When I was sixteen, my dad brought me along for a trip to Berchtesgaden with his lover. During one of our days there, they wanted to have some time to themselves. I welcomed having a day to explore on my own and decided to hike all the way to the top of Zugspitze. I didn’t know the first thing about hiking, pacing myself, proper shoes… and it never occurred to me to research beforehand how long the hike would take.

Late morning, I set off at a brisk pace, inevitably finding myself completely winded after a little less than an hour. Even worse, I was wearing new hiking boots and my feet were hurting as if they were being squeezed in a medieval torturing device. I could feel tenacity rising within me while I caught my breath. Nope, turning around was definitely not an option.
So I pushed on at the same rigorous pace. Half an hour later I felt myself unable to take another step. My lungs were burning and my feet felt as if I had stepped on multiple razor blades. I sat down on a bench and gingerly took off my socks. They seemed to have merged with my feet. Both feet were covered in blisters. Most of those had already been rubbed raw and blood was everywhere.
All the hikers I had overtaken on my way up so far, began catching up with me and gave me odd glances. Thankfully one of them stopped and, in a very practical approach, handed me some disinfectant wipes and plasters.
“You really need to slow down kid.” he said. “Get yourself patched up and then walk slowly enough so you can go the distance. From here it’s at least another four hours to the top.”
So I improvised my first ever field-dressing, gritted my teeth, and went on… step by step, by little slow-paced step.
I reached the summit about five hours later, handed my little Kodak Instamatic to another fellow hiker, and posed for this shot. Absorbing the magnificent landscape all around me with every fibre of my being I knew it had all been worth it. This was a sight and a feeling of sweet exhaustion and accomplishment to remember.

As a child I adored my dad. Come adolescence, he began to seem old to me, a stranger, far removed from my own world. In my eyes he was unable to truly comprehend what happened in my life.

Many years later, when I turned forty, I noticed with astonishment that deep inside I hadn’t changed much from the teenager who had always been so full of positive energy, hopes and dreams.
And I wondered.. had my father always remained a young man inside as well? His character and emotional predispositions might be quite different from mine, but we could have more in common than I ever thought possible.

As small as this epiphany seems, it went a long way in helping me to understand my dad better. He still triggers tidal waves of emotions in me but, our worlds have moved closer together. Instead of being offended at how different our planets are, we have finally arrived — if not on the same star, than at least only a few light years apart instead of thousands.

Writing my book has done wonders as I re-experienced so many key events involving Dad. As I dove deep into my own story, I remembered him vividly and he came alive within me: his warm smile, his calm loyalty, his limitless generosity, his boyish behavior, his tears, the trauma of his marriage, his love affairs, his struggle with depression, his breakfast tomatoes, his passion for swimming, and his kindness in giving me my first razor and a bottle of Cool Water at the start of my hormone therapy, long before I had my gender reassignment surgery.

Now, moving back to within an hours drive of my dad is another huge geographical as well as emotional step towards each other. We meet and we talk. And even if sometimes I still get impatient, I am profoundly happy to have him in my life.

My apologies for keeping you waiting with my weekly post. Our move from Malta to Zurich has brought all else to a standstill. After weeks of planning, searching and moving from apartment to hotel room to Airbnb, we have found our new home. We have unearthed long forgotten mementos from the bottom of dusty boxes bearing the scents of crumbly autumn leaves. We have bought a comfortable sofa and have enjoyed a few breakfasts on the balcony with our cheeky cats.
My introductory week at work has passed without major incident. It has been challenging, relaxing, and enjoyable, all at the same time.

Today marks our first real day off since cramming our belongings into that Maltese rental car four weeks ago. There will be no shopping, organizing, worrying, or hammering nails into walls today. Instead, we will stare into space and let ourselves sink ever more deeply into the cloud-like cushions of our new couch.

In 2002, a friend took this photograph. I felt very confident at the time, like a forgotten orchid suddenly receiving the right amount of sunshine, water, nutrients, and inner strength to bloom into an amazing being.

Still though, at that point, I found it hard to take off my shirt, because I was worried far too much about how others might react to the sizeable scars across my chest. It had been a few years since my gender reassignment surgeries but, like a fugitive on the run, I expected trouble from all directions at any time. Everything was still too raw emotionally. No matter how unhappy and incomplete I had felt growing up in the “wrong” body, my mind now wasn’t just at rest after the reassignment. I needed some time to get accustomed to my “new” body, in all its beauty and imperfection.

