From his Belgian friend in Cadiz

Hi,

my name is Simon, I was one of Max' good friends here in Cadiz. I've been wanting to write something to this blog for a long time now, but I just couldn't find the courage to do it. The last week it has become clear to me that there is still a lot of pain left in me and that I loved Max more then I ever imagined. I realised that last week, when I was going out, and I passed the place where he fell in the water, and I just started crying and had to go home after that. And then just now, as I was watching some video's I made earlier this year, my housemate (she knew Max very well too) bursted out in tears by hearing the sound of Max' voice. It was then I decided I had to write to this blog, and I felt guilty I hadn't done it before.

I, like all of the other Erasmus-students here in Cadiz, have only known Max for about 5 months, but that was enough time to see what a brilliant person he was. He became one of my best friends here, and together with the English we formed a group of friends that saw each other every day and over time became unseparable. We hung out together almost every night and it was us he was with on the night of the accident. That night was the turning point of this year, nothing has ever been the same after that. The first 5 months here have been the best of my life, and Max had a lot to do with that. He was always so full alive, always the one to cheer you up when you were feeling a bit down and always the one to give you that one great compliment that would make up for a bad day. I never thought I would miss this that much. I guess you always kind of take these things for granted until they're not there anymore. I wish now that I could have told him how much I appreciated his friendship and how big an aspect of this year he was for me. When I look back on this year in Cadiz now, with the end in sight, I split in up in 2 periods: there's the time I had with Max, and the time I had without him. I whish I could have known him forever!

My deepest sorry to the family and friends,
Simon Vandekerckhove

PS: This is a picture of me and Max in better times