few years.

And in between it all I skied down the snowy mountains in winter and skated on my inlines skates across the fields in summer. In later years I boarded down the sand dunes of the Namib desert. And I still love hiking, especially in foreign countries and landscapes.

I’ve done quite a lot of rock climbing while living in Namibia for a few years and even worked as a climbing instructor.

And believe it or not — skydiving is a sport as well. I’ve had muscle pain from jumping out of planes in places of my body where I didn’t know muscles existed.

I love the feeling of doing exercise. It refreshes my mind and keeps me fit. When I’m down or feeling depressed for whatever reason, I love to go on a walk in nature. It gives me so much energy, brings new thoughts, and lightens my heart.

7. Water

This might sound weird now but I am not talking about I need drinking water to stay alive. I am talking about the sounds of a roaring waterfall, a rushing mountain river, the waves of the ocean, or the always soothing sound of the rain.

I simply love being surrounded by water. I sleep the best while listening to the sound of the ocean or flowing water. And I love being in the water. I love to swim. I love to paddle and play in the water.

While I am not a big fan of swimming pools and man-made waters, I still use them if no natural body of water is in reach.

But if there’s a lake, a river, or the ocean you won’t stop me from getting in. Not even in Ghana when they told us, foreigners, the lake was dangerous. Once I saw the locals were in the water I knew whatever bacteria it was, it wouldn’t kill me either. And of course, all the others followed.

Most recently I picked up the sport of stand-up paddling which is for sure my latest passion. I’ve paddled since in the rough Atlantic ocean on Namibia’s coastline, between tropical islands in Thailand, and explored lakes and rivers in Germany on my inflatable SUP.

And this is the exact thing missing in my fairytale village. It’s the one thing separating it from my perfect place to live. There’s no water. No river is running through the valley. Only a small droplet flowing down and only if it had rained enough.

If I should settle down one day, it would be for sure on a body of water. Somewhere on a beach, next to a lake or at least a roaring mountain river. High enough, of course, to be safe from floodings. But close enough for me to go daily in the water.

8. Food

While I’m at the basic things in life like water and food let's continue. There's one thing for sure — I’m never going to be thin. I love food too much. All kinds of food. Food from different cultures and various cooking styles.

I love a good meal. Together with my husband or a group of friends. There’s not much more to say. If I would need to narrow it down on one item it would be like Barbara Dalton said — cheese.

When I first left for Africa many of my friends and family members thought I would struggle with food since I was and still am such a meat-eater. But they were all wrong. The first thing I missed was cheese. You’ll always find some meat, wherever you go. And if it’s just chicken. Or squirrel and monkey. Who knows what they fed me on the street food stalls.

But the one thing I craved for first, was cheese. And hell I did complain when I finally found a cheeseburger in some western restaurant on the menu and they served it without the cheese. I made them bring that slice of processed cheese on an extra plate. And yes, that cheese was delicious!

9. Yellow

I mean literally. If you would erase the color yellow out of my life I would not just have nothing to wear but I would be also pretty sad.

Just last week at my grandma’s funeral I stuck out like a sore thumb wearing a bright yellow hoodie among the all-in-black funeral party. And I didn’t do that because I needed attention. It’s just who I am. Miss Sunshine.

I don’t own black clothes. All my clothes are in happy colors, most of them in yellow. Because yellow stands for happiness and sunshine. It’s who I am. Yellow is my brand.

And nobody at the funeral was upset that I was underdressed or inappropriately dressed. Not that I would have cared since I was one of the closest relatives of the deceased but many actually came to me saying my grandma surely appreciated the sunshine in the room.

So yes. There is a color important enough to make it onto this list. Some would say it should be further up in this listicle but I spoke before already about the order of things. I didn’t really put them in order. They are simply all things I cannot live without.

10. Sundowner Drink

This might be sounding off but I simply enjoy a cold after-work beer, a refreshing gin&tonic while the sun is setting into the ocean, or a glass of red wine while chatting with a good friend.

I’ve done phases in my life without drinking at all but honestly, I’m happier with it. I love the socializing part of it and do enjoy visiting different breweries and distilleries in foreign countries learning about their culture through the alcoholic drinks they’ve created over the years.

So please, don’t take my sundowner from me. It’s a special moment in the day and I would love to sit back and enjoy the moment.

That’s it. I know, I did go overboard again. I apologize for the lengthy read. When I first read Gurpreet‘s post on “10 things I can’t live without” I enjoyed the read but quickly ignored the thought of writing one myself. It’s just another listicle. Nobody is going to read it.

But then I read a second, third, and more posts like this from other writers and started realizing how personal and honest these articles were. They reveal so much of the writer’s lives, their passion, and their love for life. I enjoyed them all. I re-read some of them.

And then I had already opened a new draft. The first notes were done. Just so that I wouldn’t forget to write it too. Until tonight. When I opened the draft and just wanted to write the first few paragraphs.

Hours later…

Here I am. I feel like I wrote a biography. I might have misunderstood the writing prompt. Or I just personalized it. I hope you enjoyed it though and I invite you to do the same. I’m telling you, I had lots of joy writing this. And if you decide to create one too, please tag me. I would love to learn more about you!

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