The catering tent smelled like overcooked fish, and the conversations around me were the same tired loops I’d heard a hundred times before. War, migrants, inflation, energy. They talked like it was all inevitable, like a storm you just had to ride out. I was holding a paper cup of lukewarm coffee, not really part of the group but close enough to listen. When I finally spoke, it was more out of frustration than anything else.

The office smelled the same as it always had: a faint mix of musty paperwork, cheap air freshener, and frustration. I sat in the same kind of metal chair I used to watch citizens sink into during my years in public service in Chengdu, China. This time, I was on the other side of the desk, clutching my forms, waiting for my turn.

The sun was barely up, but Bamako, Mali, was already awake. The market district buzzed with noise—vendors shouting, engines sputtering, people jostling. My battered old Peugeot 504 creaked under the weight of the family I was driving. A father, mother, and two wide-eyed children sat in the back, their silence as heavy as the heat that pressed down on us.

Twenty years ago, the sea betrayed us. It wasn’t the gentle horizon my father loved, the one he stared at during quiet moments on the dock. That day, it rose like a predator, devouring everything in its path. My father was one of over 160,000 Indonesians taken by the tsunami. He worked as a dock worker on the coast of Banda Aceh. There was no warning system then, no time to escape. Just devastation.

The barn smelled of fresh hay and warm animals, a scent I’ve known since I could walk. It was dusk, and the sky outside glowed a soft orange as I leaned against the old wooden door, watching the cows settle for the evening. My life has been rooted here, on this farm in the gentle hills of Croatia. Forty years of work have left my hands calloused and my back stiff, but they’ve also given me something far greater—perspective.

The scent of fresh bread barely cuts through the chill of winter in Madrid, Spain. I cradle my coffee, its heat seeping into my fingers as I stare at the street outside. It feels surreal to be here—half a world away from Buenos Aires, Argentina, where everything seems to be unraveling. I haven’t been back in six months, and the city I left behind feels like a distant memory.

The smell of smoke clung to my uniform, even after I had scrubbed my hands raw and changed into fresh clothes. It was past noon on New Year’s Day, and the house was eerily silent, except for the occasional creak of the floorboards beneath my feet. My wife had gone to visit her sister, leaving me to my thoughts.

The young man’s hand was a mess of raw flesh, shredded tendons, and shattered bones when he arrived in our emergency department on New Year’s Eve. His name was Julian, barely 18, and his face was as pale as the sterile walls surrounding us. "It was just supposed to be a joke," he murmured, his voice trembling under the weight of morphine and regret.

The final hours before the show always feel like a slow burn, a pyrotechnic fuse creeping toward ignition. My crew and I have spent months perfecting every detail of this year’s New Year’s Eve fireworks in Sydney, Australia, and yet, as we stand near the Harbour Bridge, the enormity of it all hangs heavy. Nine tons of pyrotechnics. Drones creating shapes we once thought impossible.

The smoke from the cooking fires still haunts me sometimes, curling in my memory like it did in my grandmother’s kitchen all those years ago. I was nine, sent to the village for the long holidays. It was supposed to be a break from city life, but it turned into something far darker.

The howling begins just after sunset, a low, guttural wail that claws its way into your chest like an unwelcome specter. It grows louder, a cacophony of scraping, barking, and quacking, as if hell’s orchestra has been set loose. I sit on my porch, a glass of soju trembling in my hand, knowing what’s coming but still unprepared for it. My wife, Mina, has already barricaded herself inside, clutching her sleeping pills like a lifeline.

The market was alive with noise, a jumble of shouts and laughter mingling with the earthy smell of fresh produce. I adjusted the woven bag on my shoulder, scanning the stalls piled high with tomatoes, zucchini, and gleaming eggplants. This was one of my favorite rituals in Milan, the city I’ve called home for all of my 25 years.

The clock in my office ticks faintly, a sound I didn’t know I missed until a few years ago. I often find myself glancing at it when my last patient of the day has left, marveling at the clarity of its rhythm. For 52 years, I lived without that sound, the world muted and contained within the confines of my own determined mind.

The hum of the headset feels like an extra heartbeat, a pulse I can’t ignore. Fourteen years in a supermarket in Berlin, Germany, and it’s always the same: deliveries to check in, shelves to stock, prices to update. The voice in my ear reminds me of tasks I haven’t finished yet. On busy days, it’s chaos. At 32, I’ve developed a knack for juggling it all without falling apart—at least on the outside.

The Santa gig was supposed to be my big break—something lighthearted to break up the heavy slog of odd jobs I’d been doing to keep afloat in Chicago. At 59, you don’t exactly bounce back from financial setbacks like you used to, and when my friend joked that I had the perfect Santa Claus look, I thought, “Why not?” Big guy, white beard, deep voice—it made sense.

The monsoon was late this year. Even in June, the skies over our village in southern India were only faintly gray, teasing us with the promise of rain. The air hung heavy with heat and the unspoken tensions that were my constant companions. I brushed rice grains into the pot, my mind spiraling through memories and futures I couldn’t control.

The mud squelched under my boots as I made my way up the slope, the scent of damp earth mingling with the sharp resin of fir trees. Racha’s forests always had a way of reminding me of my childhood in Tlughi, Georgia, even now, at 32. I’d grown up watching men climb these towering trees, their movements as graceful as dancers in a perilous performance. Now, I was one of them.

Three years ago, I fell victim to a cryptocurrency scam. At the time, I was obsessed with the idea of traveling the world. Most of my friends were doing it, financed by their parents. For me, though, it was a distant dream—I couldn’t afford it on my barista salary, and my family in the suburbs of Paris, France, couldn’t help. I was 21 and desperate to find a way.

It was a grey afternoon in Dublin, Ireland, when I stood outside the philosophy department, my breath misting in the cold. The city had become my sanctuary in the past year, far enough from Waterford to feel the distance, but close enough for its shadows to linger. I had just finished a lecture on Nietzsche, a thinker who seemed to scorn everything that once defined my life.

The whispers started long before I even understood their weight. At the marketplace, women would glance at me, their voices hushed but sharp enough to pierce. At family gatherings, the unspoken questions hung heavier than the aroma of jollof rice. In Chachi, Nigeria, where the streets are filled with children’s laughter and mothers sling babies on their backs with effortless grace, I became the silence in a chorus.