However, I cannot let the postponed GEJA updates hold up my updates about life in Rennes, or this blog will go to pot. I have been back in Rennes now for.... um...... I did a week in Rennes before going home, and I came back on Monday. Okay so it hasn't even been two weeks. Not too bad! I haven't left the first Rennes term 2 update too long.
Although to be brutally honest, it doesn't really matter how long I've been here. It took a little while to calculate how long it's been since I've been back because I've kinda lost track of time. I've been stuck in limbo.
The GEJA is now over. After 21 days of ceaseless walking, early mornings and spending more time asleep on a train than in a hostel, Simon, Itzel and I were exhausted and longing for our beds at Appart City. We were so excited. Usually after a trip, holiday, cow-tipping session... you do not want it to end. There's nothing to look forward to on the other side. But as the SNCF pulled into Rennes station, we leapt out and hugged each other, excited for a second semester at ESC Rennes, and more great Erasmus times ahead! There would be new Erasmus students as well as old friends, and more great times at la Rue de la Soif and beyond. We could have weekend trips - see more of the world! We could enjoy ourselves as the carefree exchange students we were last term...
So why do I feel like I'm stuck in limbo?
France for the French
Okay the first week. Arriving back in Appart City just after midnight on the night of Monday 23rd January, I knew I could not rest properly until my interview for PwC was over at 5pm on Wednesday. There was a lot of preparation to do, and I had very little time to do it in.
Due to a technical issue, I had to go to school to use the Internet for my research. Naturally, this meant bumping into old faces and the odd catch-up. I saw my Cypriot friend Rob in the corridor, and had dinner with my Swiss mate Jonas, as well as a few quick chats with the very few people I recognised.
The atmosphere at school was different. No longer alive with the excitement of cosmopolitanism, but a metaphorical cemetery of an overly-French population. Many Erasmus students did not return, and much to my surprise there were no more to replace them. I had been looking forward to welcoming new people to our Appart City group, but the rooms that were once inhabited by people I cared about are now occupied by businessmen on a conference, people travelling through, and.....well, I can't be bothered to use tripling here. It may as well be Madeline McCann in there for all I care. The point is: they are not part of our heavily-reduced group of exchange students.
Briefly jumping ahead a few days, I had 'everyone' over for drinks and a catch up. It was a brilliant evening, but what hit me was that 'everyone' had become such a small quantity. There were 11 of us, including a couple of people not from Appart City. So few! I felt like I was part of a refugee group, huddling in the confined space of my room away from the relentless French invasion. It's like 1066 all over again, except we were in their country.
Now, I'm trying to see this positively. I need to up my game this term with learning the French. I NEED to be fluent in it! What better opportunity than a greatly increased French population! Well, here's the rub: they're French! They've come back from their exchange programmes and are happy in their own cliques. It will be like term 1 all over again, with the slow integration of the French and international groups, when only after a month or two was any international bothering with any French person.
Last term this didn't bother me too much, as I had plenty of awesome international friends. This term, however, it sucks! I have gone from the comfort of a vast international network to part of the small group of outcasts. There are no party-hungry Belgians, no dining-fanatic Dutch, no joyous Spanish (this time the subject deserved a tripling!) but merely more French, with their strange propensity for tuneless singing and bizarre sense of humour.
Limbo Reason #1: Waiting to make new friends.
What to do? Well, my classmates hadn't arrived yet, and there was no time to dwell on it now - I had an interview to worry about!
The Interview that Would Not End
PwC: my big chance! But how to prepare? I spent time on Facebook chatting to a few who had already done internships at PwC asking their advice, I needed somewhere to start! Unfortunately, time passed as it does when you're on Facebook and catching up with some good people, and I hadn't really done anything! I was supposed to know about what's happening in the news. I knew nothing of economics! The world is fucked, that's about it! I didn't know why, just that it is!
I needed sleep so took a fairly early night. 01:00. I'm a student alright?! That's early!
The next day, I realised I was screwed. I knew nothing of the company, the news....anything?! I needed my dad. I rang him to ask him how to deal with not knowing an answer at interview. This wasn't good. I had already given up on passing. Now my sole concern was avoiding looking like a tit (well, sounding. Was a telephone interview).
I was so stressed, not to mention tired after not having had my well-needed post-GEJA hibernation. The clock was racing away, unlike my brain, which was murmuring utter drivel for my poor excuse of interview notes. 15:50. I had to be ready to take the call at 4pm. I sat waiting, panicking, rehearsing the line "I'm sorry but I do not know the answer, but I am keen to improve on this area".
Why was I kidding myself that I could get this internship? I'm not Employable Ollie: I'm an Unemployable Wally! Just keep calm, do your best, and work at the Graduate Programme application next year. 16:00. I sat with my eyes closed, waiting for the time bomb that was my phone to explode with noise.....
But it didn't come. Maybe the interviewer was busy. After all, it is a competitive process. 16:05. Okay this was getting weird. 16:15. Hmmmm.....maybe it was 16h British time and not French time. 17:00. No call. 17:10. Okay it's not happening. I've been saved from humiliation! This was brilliant!
