Things I learnt from my first semester abroad

I’ve just spent the last week in quite possibly the best city in the world, Bristol (obviously), and I’m so sad to leave because it is beautiful here and filled with some of the best people in the world and I’ve never felt this much at home anywhere else. With perfect vegan burgers for breakfast, smooth ciders and sweaty dungeon-like nightclubs, I couldn’t really have asked for a better time. But I am consciously aware that I’m not the same person I was when I left Bristol last June. And with my departure from this bohemian city comes the official end of my semester break (almost), which has left me thinking about how I’ve changed throughout this semester, hence this post about things I have learned from my first semester abroad. Mostly I think these are good things. I don’t want to be that person who claims that they ‘found themselves’ when they went abroad, but in a way this is true. Here’s why…

1.       Giving people a chance is really okay.

I always had the policy that if you don’t let people in they can’t hurt you so for most of my life I have been really reserved and guarded and shy, and just genuinely terrified of being intimate with anyone. I don’t really mean that in a physical way; it’s really easy to get with someone, but emotionally that’s really tough. I think most people can relate to this to some extent, but I was like this to an extreme level, and still am to a large extent. I have always been horrified that someone might actually find out about all of the things I try to hide. And, taking 2^nd year of uni as an example, this really wasn’t working out for me. It’s just not sustainable to closet everything. To quote Rae (My mad fat diary):

“There are times when I can’t stop speaking, when a million words leave my mouth in a matter of seconds… a million words that mean nothing… but when I want to find some words that mean everything, I just can’t speak. Like: I miss you. Like: I love you. Like: my world is falling apart and I need you by my side.”

But I think I have finally got to the stage where I have a handful of friends that I can call when my world is crumbling, or when it is amazing, because I don’t doubt that they have my back anymore. I finally realised that there are times that it’s okay to lean on people, which my year abroad taught me because there were moments when things were too hard. Times when there was nobody around me that I felt comfortable with, when I couldn’t stand the idea of going out and having to make so much effort to have a conversation with people who wouldn’t understand what I was saying anyway. And what I found the most hard, is realising that to German people, I have no personality. I used to have an issue a lot of the time where when I was talking to someone I would simultaneously be telling myself to stop talking because they weren’t interested in what I might have to say. And this still happens sometimes. And I’m still socially awkward. But despite all of that I realised that people don’t think half as many bad things about me as I do and the only way to get over times this hard is to let people in a bit. Giving them a chance is really alright. And going on a year abroad and making a whole new set of friends, who are in many cases somehow undefinably culturally different, you realise that it’s okay to invest in people, even though it might not always work out that those people stay in your life and that you might look like a fool during the process. So essentially I have learned not to be (so) socially awkward and I now make the effort to get to know people. And I let them know a little about me too, or enough at least. And yeah sometimes I seem like the weird keen English girl, but being keen shouldn’t be a bad thing. I am keen. I think most people are lovely so of course I want to get to know them better. It’s their problem if they find this weird. I’m actually alright and it’s their loss to miss out on this.

2.       German bakeries are AMAZING.

Laugenbretzel is all I need to say on this matter. British bread is shit.

3.       Germans are taught to communicate better.

So Germans are always stereotyped as being very direct and blunt, often to a very intrusive extent (which is comical given that a German boy actually, though admittedly jokingly, told me I was intrusive). Stereotypes are always based on some observation, and in this case its relatively accurate. Germans are direct but I don’t think that this is a bad thing. I think that this directness comes from being taught that it’s okay to have an opinion and to express it. At university (in the geography department at least) there are lots of small seminars in which you are assessed for presentations and group discussions. I find this to be the most painful thing in the world, but it makes it clear why a lot of Germans are a bit more direct, which seems way nicer and genuine than the English culture of acting nice whilst entertaining a different opinion on the inside. So essentially it’s just that Germans are taught that it’s okay to say what you are thinking and to disagree with those around you.

