This is the exact amount of days that have already passed since I started my EVS the last 1st of September. It seems like nothing, right? So little time if you compare it with any other thing: your long years at School, the time you needed to know what you really want to do in your future (if you already know), that relationship that you believed it was forever or the endless minutes while your Internet connection is gone… 5 months is nothing. However, it’s striking how many things can suddenly happen in your life without warning at all.
Everybody talks about the changes you live when you are abroad living this type of opportunity, the many new experiences you have, the anecdotes, the amazing stories and the skills you gain. Everything it’s true, don’t misunderstand me, but in the middle of that overwhelming avalanche of emotions not everything is happiness and excitement. Sorry, but you will also find days in which you feel that you are not in the right place, in which you will wonder if you made the right decision. There are days in which you wished you could be back home. You decided to leave your city, your family, your friends… but life, their lives, are not going to stop for you. As Freddy Mercury used to sing, the show must go on, and life will continue with or without you. Here there is also a life lesson you must learn. You will find hard times to overcome, there will be events that you will want to share with your closer family members or your friends and you will not be able to do it because you’re far (too far) from being able to change a single thing. There will be births, there will be birthdays, there will be deaths, and that’s something that simply does not suit with Skype.
Today, for me, it’s been one of those days in which you have to hold your breath and focus to think clearly. Today I’m not close from the people I would like to be with, and not, communications don’t help you feel better, but hey, this is not a pessimistic article. Life is challenging, and yes, there are always difficulties. You will feel down, you will feel useless, you will feel out of place… sometimes. It’s part of your personal development, and it’s natural. But then, and if you are lucky as I am, without expecting it, you might find something very deeply moving. When you are lost, when you feel like nothing goes well, in one of those days in which everything seems just wrong, you will get home exhausted and you will find the warm and sincere hug of your flatmates who wait for you willing to cheer up you up with all their energies. One day you will be in troubles, lost in the middle of an unknown city, and as a miracle you will receive a message from that person who was a stranger three months ago and has become quickly in your accomplice in evenings of hot teas and long talks just to check that you are ok. One day you will not want to go out from bed, but you will hear your flatmate rushing out to the corridor to announce something and you will not be able to resist the temptation to share her enthusiasm.
I must say I feel very fortunate myself because along the years flatsharing I found great friends, and today, after all this sadness, I am happy to say that in these short 5 months that feels like nothing I found a family that feels like the biggest thing in the universe to me right now. In this little city, in the middle of France, and in between these cold days, I have been lucky to find many people who make me smile even when I’m tired and who fill my heart with their kindness and great sense of humor.
As part of the natural course of life, people come, and unfortunately, people also go away. In some cases, they leave definitely and you don’t have the chance to say goodbye, but deep in my heart the great memories I have will stay forever and I will keep them with love, as the memories from this new place I can call home.