Getting accepted into a music conservatory in Germany was a huge accomplishment. I had found an apartment, unpacked my suitcase, opened a bank account, bought a bike and a mattress (huge purchases considering my budget), and got my Meldebestätigung, a type of resident registration providing proof of your address, necessary for a lot of bureaucratic procedures here. I got my public transport ticket which was a free monthly pass included in the tuition, or should I say, it basically was the tuition. I got my student ID. My first lesson with my new professor was scheduled. I was anxious and excited about meeting the other students, seeing how they played, and what they were like. It was time for the next chapter to begin, I had successfully moved to Europe! I was making Hamburg my new home.

Now – time to make sure this chapter didn’t end before it even started…

My allotted 90 days of visiting as an American tourist in Europe without a residence permit were almost up, which meant I had to get a student visa to be allowed to stay, study, and work. You’d think this would be no problem with an acceptance letter and student ID from an accredited conservatory in town, but no, even students have to go through the run-around at the Ausländeramt (foreigner’s office). As I would learn over the next many years, they have a quite the reputation, never failing to disappoint on the unfriendliness front, to say the least.

I soon found myself in a Catch 22 situation – as it turned out, an official student ID is not all you need for a student visa, but rather proof of a certain amount of minimum yearly income. Income that I definitely did not yet have because I needed the visa to be allowed to work legally to get said income. Aren’t students supposed to be poor, I wondered? Did it really matter about a dollar amount if I was just allowed to pinch pennies and do some side jobs once I got my visa??

I was committed to this and I knew I could somehow make ends meet, but Germany didn’t.

Many trips to the foreigner’s office with varying documents ensued, the clock ticking away toward the end of my legal stay here. There were calls to and faxes from both my American and recently-new German banks in an attempt to prove I had at least a little money to support my studies, but this turned out to be what they considered “not enough”. As a student and a non-EU citizen, I was not eligible for social assistance and welfare, which didn’t even cross my mind to try to get anyway, but this scenario appeared to be a worry for them nonetheless. There were calls and emails to my mom to try to prove that her bank account had enough in it, to “sponsor” me if I needed, which also proved to be unacceptable evidence as well.

Finally, things were coming down to the wire and I was starting to wonder if I’d made a mistake, if this fragile yet proud existence would vanish right before my very eyes. I had to pull out my last trick – my mom co-signed on a private bank loan in the States so I had some cash to deposit into my account (since I had to regular pay coming in, they wanted to see cash in my German account for the amount that they considered enough for a student to live off of for a year).

Guess what? This finally settled the issue and appeased the visa Gods! I was granted a Fiktionsbescheinigung, or a temporary 3-month visa, allowing me ONE 3-month shot to try to find a job and work a bit to prove I could provide the minimum income necessary for my student visa.

HUGE. RELIEF. I felt like the luckiest girl alive. Hamburg was meant to happen.

I had fought tooth and nail to come this far and was NOT going to give up that easily.

Sometimes things happen that really make you believe in fate. This may sound silly considering the amount of work I out into fighting for my visa, but it could have gone a different way. Since the beginning here, I have always said that Hamburg has had my back. Things have somehow always inexplicably worked out. As it turned out, someone I’d met at a music camp during my exchange year was studying in Hamburg in my studio, and his career was already taking off. He had a contract out of town and needed someone to take over some of his gigs. Luckily I became this person!

Without these gigs, I may not have gotten my footing…or my student visa. I was very thankful for the jump-start and said yes to everything I possibly could, paid or unpaid. I was thrust right into the real-life gig scene in town – got to know people, do some networking, and learn about differences in playing styles between the US and Germany. And not to forget – I now had at least a month or two of deposits in my bank account, which was enough to convince the foreigner’s office to grant me my one-year renewable student visa (with official permission to work for 90 full days or 180 half days)! Scoooore! Luckily, they did not know how fickle the gig scene can be, but this opened up my options and gave me a chance to try life here. This way, I at least had something to start me off and allow me to stay, literally putting food on my table.

Sidenote: This wasn’t much that first year or so, mostly just muesli with yogurt, bread, apples, and rice with pork, the cheapest meat over here. Typical student fare, especially for foreign students, my friends and I realized. I rarely bought clothes, traveled home once a year at the cheapest time of the year with the cheapest airline (who knew there was an Air India! Amazing food, btw), and learned even more how to skimp, save, thrift, and make things work…somehow.

But I didn’t mind much at all – my dream was starting to come true! What more could I want! I overcame unexpected hurdles and was starting to figure out how to navigate life in my new home country. I was gigging and growing as a player, studying at a conservatory in Germany’s second-largest city. I was earning enough to cover the bills and an occasional night out with my new friends from all over the world at school. I had a long way to go yet, but my dream was at least on its way now…

Stay tuned to more from my In the Beginning series to learn about how I navigated life upon arrival in Europe!