I was far too tuned to my surroundings and got upset about the smallest comments. I even gave up a friendship once because my buddy chose the somewhat unfortunate phrase “you’re neither fish nor fowl” to describe me. Years later, I smiled at my lack of confidence and my consequently harsh response. In a state of emergency it had been hard to see the bigger picture and relax about simply being myself. My friend had never meant me any harm. Like me he had merely dealt with adjusting to sizeable changes.

Over the years, I pushed myself into extreme situations to learn and grow. The remedy to overcoming feeling awkward about people seeing my scars, for instance, came in the form of me working four years abroad as a snorkel guide and diving instructor, in a strict Muslim country, in nothing but my swim shorts. Today, I don’t even think about my scars anymore, and, as it turns out, neither do those around me.

The overall issue of confidence is a lifelong struggle. Words or looks can still throw me off balance. I know now, however, that I am not alone in this. Depending on our daily form and a combination of factors we all have days during which we feel less stable, and others during which even a tornado wouldn’t be able to throw us off base.

I guess the main thing is to forgive ourselves our imperfections, be they protruding ears, pimples, a lack of six-pack, being born in the wrong body, or any number of underlying reasons. After all, it is our imperfections just as much as our strengths that make us unique and beautiful. How humble and kind we deal with both shapes us and defines our character. It is a long-term learning process I am immensely grateful for.

When we first arrived in Gzira, Malta, I couldn’t help but notice this cute sign. I would pass it every day, chuckling to myself as I imagined this tiny space to be a secret clinic for gender transitions. Of course, Gzira’s “He to She” is only a small neighborhood barber shop. Being a transgender male who doesn’t take himself too seriously, I became a regular. As imagination and humor swept me away, I would just barely manage to contain my laughter each time I went for a high-speed Maltese haircut.

I’ve always believed in signs. If I hadn’t, then this last month surely would have changed my mind…

It all started with me writing an old buddy in Zurich, asking, “Hey, if you guys ever have an opening in your team, could you let me know?”

Five minutes later, I get an email, “What a coincidence. I just got back from a long vacation, first day back in the office, and we do have an opening right now.”

Two weeks later, I fly over for the interview and get upgraded to business class for the very first time in my life.

The interview day is so positive, it’s almost eerie. Even though I am as nervous as a giddy first grader approaching the school gate for the first time, I feel comfortable with everyone. The office is located in my favorite part of town and from the meeting room I’m put in for a whole series of interviews, I can see Zurich’s Uetliberg on which I used to spend many happy hours.

Upon returning to Malta, strange things happen. The next day, early morning, I decide to stop being lazy and take the stairs in our apartment building for the first time in weeks. Three floors down, I find a trapped dove. On the fourth attempt of throwing my sweater over it, I finally succeed. I manage to pin the delicate bird securely between my hands, walk down six more floors and upon reaching the street raise the sweater high above my head. I open it up towards the sky. The dove sits there for a long moment, stunned, then takes off soaring into freedom. Being overly romantic by nature, I can’t help but wonder, “Does this mean we’ll soon be flying to a new life, too?”

Two weeks pass without a word. Waiting patiently for big decisions has never been my greatest strength. But just as I begin to doubt, I get the new monthly shift plan for my job here in Malta. The team leader coordinating it for our team is very conscientious and never forgets anything. Curiously, this month he has forgotten two entire weeks on my plan. According to this, I don’t work here anymore from end of June. “Is this another sign?”, I wonder.

The weeks seem to pass in slower-than-slow motion. My inbox refresh-button would have sores on it by now if it were a living being.

Then my wife and I travel to her sister’s wedding in Korea where we have wireless everywhere and spend too much of our time continuing to refresh that inbox.

A week later, still waiting, we travel back to Malta via Paris and Amsterdam. In Amsterdam we have a long layover and spend the night in a hotel room. After seventeen hours of traveling, we collapse on our hotel bed and fall asleep instantly. The next morning as we relax on the bed, I notice a nice painting on the wall across from our bed. “That’s a great watercolor of Amsterdam,” I think. Then, “Wait a minute, that’s not Amsterdam!” Sitting up straight on the bed, eyes wide in wonder, my wife and I realize that we have booked the one hotel room out of a thousand in this huge hotel, sporting a watercolor painting of Zurich. We look at each other with goofy smiles on our faces, sensing something like magic in the room.

