On Monday 6 December, I was woken up by the fire alarm like any other week. The halls manager would run tests every Monday morning, but I also remember the times we had to get out of bed at night, because some people did not know anything about fire safety. One time, I took my photo camera with me and took funny photos of the sleepy students. Unfortunately, nobody would allow me to put those photos on Facebook. I wonder why… After the English language course, I had to hurry to Student Central where I had to set up a stall for Tilburg University at the Study Abroad Fair. There was supposed to be another representative for the University of Amsterdam as well, but he did not show up. Hence, I was sitting alone at a table with many brochures, Dutch candy and a small Christmas tree. I attracted a lot of people with my stall, but those students were more often than not interested in the free stuff I displayed. Every now and then, I talked to someone who was sincerely interested in going to the Netherlands, but I had to disappoint some of them with the fact that Tilburg University was primarily interested in students studying management or economics. At the end of the day, I had a list with about ten names and I hope that all of these people will get the chance to visit Tilburg. After I cleaned the table with another Dutch girl, who joined me during the last hour, the international officer thanked us for our enthusiastic contribution and she rewarded us with a prize for best stall. We could have dinner at a restaurant of our choice in Bradford. In the evening, I watched the film ‘Inception’ at the Bradford Student Cinema, which was a nice closure of a great day!
After my lectures on Tuesday afternoon, I went to the supermarket with a Chinese friend. Close to campus, there is a huge supermarket with food from all over the world and most of the products are very cheap. I bought noodles, yogurt and vegetables for the next two weeks, since I would have to spend all my time on the essays. On Wednesday, I went to the last tutorial of Resource Planning and it felt strange to say goodbye to my friends after class, since I knew that I would meet them for the very last time during the exam in January. This was the moment I realised that my exchange was coming to an end. Nevertheless, there was still a lot to do before I could go home with a satisfied feeling. In the afternoon, I browsed the internet for information about neoliberalism for my essay of the module World Economy Since 1945. Wikipedia.org turned out to be a helpful source, even though I never directly used the information provided by this non-academic website. Next to this, I spent some time reading about Chinese history as I got more and more interested in this country due to my many new Chinese friends.
On Thursday, I was in the library for a long time: almost two hours. This may sound short, but it was actually the longest time I have been in the library in Bradford. I know people who have spent hours, even nights, inside the library, but I preferred working in my room all day (or night). That day, I looked for books about British economy and politics in the 1970s and 1980s. After I collected all the necessary material, I started writing my essay about neoliberalism and I nearly finished the first part about this topic, which was about the factors that led to the rise of neo-liberal policies in Western economies. I continued working on the essay the next day and also attended a few lectures. During the tutorial of World Economy Since 1945, I noticed that I could make a useful contribution without the help of the textbook, because I had already read so much about the subject and hence I could answer all questions by heart. In the evening, I looked on the internet for master programmes in the Netherlands, since I wanted to know whether I would have to start with some new modules at the end of January. Eventually, I decided that I would either do a master at Tilburg University (plus some modules at Utrecht University) or abroad. My girlfriend was of course not very happy with the latter option and I found out that the master at Tilburg University met my requirements pretty well. Therefore, this decision was not too difficult and I would stay in the Netherlands. Nevertheless, it would be great if I could do my master at a foreign university, but the decision to go abroad should be based on more than just the great experiences you expect to have.
At the weekend, I worked on the essay again even though I did not finish it entirely. I like to dedicate all my time to a specific subject and constantly learn more about it. Unfortunately, I had read so much that I first had to digest all this information before I could write a sensible essay about it. Therefore, I would not work on this essay for a while. Luckily (or not), I had two other reports to worry about, so I decided to start working on the assignment for Understanding Strategic Management. I chose to write a report about the Walt Disney Company that would focus on its acquisition of Marvel (a comic book publisher). In general, I found it rather difficult to combine the writing process with the daily activities and I therefore decided to skip some lectures the upcoming week in order to have enough time to finish my reports in a proper way. Nevertheless, I did not lock myself in my room, but went out on Saturday and Sunday night. On Saturday, I had dinner at the flat of two Brazilian friends together with two of my flatmates. As always, the food they cooked was delicious and it was nice to have a chat with my friends even during this busy period. My French flatmate told me that he would leave on Thursday and would not come back after the holidays. He had to do exams in his hometown and thereafter he would start an internship in Brussels. I was amazed by his achievements, since he did two degrees at the same time in France and found an internship before he was even twenty years old! On Sunday, I met with my friends of the BURACS for the last time in 2010. We played laser quest in a large building close to the university campus. It cost about ten pounds, but we played about five games of fifteen minutes each and the whole event took almost three hours. Although I could not afford to spend so much time away from my books, it was great to show the Brits how aggressive the Dutch can be…
The next Monday was the start of the busiest week of my life. I worked on three reports and finished them all just-in-time. The word count was my biggest rival: I first had to process all information and make sure I reached the minimum number of words. Halfway through my reports, however, I would typically find out that reaching the word count was not a problem. Instead, I have the tendency to write too much (does that sound familiar?) and this meant that I had to cut down on words. This was hard, because the time pressure gave me little peace of mind, which was needed to complete this painstaking procedure. Hence, all of my reports consisted of too many words and I just hoped that the professors would not punish me too much for this mistake.
