I always had very tender feelings for you, and you were always sweet and kind to me, even when I made hilariously awkward language mistakes that made everyone, including you, laugh uncontrollably. I loved how respectful of the language you always were; as a passionate language learner myself, I appreciated it in you, in what and how you spoke a lot.

We listened to music and watched movies together, discreetly competed to see who would take a better photo during our walks… Although I had already been dabbling in photography for a couple of years, it was your appreciation for beautiful photos in general and your praise of some of mine in particular that really made me catch this photography bug. (Once, you were so excited about a photo I had taken that you half-jokingly exclaimed, “I should have taken it myself!”=)) Thank you for that, because it helped me capture important everyday moments of my life in a more tasteful way than I would have done otherwise.

What has always stood out to me in my memories connected with you is that I felt more treasured and beautiful in your eyes, as if you saw something adorable in me I didn’t realize was there. You never said it out loud, but somehow it was clearly felt in the gentle way you treated me and in the many photos you took of me as if trying to capture those moments of our life forever. By the way, no one had ever taken so many photos of me before, so it felt strange, flattering, and nice. But I did the same, whenever our group was out and about on some tour or afternoon walk, I made sure you were in the frame of as many photos I took as possible. However, it’s not just about the quantity of photos that matters, but all the attentiveness to each other that shows clearly in them and through them in my memory. We had connected and, without realizing it, had an invisible but very powerful tether formed between us which made us always look in the direction of each other.

Later on, you showed me the capital through the eyes of someone who had lived, studied, and worked there. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for a more captivating and personalized tour of this magnificent city. You took me to charming little streets and shops, to a museum and a castle I didn’t even know existed. Thanks to you I got to see the city from within, with its gems of places off the beaten track. These walks have been tucked away securely in the sunny corners of my memory, and nothing can replace them there, ever.

It was always very easy and comfortable for me to be by your side. For me it felt like we had known each other much longer than those few weeks; it just so happened that we had grown up countries and time zones apart. So, this wonderful adventure of ours always had but one flaw: we both knew from the beginning that at some point I would have to leave and go home, making it all very nonchalant. The time was treacherously limited and our relationship was never supposed to last long. Or was it?..

Anyway, we fully embraced this opportunity to be happy kids living in the moment. However, I wished back then and wish to this day our story would have continued and evolved into something as beautiful and strong as my feelings for you were. And yet, I will always cherish my memories of the time I spent with you, a tough-looking young man with the kindest and warmest of hearts.

How can I even begin to describe what turned out to become the warmest and most magical evening in the middle of a full-blown snowy winter? And we didn’t even make any conscious effort for it to happen.