Homes On The Road #8 - Joscha, Sindy, Fin (and Little New Soul)

Welcome to the 8th edition on my #homesontheroad series, where I write about people living in freedom in mobile homes!

This time we meet a family in a less mobile home, but non the less on wheels! (With extended introduction!)

Joscha, Sindy, Fin (and a Little New Soul)

In NorthWest Germany

I first met Joscha 9 years ago in Dresden!
I was hitchhiking with my boyfriend at the time back towards Denmark after my first Rainbow Gathering in Ukraine, when we decided to stop for the night in Dresden. It first seemed like a bad idea, since we were caught in the rain with no idea where to sleep or where to go.
We we sitting under a shelter by some shops looking at this view:

Not knowing what to do, when suddenly these people turned up!:

A guy and a girl, dancing and singing in the rain, jumping in the fountain and playing!
First we got a bit shocked by this sudden outburst of joy in the middle of the desolated wet city, wondering what they were high on! But we approached them anyway!
It turned out they were just high on life and we had magically received the honor of meeting the Peter Pan of Dresden! It was the best gift we could have gotten on that rainy summer evening!
The girl had to go, but the guy - Joscha of course - invited us to come and stay with him at his place.
He took us on a very alternative tour of Dresden, on the way back to his house, telling us which buildings he climbed the roof of, which church was the Toilet of God and all the secret stories in between!

me on the bridge in Dresden on the way to Joscha's flat 9 years ago

Arriving at his flat was also an adventure - his bed was under a tent of sheets, shoes hanging from the roof, like the room of a child. He even made a fireplace on a piece of roof he could access from the kitchen window and a swing in the garden.

But I didn't find him stupid or naive. Just a spirit who had kept the wonders of a child in his heart. "Peter Pan never dies!" was one of the sayings I remember him laughing out loud.
He really was a real life Peter Pan. We stayed with him about a week I think, then moved on and I didn't see him again for 7 years.

Then two years ago, as me, my partner and our almost 2 year old son passed by Dresden, we got in contact with Joscha who now lived with his pregnant girlfriend Sindy, in Sindy's fathers house.
This time I met Joscha as a coming father, and there was not as many swings and tents in his room ;)
First time I met Joscha, he was one, second time they were two, and now, 2 years after they are 3. Next time they will probably be four, because Sindy is also this time pregnant :)
And now they live in their beautiful mobile home, which this post was initially to be about!

Their home is an old wagon which they bought from Austria and first got transported to Nürnberg, where they were staying with Joscha's parents.
The wagon was empty, but it already had the wooden floors and walls, which Sindy took off though, to add insulation and put it all back on again!

They then spend the summer building the interior, all by recycled wood. The kitchen was made by an old closet, which they tore apart and reconstructed as a kitchen!

They put new windows (just the windows and wood burning stove where bought - second hand), Sindy build a table of wood from the garbage and they were given some chairs and a couch. All else is handmade. They even made their own mattress of straw on a bed build from pallets and wood!

It turned out to be a challenge to move the wagon to it's new home. For a long time they wanted to move it to a location in Dresden, but transportation kept failing and other things came in the way.
They felt that it wasn't meant to be.
And then this place in the North West of Germany turned up! And they managed to get the wagon moved to here without much trouble.

The place where they are living now is owned by a couple who lives in a house on the property. They are right on the edge of a forest. The last house on the road.
It's a beautiful peaceful place.

They pay a small fee and share the space with the owners. They have access to the house, but else their wagon is completely off grid and sufficient for the family.

They don't have electricity in the wagon - they see by candlelight, warm the wagon with wood and they keep their food in a small house in the forest that keeps a temperature between 4-8 degrees all year round.
The drinking water they get from a local well.

Joscha makes all the money by playing street music, just as he did when I met him 9 years ago! He has been a street musician for 10 years and has always managed to pay the bills.
Living in the wagon is cheap, since they have no other bills than the rent of the space, which is 80€ a month, and else they just pay for food, which they hope to be less dependent on after planting a lot of vegetables in their new garden!

Sindy is also very creative and artistic! A part from planting the garden and making beautiful structures and furniture, she also paint pictures and made some really cool wooden toys for Fin.

one of Sindy's paintings, I didn't get a picture of the toys unfortunately

I see both Sindy and Joscha like some innocent fairy people, who doesn't really fit into the grey concrete world, but luckily they found a place in the forest where they can feel in harmony with the surroundings.

Joscha pushing Willow on the swing

They are really great parents who has never forgotten how it is to be a child, and I sense a wonderful harmony and understanding between each other and their son.
Sindy is hoping to have an unassisted birth in their home for their second child.

Fin was born in an assisted homebirth, but sometimes Sindy felt that the midwife was more a distraction and confusion than a help, so next time she will try to just be herself, but has the possibility of calling a midwife any time, if she feels she needs it.

I really love to meet people like Sindy and Joscha. They remind me how life can be lived "simple", without the troubles and complicity that most "adult people" make for themselves. That you can keep the innocent mind of a child, without being a child. Just not forgetting what the best things in life is about.