Five days later, I get the long-awaited email. Such a little thing… a click on a button, a small link on the screen, a few lines of text… but in the end this little thing can determine the course of a life. It can make all the difference.

Scared out of my wits at first, I finally open the email with closed eyes. When I squint a little, I see, “It is my pleasure to inform you…” and breathe out with a long sigh. Minutes later when the first shock has worn off, both my wife and I whoop with joy.

So, after ten years of living abroad, I’ll be coming home. Better yet, I’ll be coming home with my soul mate, and I’ll be able to work in a profession I enjoy. I’ll be having lunch breaks in Zurich’s Niederdorf, at the River Limmat, one of the places in this world that has always enchanted me.

I am so grateful life is leading us in this direction. And, I am sure, with every happy fibre of my heart: This is meant to be.

“The first gay couple was just married in Dallas today. An 82 yr old and an 85 yr old man finally got to be recognized as legally married in the city they call home. The world just became a little bit brighter in our corner of North Texas.”

As I read through my various online newsfeeds, tears of joy keep welling up. I smile, laugh out loud, and rejoice in this positive humanitarian milestone. I bow my head in respect to the US Supreme Court. Well done. Here is to love, humanity, freedom, equality, and mutual respect!
There will be outrage from some sides, I’m sure, but no matter what will happen, one fact will remain: we have caught a rare glimpse of humanity at its best.
Halfway across the globe in Malta we can feel the Earth shaking as rainbows light up our lives and even the Mediterranean sun is celebrating, glowing brighter and warmer than ever before.

Beautiful backstage video of the show I dedicated four years of my life to. I was just one little cog in the giant mechanism of this masterpiece, staying with it as an underwater coach and show diver from training and formation through creation through to operation. I ended up working more than one thousand shows behind the scenes and trained most of the artists between 2009 and 2012 for their underwater exits and entries.
During creation, our director used to say “let’s shake the stage.” And we did, twice every day. Shaking not just the physical stage of our theater but also the individual stages of our lives, growing far beyond our years while performing at our utmost best every single day. Living in this show family was heaven and hell, Jekyll and Hyde and all shades in between. Life’s learning curve has never been steeper.

I read something this morning that lifted my spirits, a quote by Stephen King: “The only mortal sin is giving up.”
Thank you Mr. King, I needed this today.
The last four weeks have been hard. I am waiting for a decision. It’s nothing earth-shattering. I applied for a job. Still, a “yes” will be life-changing. It will mean to be able to move back home, be amongst my most trusted friends and family, and do something I like doing (whilst also having enough time, energy, and money to continue with publishing my book).
As I wait, all seems to come to a standstill. I can’t help but be obsessively focused on the question of what the answer will be. Time seems to stretch and everything seems to slow down to a crawl slower than that of a tortoise on diazepam.
Of course, I am aware that life will continue and our planet will still rotate no matter what will happen.
So I breathe, do gardening, read, cuddle my cats, and gaze into the eyes of the woman I love. As the weeks pass and my sense of insecurity grows, I remind myself that I am worthy. I have done all I could, shown an immense amount of motivation and dedication. All else is out of my hands.
Some years ago, when equally important decisions loomed, I painted myself, standing firm, enveloped by huge waves crashing all around me. That time has come again: to stand firm, believe in myself and have faith in the ways of the world.

Writing my first book was an intensive experience and finding a publisher proves to be quite challenging as well. However, the hardest part so far was finding the right title.

Now, we found it: “The Fortunate Nomad” will henceforth be “Paralian.”

Paralian – it is a word from the greek language, meaning “one who lives by the sea.”

Paralian… Paralian… roll it around your tongue for a while like a well-aged wine, and my book’s new title will fill your mind the same way a good bottle of Bordeaux would flow through your stomach – velvety and strong.

I have always lived by the water and it has given me positive energy when all else seemed to fail. Paralian brings a depth of meaning far greater than my working title “The Fortunate Nomad”. Paralian brings us from associations of the desert to the water and its mysterious, invigorating, myriad shades of turquoise and blue. Someone living by the sea is associated with battling forces far stronger than himself, being a lover of nature, a free spirit, a survivor, a thinker, and a philosopher.

“Paralian” it is my friends. It fits.

Please be aware that as of today all social media sites for my book, as well as all other mentions of it anywhere, will change to the new title!