I still don't know why there was a technical error, but I'm partly grateful for it and partly resentful. It meant that I had an extra week to prepare, but it also led me to go home to take the call in case they couldn't make an international call, or that Appart City had poor signal. But that's the thing: I couldn't relax for another week! I was supposed to have a week of pure recuperation, with no commitments, but now I had merely 2 days of actual vacation before I had to start term again. It wouldn't end!
So to stop boring you with the details, I had spent my second week kind of preparing, whilst on Facebook with Procrastination Jones. Luckily, Prokey didn't stop me from passing the interview. (YEAH YOU HEARD ME EMPLOYABLE OLLIE! Wait, why am I talking about my metaphorical creations like they're real people? God I need to get out more....)
I found out Monday as soon as I got back from the UK that I would have to return in a month for an assessment centre. I can't get too comfortable here! And now I'm still waiting to hear from Unilever, PwC, Towers Watson and BT about interviews and assessment centres, unable to make other arrangements for the summer until I know whether or not I have been accepted. Vacancies are filling up, so I wish they'd hurry up!
Limbo Reason #2: I've only been thinking about internships. BORING!
First week of term
Now I'm back in what will hopefully be a routine, I'm still not really enjoying it. When I arrived Monday, it hit me that I actually don't have much money to splurge on trips away, or meals out, or nights out.......or allow any sort of flexibility for adventurous excursions. I would have to be tight this term. Set a budget and control it. That's not fun! That's what my parents did at university! I'm on ERASMUS! I need to be free and spontaneous. Wanna go to Portugal? OKAY! Wanna see some random Breton city? WHY NOT! Wanna go paintballing in the freezing cold? SURE! Wanna join me and pull your trousers down in the middle of the club? NO MATT THAT'S WEIRD! I feel caged by lack of funds. If I can get one of those internships it would be okay but OH GOD I'M THINKING ABOUT THEM AGAIN!
I need a part time job. It would be AWESOME for my French, as well as giving me some extra cash so I don't have to work with pizzas again back in Warwick. Sigh, Warwick: it's so close! Only one semester more and I'll be back there, trapped in the Bubble preparing to become a corporate bitch. I need to make the most of my time in the open, as a youth!
But I haven't really done anything towards getting a job this week. Class started Tuesday, and I quite enjoyed it (Strategy), and after that I did a silly thing. Bought an Open Bar ticket. It had been too long since I had just let go and drank as much vodka and orange juice shots as my body could take. Maybe I could meet new people that night. Rebuild a large group at Rennes! I can't let term 2 at Rennes be as boring and soul-crushing as year 2 at Warwick.
As it turned out......no. We all just got slammed. I don't know how either - I only drank about 10 shots! There must have been more in those shots than merely alcohol and Vitamin C, because I had never been so hungover the day after! But that night, the drunkenness hit me like running into a brick wall. The negative thoughts about loneliness and career worries were flooding in uncontrollably, and my mental dam had been severely weakened by the vodka. I fell silent. I needed my own space to regain control. So I didn't bother talking to anyone, making new friends. This wasn't the place for it anyway. This was a place for getting drunk and doing or saying things you wouldn't do otherwise, 90% of the time with bad results.
Why do we get drunk? Why do we enjoy losing control of our bodies and minds? To get Dutch courage? Nothing more attractive than passing out in your own vomit. To enjoy ourselves with our friends? Okay that has definitely happened to me (on occasion) when drunk, but what happened to good old fashioned games and banter and stuff like that? Are we young people really so depressed that we need the drug that is alcohol to have a good time? I realise now (after a Thursday spent in bed, wrapping myself in my duvet like a fajita to minimise the pain) how I don't actually enjoy binge drinking. It doesn't make me any more sociable or anything than when I'm sober!
Maybe I'm overreacting by deciding to stop binge drinking. I'm an Erasmus student aren't I?! Carpe Diem, life's too short! I guess I just miss my friends. My fellow Warwickers and our French chats - I now feel like a pompous showoff every time I speak it in my friends' company. The Finnish girls and how just their presence at Appart City made it feel more like home. The Belgians and how they'd just start a party on impulse. There'd always be something to do, somewhere to go. But now, it just feels desolate.
The good thing is that our classmates have come back, and so the international population has grown somewhat, but the way the classes have been organised means that I don't get to be in any class with quite a few of them. It's difficult to have a proper catch up.
I just need to get used to it I guess. This term was always going to be different, but why can't it be enjoyable? I'm dangerously close to returning to my pre-Rennes mental state, and this can't happen! I had never been so positive as I had last term. I need to keep this up! It's just another shit phase (see my post on 28th November). I overcame the last one, I can do it again!
I hope my next Rennes update will be more cheerful, but to do that I need to be more cheerful. Life has its ups and downs, and my year abroad is no different. But I need to stop moaning and focus on the good things. I'm going to recycle the picture I uploaded on my first post of the year, because I clearly need to remind myself of a few lines. "If you don't like something, change it". "Some opportunities only come once, seize them". "Stop over analyzing". "Life is about the people you meet and the things you create with them, so go out and start creating".
Limbo Reason #3: I'm not doing this. I'm not doing anything.
Maybe you need reminding too. If so, good luck.
Ollie
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