Beyond Borders Bloom

Do you have a ritual you always keep when you travel? For my husband and me, it's simple and unwavering: every morning begins at a cafe. Two cappuccinos, one or two pieces of bread, and a quiet moment to greet the day. It's less about breakfast and more about setting the rhythm for whatever lies ahead. We arrived in Milan on the evening of January 1st. When morning came, the city was wrapped in fog, calm and hushed, as if easing into the new year. With our cameras in hands, we stepped out for a walk and stumbled upon a small cafe near our accommodation ⎯ Caffè Napoli . Locals crowded the bar, voices overlapping, cups clinking. We joined in without hesitation, calling out what we had already learned to say instinctively: "Due cappuccinni!" That first sip was enough. From that morning on, until the day we left Milan, Caffè Napoli became part of our daily routine. Caffè Napoli is a coffee house chain inspired by the espresso culture of southern Italy, particularly Naples...

There are moments when life insists on holding two opposite things at once. In my case, it was a wedding and a diagnosis ⎯ arriving close enough to share the same calendar, but asking for entirely different kinds of attention. I didn't go to the hospital out of fear. It was autumn, and we were in the middle of preparations. A routine check felt like one final act of responsibility before M's departure. Nothing more.  The examinations unfolded unevenly. Some were quick, forgettable. Others paused longer than expected. A screen held still. A measurement was repeated. A biopsy followed. A week later, the phone rang. The diagnosis came quietly, without urgency in the doctor's voice. Thyroid cancer, papillary, early. The language was careful, clinical, and practiced. I listened, nothing how often the explanation circled back to prognosis, to words like manageable and treatable . Two days later, I was scheduled to get married. It felt strange to hold those two facts together. No...

Some music doesn't announce itself. It waits. The music of Gigi Masin is not built to convince, impress, or persuade. It exists more like a landscape ⎯ something you notice only after staying long enough. Image from Gigi Masin Wikipedia Growing up Venetian "I'm a Venetian. It's something about the sunset on the water, the sails, the food, our history, and the blue sky in the springtime." For Masin, Venice is not just a birthplace but a sensibility. A city of reflections, slow movements, and unstable ground, where nothing feels entirely fixed. That sense of suspension would later become central to his music. As a young man, his desire to study music was not encouraged. "My parents didn't understand why I wanted to study music," he recalled. "Becoming a musician or composer seemed like a silly idea to them. I had to find my own way ⎯ and it wasn't easy." Finding a language through experiment In the late 1970s, while working in theaters in...

I didn't come to Germany expecting to love winter. It was the season people spoke about carefully, often with fatigue. Something to endure rather than admire. But coming from a place where snow almost never stays, winter here felt different. Less dramatic than I imagined. More persistent. Oberstdorf entered our plans without much insistence. It was simply the right scale for the time we had. Bic cities, like Berlin, demand attention. This weekend asked for something quieter. So we turned south, toward the Alps. The drive changed gradually. Roads stayed familiar until snow began to settle along the mountains. As evening approached, the landscape slowed us down. By then, the journey itself felt sufficient. Our accommodation stood slightly apart from the town. Inside, the room was simple and spacious, opening onto a small terrace. Travel often makes itself known in small ways⎯through light, temperature, the smell of a room before it becomes familiar. The town center was compact and pr...

Have you ever imagined yourself at an airport on New Year's Day?  It's the first morning of the year. You've just finished check-in at a busy terminal, and now you're waiting at the gate, watching the sunrise spill slowly across the runway. As the plane lifts off, the past year is left far below your feet. Breakfast is served onboard, and with it comes the first brilliant sunlight of the new year, flooding the cabin. A quiet beginning, suspended in an almost empty sky. This is not just a fantasy⎯it's a memory I still hold vividly from two years ago. That New Year's Day, M and I were flying to Milan, Italy. Our in-flight cinema for the occasion was Everything Everywhere All at Once , an American sci-fi action comedy about the multiverse. A film where countless lives unfold from countless choices, spreading endlessly like clouds beyond the airplane window. By the time we landed in Milan, the sun had already set. On the subway to the Navigli district ⎯where we thou...

This year, I had two weddings. One in Germany in the summer, and another in South Korea in the winter. If you've been married yourself ⎯ or have friends who have ⎯ you'll know this already: a wedding is not something that's over in a single day, like a reservation at a restaurant. I promised marriage to my German partner, M, in 2023. Long-distance relationships carry an unavoidable truth: for two people to truly be together, someone has to move. After spending short but meaningful stretches of two to three months in Korea and Germany, and after many long conversations, we reached a conclusion⎯I would be the one to try living in Germany first. From an administrative standpoint, it's much simpler to hold the wedding in Germany first and then apply for a residence permit immediately. So we set our sights on a German wedding in the spring or summer of 2025, and decided that for the two years leading up to it, I would slowly prepare everything I could while still in Korea. ...

I already run a blog under my real name on my personal website, but I decided to create another one here. In the long run, it feels cleaner to keep that space focused solely on my work and brand. More personal, everyday stories seemed better gathered elsewhere, in a place of their own. Here, I want to speak freely—without sorting thoughts into what’s small or what’s important—and simply let them accumulate. My nickname, Tschae, is a German-style rendering of part of my Korean name. The Korean artist Kim Tschang-yeul, known for his water drop paintings, also used “Tschang” for the “Chang” in his name. In fact, many Germans naturally pronounce my name using the German ch sound—the guttural “h” that comes from the throat. In German, Tsch is pronounced much like “ch.” While my passport follows the English spelling, online I wanted to try this version as a way of marking a new identity. Beyond Borders Bloom. The name holds my wish to let ideals bloom while moving across boundaries. Wha...