Saying farewell

Date: 15.10.2026

Saying farewell was a challenge. Not because we didn’t know what to say, but rather because realization hadn’t fully hit us yet. Because our minds had yet to process the fact that we were going to be gone for half a year. That we were not going to return home, not going to sleep in our beds or study in our rooms for half a year. I’m not sure, if we have realized it by now. So, there we were standing. Nine o’clock in the morning, right after breakfast, thoroughly dressed in our oilskins, since the North-German weather is always ready to bring a few surprises. We had half an hour on the pier to say farewell. Half an hour to cry, half an hour to laugh, to hug our loved ones. Half an hour that passed all too suddenly and when we returned to the ship, it didn’t really feel like we had finished. This feeling of incompleteness is probably the reason why there’s always a kind of farewell-show when it’s time for the Thor to leave Kiel once again. It turns saying farewell into a whole process that makes both leaving and being left easier.

Starting with Dr. Ruth Merk as project manager, the AlumniKUS association, Dr. Johannes Schiller as new head of the Thor Heyerdahl gGmbH, us student as well as our parents each gave a speech, expressing different feelings, expectations and points of view.

All of us sailors got to introduce ourselves and between the different points on the agenda the music project and the parents contributed different songs. However, at some point we had to leave. After a final test-alarm, we sat sails for the very first time and the Thor Heyerdahl set out from Kiel’s port. Behind us, the pier with all its visitors calling, singing and waving of colored handkerchiefs got smaller and smaller, as we sailed into half a year of adventure, experience and collecting memories. If we had tried to sort our feelings, we probably would have failed miserably. We were feeling everything at once, even contrary feelings, worry and excitement, annoyance and happiness, sadness and confusion and numerous other emotions. It felt like everyone was overwhelmed.

Yet, at the same time there was so much to do, so much to see, so many new things that we didn’t even have the time to think much.

Setting sails for the first time, climbing the main deck’s house for the first time, or pulling the rescue boat aboard for the first time. We had so many first times that at the end of the day everyone fell into their beds, sleeping soundly and deeply, regardless of the roaring sound of the machine.