because everything sounds better in French

Méme si les distances nous séparent
Je saurai continuer notre histoire
Je t'attendrai malgré tout
Je t'attends plus que tout


The title of this page, "Jusqu'au bout" means "until the end" in French. It's the title of a song. I don't really know why or how I came across it, but I have this French song on my computer, and I love it. I actually don't speak French, though I tried to learn, once, in eighth grade. Un, deux, trois; J'mappelle Tracy, and that's about he extent of my knowledge. According to free translation websites, however, the lyrics are really nice. Throwing in random foreign words into journal entries is always a nice touch.

In case you didn't catch my French, my name is Tracy. I'm a Christian, I'm a girl, I hate bananas, I have a passion for studying the Korean language [미안해요...내 한국어 잘 알못해요.].

What else do you need to know?

I was born in a small, rural town in Germany over eighteen years ago, or six thousand, six hundred and twenty-eight days ago, specifically. I was born a bit premature, but I grew up like any other child, if you call cows living in your backyard normal [and when I say backyard, I literally mean my backyard]. I occupied my time as a child playing in corn fields, going to beer festivals, and taking day trips to Belgium and Luxemburg with my family. I have one older sister, and she was my best friend during those years, as there were not many children in our town to play with. We relied on each other. To this day, I am quite happy to say we remain close.

In Germany, everything revolves around alcohol. Some of my fondest memories come from times when my parents would go to "wine probing" sessions to taste and purchase different wines, most often to our favorite weingut [the English word for this is "vintner", I think], Martin. Martin lived in a house that could only be reached by going down an incredibly steep hill paved with stone. It was a musty and dim place, but I loved it. My sister and I would play tag between wine barrels and Martin would let us drink kinder [children's] wine, which was non-alcoholic by the way.

At the age of nine, my family moved to the United States and settled down in northern Virginia, in the suburbs of Washington DC. Looking back, I can't believe I survived. Virginia was hot and humid in the summer, far from the cloudy weather I was used to. There were people everywhere! Kids actually living in my neighborhood! A mall within minutes away! They were all novel concepts to me. I grew to love it here, which was probably my motivation for attending The George Washington University.

In the summer of 2006, I returned to Germany for the first time after moving away. We went to visit Martin, and this time I was able to wine probe alongside my parents [the drinking age is 16 in Germany!]. Martin was older now, as was I, but his wine cellar still smelled exactly how I remembered. We visited our old house, and there were still cows living in the backyard. I miss Germany a great deal, and even though I identify as an American now, I will always have a special fondness in my heart for Germany, my homeland.