Emma - Classic elegance and international tradition

Mirror of my world

Today I think back with gratitude to those years that I was allowed to spend as a teenager, especially in comparison to the things that the teenagers of those pandemic years had to live without. I regularly pursued my longest hobby, dancing, was able to attend a graduation ceremony with my family, and participated in many midnight performances at balls with my colleagues. In addition, my personal development was promoted by the daily personal exchange with my friends and I got the opportunity to take a lot of knowledge with me. School trips and lunch breaks spent together in Linz will live on forever in my memory.

I was and am always supported by my family in getting closer to what I want to achieve in my life, without ever being completely deprived of the safety net. I am very grateful for this stability. 

In school, our foreign language lessons were always among my favorites, along with creative subjects and cultural or history units. I learned to play the guitar, to consciously follow our world events, and to define my role within my environment in the years leading up to my high school graduation. Likewise, these years laid the foundation for that personality trait of mine that consciously sets boundaries, looks out for oneself, and stands up for oneself. I am still working on this side of myself, but I believe that I am on the right track. After finishing my school career I entered "real life" for the first time, about which I will tell you more soon. 

EMMA - Classic elegance and international tradition

Emma Berger lives where others go on vacation. That's probably the only clichéd thing you can say about the 22-year-old who waits tables in the family business, which lies pretty much between her family's two lines of origin. One half comes from the home of waffles, French fries and stout, the Flemish part of Belgium. The other part of the family, on the other hand, comes from the area of spiced traminers, chestnuts and spinach dumplings: South Tyrol in northern Italy. Emma, however, grew up in the Salzburger Land, between rocky mountains and green meadows, where traditional wooden houses with geraniums in front of them stand and New Year's Eve is celebrated in the ski hut.

As you can already see from this introduction, the person I'm telling you about today is family-oriented and also a pleasure person. Emma lives through all her senses, intensely and with a full heart. She thinks in colors, sings with feeling and likes to admire art in all its facets. 

We met at one of my favorite places in Salzburg: the roof of the Faculty of Culture and Social Sciences, also called Unipark Nonntal. Since that Monday afternoon two years ago, I can't imagine our circle of friends without Emma, even though I almost scared her away again with my charming opening remark that she was only welcome twice a week. 

Emma is my first interview partner whom I question in my home. Laughing, we agree that the ambience is somewhere between a talk show and Sigmund Freud therapy. As a creative person, I feel connected to her when she tells me that she is convinced that somewhere in the world there is her element that completes her, her project and her purpose in life. That's what I'm working on myself with texts like this.

The young woman's two greatest passions crystallized as early as her toddler years: foreign languages and music, which set her apart from her peers and also made her lonely in a certain way. Today, she has found like-minded people in the Romance Studies department at the University of Salzburg who are grappling with what they want from life in the same process as she is.

To herself in days gone by, Emma would pass on that you should listen more to your mothers. The women in her family today form her greatest role models, and the former home of her bomma (Flemish for grandmother) is also one of her absolute comfort places, which the girl can remember most clearly. This is also where she would take the love of her life, a person she trusts so much that she wants to share her most intimate place with her, without fear that the memories of it might be tarnished by someone else.

Personally, Emma underwent a great development in her life so far, which was mainly encouraged by her profession in tourism. She now dares to tell people what she thinks, she knows how to deal with herself when things don't go according to plan (quote: "When everything goes to shit, I can always read Dante's Divina Commedia.")

Emma is a true sunshine who has found her place in the world and her own voice through working in the hospitality industry and consciously singing. It is also important to her to spend time with people who are really worth it and to keep a certain degree of openness towards people who seem "different" at first glance. Emma explains that you can't know what others are talking when you literally don't speak their language, and accordingly you shouldn't presume to judge these people, but rather try to listen in order to be able to understand something of the other world. Due to her family's colorfully mixed origins, she questions on a daily basis what actually constitutes being "Austrian" and in what way she can or may feel herself to be Italian or Belgian because of her roots. 

We also talk about money as a well-known "means to an end": Emma interjects that, as a prospective full-time working woman, one already thinks about what the main purpose of working actually is for the majority of the population. In most cases, it's about slaving away every day in order to be able to afford a vacation to recover from the drudgery. Wouldn't it actually be much more desirable to live without money? And even with money, could we learn to organize our everyday life in such a way that no escape from it is absolutely necessary?

Emma feels happiest when she's not chasing what she thinks she needs to feel even better. Instead, she explains that an awareness that her needs are all met, that she and her loved ones are well, and that she is loved is more important. She feels safe when she can be herself with someone, laugh with the other person, and tell them something that excites her. Authentic people are the most beautiful for Emma.

She tells me and all readers of this text that she herself doesn't waste her time with negative things anymore, because there are so many good things in the world to devote oneself to. With regard to the young woman's enthusiasm for art mentioned at the beginning, she sums up that art consists not only of paintings or sculptures, but just as much of texts, plays and pieces of music, and that each individual work has its justification and its background thought, which is why one should not judge as an outsider that something is or isn't real art. 

She also raves to me about her absolute favorite dish, Sicilian tagliatelle with orange sauce and shrimp, so I guess we'd all like to be invited to dinner at her father's house to recreate the figuratively described aroma of Italian food in persona.

Do let me know what you have in common with Emma and me! I look forward to continuing to connect people. See you soon 💛

Hanna