Travelling alone, but not quite

এইখানে কীভাবে এসে পৌঁছলাম আমি? How ever did I reach here?
মৌসুমী ভৌমিক

The Bangla book, Ekla Meyer Ghoraghuri, an anthology of women solo travellers, is edited by Sumita Bithi and published by Sumita Samanta of La Strada, Kolkata, January 2025. I am one of the writers but I write less about travelling alone and more about being not quite alone on the road. I write about the many faces and traces of sound, lives and loves that draw me out and pull me in.

My friend Debjani, who lives in Wahlwies in Germany, is central to my story as is the voice of Maria. Maria of Freiburg, we call her. It was a blessing to have heard her on a wet Sunday in October 2022.

My professional sound recordist/sound designer friends complain about the fumbling noises with which all my recordings start. That’s all right. You have to be a little patient. I am walking and recording, the mic of my recorder is brushing against my coat. I am not always aware of the angle of my arm. Then the tram comes, I have to stop, but now I have reached her. Debjani and I. She sings, we talk, she sings again, I hum with her. Beautiful she says. But the beauty was in that day, in Maria’s song and all the stories she has been leading me to.

On that trip in 2022, I was leaving Germany and going to France. I would take a train from Strasbourg. Debjani started with me, and said, I’ll come up to this point. Then she came some more. And some more. Till the border of Germany in Kehl. We crossed over to France by tram. Walked through the market, drank coffee, ate some food. I recorded a man playing accordion on the bridge.Then we went to the station and waited outside. We were sad to part. I was singing this song of D. L. Roy, and Debjani was recording me. How beautiful to be tangled up in love, to feel the pain, to be captive in our prisons of desire.

9 October 2022.