My parents wanted to call me Hanneke but worried it wouldn’t work in Italy, where I was born. Children might transform it to a famous beer brand and mock me. So instead they chose Marianne. I like it. It reflects all aspects of me. It can be pronounced in many ways. The Italian version being my favourite. It seems a fairly simple name but since my childhood people seem to have a hard time pronouncing it.
Nowadays the ‘e’ always gets forgotten and I become Maryan or Marian in the French version. I barely ever correct people – I even pronounce it as I feel depending on my mood – but I do love it when people pronounce it correctly. There is a certain proud connected to it. It reminds me of me, of my past and present, of my Dutch side and my Italian self. Of my international spirit, of my daring side but also of my shyness.
All in all it represents me. I can’t imagine being Hanneke. That’s someone else. A Dutch girl who grew up in some Dutch town. Marianne isn’t that person she is a variety of people all collected in one name. Different sides of the same coin. It’s a girl who wants to discover more, get out there. Be taken away.
Here, there, in between tells the story of this girl, now living in Brussels and travelling the world…or Europe at least. The feeling, sense of being, the state of mind conveyed in the posts are illustrated by photographs taken by myself either during one of my trips or here in the city where I live, Brussels.
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