Whilst on the topic of communicativeness, one of the major things I have realised is that I am not very articulate at all. This probably relates back to how much I am a closet person, but I really can’t express myself very well at all. Add this to speaking in a foreign language and it’s just a ridiculous problem. One which I haven’t solved as of yet. I just write so much better than I speak, in both English and German. But I’m trying to change this and get used to articulating myself, and these horrid presentations help. I know in the moment I will be praying for the ground to swallow me whole, but after this fails to happen I’ll realise that it was good to be pushed this way as I can’t spend my whole life not verbally expressing myself.

4.       There are enough hours in the day to do everything.

In Bonn I do the same amount of credits as in Bristol and actually have a lot of work to do, but despite this I have learned that there are in fact enough hours in the day to do everything (as many hours as Beyonce has indeed). So it is my full intention to do everything: uni, have a job, volunteer, see my friends and do absolutely nothing and lay around for hours listening to music and reading. And when someone asks me if I want to go on holiday or to a festival or go chill out in a park, the answer is yes. Always. Because there is time for this. And time for more too. It probably helps that I am naturally an early riser and have acquainted myself with those ungodly hours that a lot of people seem to be entirely unaware of. 7am is actually a pretty good time of day, you should try it. Essentially there is just no reason for my life to be less than awesome. I am definitely up for testing its potential.

5.       Life at home goes on without you.

Whilst this seems obvious it is entirely not unobvious at the same time. When you get home you realise that everyone has been getting on with their lives as if your absence wasn’t such a gaping hole in their lives. At first this kind of stings when you realise that they will replace you with other people and things. Then you realise that this is just how it has to be. And that your life is going on without them too, so it’s not one-sided at all. You can’t fit into the same life again because you aren’t the same and neither are the people around you. Stuff happens in between. This is sometimes good and sometimes not, and coming to terms with this is important. I realised it’s not okay to live life thinking about all the choices I didn’t make, that’s way too tiring.

6.       My friends are beautiful.

Whenever I go home it’s always really hard to keep in contact with everyone as there are like a billion people I want to see and a never ending list of things I want to do. Some people have been surprisingly rubbish at answering my texts to hang out or chasing me up, but mostly my friends have been fantastic. I realised that my friends are all beautiful and that putting an ocean between us changes everything and nothing all at once. And I love them. I just generally love everyone. I might be a bit naive in this way, but I’d rather that than cynical.

I realise now that I have actually learnt way more things than this since going to Bonn but I’ll stop myself there. I’ll just post a part two later. And most likely parts 3 and 4, and so on. But in conclusion I’m less cagey and have realised that people are amazing and that I have got the most incredible opportunity at the moment to do a ridiculous amount of things. And I should take this.

My mad fat diary is worth watching by the way. Cute and cringey is how I would describe it. Apologies for spelling/grammar mistakes, I’m too tired to proof this at the moment. But good news, it’ a bonobo kind of evening…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFSGQZVsBJA

Venezuelans are happier than Brits, apparently…

This blog post is apt for two reasons; firstly, I said I would write it in my January blog post as the other side of the story, if you don’t know what I am referring to go back and read it! Secondly, I’m sure you’ve all seen the #100happydays posts on various channels of social media (Sarah Feldman’s is a personal favourite), and I think it’s great that for once people are thinking about what’s good in the world.  And there is so much of it in so many forms we often overlook it entirely. I’m going to make a sweeping generalisation that if you’re reading this, your life is probably pretty good, or at least has the potential to be (based on the assumption that internet accessibility suggests relatively good socio-economic conditions and a high degree of autonomy). This isn’t disregarding the fact that bad things happen, because they do. But I like to think of the glass as half full. This begs the question, what makes us happy? Money? People? Personally, I love a pun…

I think I found this a little bit funnier than the average person, but then again I literally cry at Dinner for One, which says enough about my sense of humour…

