Walking the Tightrope

I took this opportunity to finally pick up The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera, a book I have been meaning to read for years but just never got around to doing so. And am I glad I did, because the story is simply incredible. Weaving together the perspectives of four central characters whose lives are deeply entwined, Kundera explores Czechoslovakia and its people in the aftermath of the 1968 Soviet Union invasion that crushed the Prague Spring movement, changing the country overnight and forever. In the story, Tereza moves from Prague to Zurich for her lover Tomas, and finds herself troubled with the transition. “Being in a foreign country means walking a tightrope high above the ground without the net afforded by the country where he has his family, colleagues, and friends, and where he can easily say what he has to say in a language he has known from childhood.”

In moving to a foreign country, you really have to open yourself up to the possibility of feeling completely alone. There are no recognizable words, faces, and traditions to seek comfort in, no source of familiarity to grasp on to and depend on, and as Kundera illustrates it, no safety net. But I would say that’s part of the thrill. You open yourself up to a slew of possibilities that would never happen at home. In a way, I almost feel like it is harder to discard that safety net nowadays, with communication made so quick and easy and Starbucks signs littering the world. The challenge for us is to break out of our comfort zone and be brave enough to seek the unknown, to walk the tightrope.