Just Another Millenial Travel Blog

02/11/2025: early evening somewhere in Bavaria. The hunting initation. For almost everyone else in the room the beginning of their hunting life for me, at least for now, most likely an ending. An occasion I couldn’t imagine 10 years ago, in my early twenties, to happen but a deeply meaningful one. For me probably the only hunting related activity in a very long time. At the latest when the sounds of the hunting horn ring out that evening I was deeply affected emotionally. Besides that we most recently realized that my grandfather, who was to me the archetype of a hunter, passed away on Hubertus day – even though I normally do not cry at weddings or funerals I was very touched. So how did I even get to this point?

The hunting license is a continuity and contradiction, for me, at the same time. Even though I am already about to paint the education itself in bright colours it isn’t a walk in the park. I do have a profoundly rooted hunting tradition in my family and, if I would start hunting, would be technically the third generation in doing so. To quote Bismarck here the first generation creates wealth, the second manages wealth, the third studies art history, and the fourth degenerates completely. As I studied economy I do hope this is not the 21st equivalent to art history and I hope I don’t screw things up here in terms of continuity (which I am actually doing somehow, but that’s a difficult story). So hunting to me is the world of my childhood, tradition, my grandfather, Heimat, the forest in Upper Franconia, playing on a bear skin as child (and stumble over its head), the question whether grandfather has already shot the wild boar for Christmas and if the trichinella sample will be finished by Holy evening. Another aspect for me doing the license, besides the sense for tradition and continuity, is my deep thirst for knowledge and the willingness to actually understand how things work.

Hunting is traditional, you probably do it best in the Heimat, very conservative, mostly male and long-term oriented. As a woman in her early thirties who lives abroad and moving, also moving countries, is my default mode the overlap towards hunting is conceivable low. Besides that I do not have a proper home so the prerequisites are slightly not in my favour. That happens when you can life everywhere, your live becomes a permanent temporary arrangement (I mostly do not hang pictures in my apartment – to much effort when moving). As someone who loves to plan ten steps ahead bringing a rifle to Switzerland, which I am seeing as another country to live in but not my permanent home, would to me not properly make sense. Instead I am seeing another obstacle for the next move, to whatever place that one will take me (experienced in that). The rhythm of my life is so different to hunting – I do love new beginning, I am driven by curiosity and a sense of adventure in order to extent my horizon and comfort zone (what I just realized: a lot of there’s things you can probably also find in hunting). Living abroad is, in almost all cases, a huge obstacle or contradiction to hunting and an international life was, even so I am now very aware of the sacrifices, what I wanted. Being flexible and moving countries, nonetheless remain my key driver and the deadline for settling down is extend each year (yes I though, like so many, by age 31 I will be married, have a house and kids – not one of theses boxes is checked). So having a live where the next move is almost always only two to three years away, which is highly mobile and temporary a hunting life doesn’t really makes sense to be honest. My life is very contradicting to any kind of hunting and the life of my ancestors. This contradiction is so evident that there is no compromise but just a very binary decision – that to me now is living abroad as this was the promise that I gave myself when I was younger.

The education itself to me clearly was a rite of passage and a reconciliation with the world of my childhood. I do now feel clarity and new horizons ahead of me. Besides that the studying and exam part brought back the old uni Hanna – the girl who loved to study all day and night, staying at the library long and was massively into academia (I am still wondering if I could have passed the hunting license with distinction). As I now have started to learn Mandarin the hunting education definitely is very helpful here as it brought me back to systematically studying and the realisation that proper learning is possible next to a very demanding professional life. Hunting school also showed me what I am, as I am somehow detached, missing in my everyday life abroad: a sense of community and belonging. There is no shortcut or smart solution for this, and that is the price I pay for the freedom I have, I am aware. Hunting to me is also very emotional and sentimental feelings that I normally have to hold back, as I am very much on my own terms abroad and have to move on unsentimentally. Besides that my hunting instructor was a remarkable teacher who taught me an important lesson about myself.

Obviously, from a dialectic perspective, you never know where life takes you but taking everything into consideration a traditional, Bavarian hunting live to me seems pretty unlikely at the moment (I really hope I will meet the Chinese hunter one day). I most likely dropped this scenario, a long time ago, for finding freedom and adventures abroad. The time I have now, due to my non existing hunting career is used purposefully to learn Mandarin and to hopefully (finally) finish my sailing license next year. My life probably won‘t take place in the forest of upper Franconia but will hopefully remain an adventure. What a rite of passage – sometimes you have to look back in order to see the future more clearly. The hunting license to me was reconnection and deliberation at the same time.

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards (Soren Kierkegaard).