So excusing my digression, there is a growing amount of academic attention being paid to studying happiness, but it seems to me that it’s pretty hard to measure something so intangible and subjective, especially as I’ve always thought of happiness as a temporal state rather than a base condition. But nevertheless, the general practice is to use happiness studies, which essentially are surveys asking people to reflect on their satisfaction with life, and then as with any survey a small sample becomes representative for the whole population. An example of this is the World Values Survey. All the ‘facts’ – which I use carefully as I am actually sceptical about the reliability of such surveys (just think that there are governments commissioning these surveys who can’t even offer their citizens clean water) – that I am going to refer to next come from the World Happiness Report 2013, so they are pretty much as up to date as they can be given the scope of the project. It’s an interesting report, definitely worth a read if you have time and are really nerdy, which a lot of my friends are (and I’m assuming you guys read my blog at least due to the sense of obligation, but hopefully due to an actual interest). And as an aside – I love nerdy people, that wasn’t a put down.

Whenever I have a conversation with my mum she raves about how awesome Denmark is and how she wants to move there EVEN MORE THAN IRELAND (anyone who knows her will currently be like dhihrsighizdrhf). And apparently she is well informed as people in Denmark are in fact on average the happiest in the whole world, closely followed by those in Norway. Scandinavian countries are firmly up there in the top ten countries with the happiest citizens, which, being firmly left-wing, I like to think has something to do with the relatively low levels of inequality (relatively being the operative word). Sadly for people in Togo they are on average the least happy. Excluding the obvious, I don’t know why that might be having only just googled where Togo actually is (though it did not surprise me that it was an African country that came in last on the happiness scale), shame on the geographer I know. Just out interest for you the UK comes in as the 22^nd happiest nation, and Germany the 26^th. Go figure. Venezuela is in fact generally happier than the UK coming in as the 20^th happiest nation. Now I’m no expert on Venezuela but find it interesting that a country with a dubious political atmosphere ranks in higher than the UK, though again inequality is lower, which I still maintain plays a big role in happiness. I also figure that this survey was done before Chavez died, so it would be interesting to see how Venezuelans would rank their happiness now.

This brings me to the central question here, what actually makes us happy? Considering that Denmark is ranked the happiest country on average, it’s probably a safe bet that money plays a role in determining happiness. And this is true; money facilitates access to basic goods like food, water and housing, which are all vital to health and personal safety, and thus staying alive. But studies have shown that beyond this material goods become less valued, and the value of every pound – in terms of its impact on happiness – decreases the richer you are. To put this into context, a pound means more to a farmer from Togo than an IT consultant in Denmark. And I hit the nail on the head with the link between equality and happiness as studies note that people’s happiness is partly driven by their relative income. If you can see that your life is comparably as good as those around you you’re likely to feel pretty good, hence why Venezuelans are likely to be happier than Brits. There is a YouTube video showing an experiment with monkeys; when a monkey does what the researcher wants he gets a bit of cucumber. His neighbour does the same, and gets cucumber too. They seem quite happy with this arrangement. It’s like being paid for going to work. But then the researchers start rewarding the neighbour with grapes and the first monkey gets angry as he is getting a worse deal that the other (assuming that monkeys feel grapes are better than cucumber). Evolution hasn’t overcome this trait as of yet, no one wants to feel like they are poorer than those around them.

But if money only makes us happy to a certain extent, what else is doing it for us? Well, there are a number of things that are likely to make us happier relative to people who do not have them, namely being married, religious, physically healthy, more educated, employed and having friends. Denmark’s happiness, according to the happiness report, is explained more by social support than GDP, which seems totally reasonable. It’s all about the people.

Right now I’m feeling pretty satisfied with my lot, only missing out on being married (which might happen) and being religious (which is a personal choice). What I think makes me happy too is autonomy and my ability to choose where my life is going. Yes there are constraints to this, but generally I can do what I want. And generally so can you (based again on the assumptions of your ability to be reading this). So for us, life is pretty sweet. Just take a minute to think about that. Maybe start your own #100happy days if you feel like you need to share what makes your life incredible. I’m going to share a bit of my happiness with you in my usual fashion with a link to a YouTube video suitable for a hungover Sunday afternoon, happy days:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13EifDb4GYs

Not only does Moby make good music, but he’s ethical too. He did the soundtrack for Earthlings, a film about meat production in America. Not recommended if you are squeamish.