If there were the game “Show your city of birth!”, Emma and her friends would get a lot to see. Because the four-year-old belongs to a group whose parents come from the east, moved to the west, had their children there, and returned to the east as young families. For example, Emma and her one-year-old sister Nele uttered their first screams in Rosenheim. Her friends Paula and Max were born in Ulm, Maja in Ludwigshafen, Lennart in Hamburg and Danny in Neckarsulm. Now everyone lives in Kamenz.
East and West - the little ones can't do anything with these categories. They used to live there, and now they live here. It's that simple. On the other hand, the parents found it somewhat more difficult to decide to return to their old homeland. “We had built up something in Bavaria”, says Andreas Stuhr. In his case, a tribe of 1.000 patients. In January 2008 the freshly baked dentist started as an assistant in a practice in Rosenheim. His wife Stefanie Oppermann-Stuhr - also a dentist - followed her exam six months later.
“I applied across Germany, but the whole package was the best in Rosenheim”, Stuhr says. Dresden was shortlisted seven years ago, but there he would have earned gross only 1500 instead of 2500 euros a month. In addition, the native of Neubrandenburg and the Freiberg woman wanted “out into the world”.
The couple felt very comfortable in Bavaria. From their kitchen window they looked at the Alpine panorama, could see the Kampenwand and the Wendelstein. “Living where others go on vacation!” is the advertising message in Rosenheim. The idyll got its first cracks when Emma was born in February 2010 and her mother was looking for a day-care center. Oppermann-Stuhr wanted to go back to work as soon as Emma was one year old. Only two out of four local kindergarten groups admitted one-year-olds. The Catholic facility was full and immediately waved it off. “They looked at me like an uncaring mom”, says the dentist. In the other day care center, something would have become available in the autumn of 2011 at the earliest. So she looked for a childminder by newspaper advertisement. “I didn't even know there was anything like that.” The Stuhrs were lucky. A childminder, who lived only 500 meters away, answered. So Stefanie Oppermann-Stuhr could go back to work.
But at some point Andreas Stuhr raised the question of his professional future. Should he open his own practice in Bavaria, join an existing one as a partner, or return to the East with his wife and children? “We already missed the family. We stayed in touch via Skype and phone. Visits were rarely possible at a distance of more than 600 kilometers”, says Stefanie Oppermann-Stuhr. Suddenly, chance got involved. The dental assistant Kornelia Panitz, who came from Hoyerswerda, worked in the practice in Rosenheim. The "Ossis in Bayern" got on straight away, they even became really good friends. This is how the Stuhrs got to know the daughter of Kornelia Panitz, who runs a fitness studio in Kamenz with her husband. “Like many good ideas, ours came from several glasses of wine”, Stuhr says, adding: “We wanted to open a health center in Kamenz with a gym, dentists and orthopedists.”
The original dreams have burst in the meantime, but the Stuhr family moved to Kamenz in February 2013. She took out a loan, bought an apartment, set up a dental practice there, found a house to rent, a kindergarten for Emma, which Nele will soon be visiting too. “We arrived here personally", emphasizes Andreas Stuhr: “But not yet economically.” He took a high risk of opening a new practice in a place where he knew almost no one. Patients do not change doctors quickly. But the 35-year-old is certain that the risk is worth it. Because at some point the older generation of dentists will retire. In contrast to Bavaria, which has been overrun by young dentists, young successors are not exactly in line in rural East Saxony. Stuhr brought his first employee from Rosenheim with him: the dental assistant from Hoyerswerda, who wanted to return to her old home anyway.
The Stuhr´s found their new home - and learned to love it fast. Grandma and Grandpa are closer again, they don't have to justify why Emma and Nele weren't baptized. The returnees especially liked the proximity to Dresden. Stefanie Oppermann-Stuhr works - initially for a limited time - in the pediatric dentistry of the University Dental Medicine (UZM). “Commuting works well. In the morning I sleep on the train, in the evening I read a book to switch off”, she says. At some point, they hope that they will have so many patients that they can both work in their practice in Kamenz. And at some point they may buy their own little house. In Rosenheim it would have cost a middle row house a mere 400.000 euros. “You would get a castle here” says Andreas Stuhr. But they don't need a castle. At most as a miniature for Emma and Nele, to play with their friends, who lived so far in Germany when they were young.
Interview and text: Peter Glumbick & Daniela Retzmann