As my Chinese flatmate and I were both working on the report for Understanding Strategic Management at the weekend, we thought that we could finish it on Monday night. We actually promised each other not to go to bed unless the report was finished. This turned out to be an impossible mission, so we slept on Tuesday morning and continued our work in the afternoon.
Even though I spent my time efficiently and felt like I could finish the report on Tuesday night, it was still too much work for me. Hence, I had to keep on working on Wednesday morning, on the bus and in the library at the School of Management. Thanks to my flatmate, I could print the report and submit it at 15:00 sharp. As you may have guessed, this was the deadline. I promised myself to make a better planning for the next report. In fact, the next report was my essay for World Economy Since 1945, which had to be submitted the next day. Fortunately, I did make a better planning for this report as I already finished the main part. Nevertheless, there was still a lot of work to do and I slept only a few hours that night.
On Thursday morning, I was having breakfast in the kitchen while I was dotting the I's and crossing the T's in my essay, until suddenly my flatmate walked in. He would leave in less than an hour and wanted to say goodbye. It was quite strange to say farewell under these circumstances, since I was not mentally prepared for his departure. Only a few days later, I realised how much I missed his presence…
After I submitted my essay, I went over to Student Central to help my friends of Amnesty International at the Christmas Market. We held a fund-raising by selling Christmas cookies and I made my contribution by providing Dutch ‘stroopwafels’. I enthusiastically told the girls how my parents and girlfriend took these traditional cookies with them in the airplane and how I saved them for a special moment. The girls, however, started to laugh and told me that these ‘traditional cookies’ of mine were just called caramel waffles and were available in almost every shop in England. “Even Starbucks sells them.” I have to confess that this is actually true, but it did not make them any less tasty and at the end of the day, we sold almost all of them. Due to my short nights, I did not stay all day and decided to go to bed in the afternoon and come back by the end of the market. After I wished my friends of the society a merry Christmas, I went home again to work on my last essay for that week. I had to write about the aircraft manufacturing industry and compare this to the market for personal computers. The essay would count for 30% of the final mark for the module Economics of Industry. Hence, I started by browsing the websites of Boeing and Airbus, but also looked for my class notes and lecture slides. The questions we had to answer were not too difficult, but it was tricky to combine the information on the internet with the subject-specific knowledge. Eventually, I succeeded in harmonising the theorems and the data I found on the internet, although I think it would have been better if we were granted access to more academic (and possibly confidential) sources. After I found a computer and printer at the School of Management, I submitted my report at 12:00 noon on Friday 17 December, which was not surprisingly the deadline for this assignment. I was pleased to see many people running towards the mailboxes after I left, since I knew that it could have been worse: I could have been one of them. Luckily, I wasn’t and with a satisfied feeling I got onto the bus for the last time in 2010. In the afternoon, I attended my final lecture in Bradford. There were not many students during this class for World Economy Since 1945. I guess the reason for this was that everybody already handed in their essays and probably did not see the use of attending the lecture anymore. Nevertheless, the lecturers presented an overview of what we had learned and asked for feedback. For me, this class also meant the end of my academic education in Bradford. For two weeks, I would not bother about economics or management and I would postpone the rest of my studies to 2011.
At about 17:00, I went to the airport to pick up a special guest: a friend from the Netherlands was going to visit me for the weekend and we would travel back together on Monday. Of course, I already bought him a ticket for Friday Night Disco and I was very excited about going there, since I had not been to FND for several weeks. We started the evening with a few drinks at kitchen B on the ground floor of University Halls, which was the place to ‘B’. Thereafter, we went to Student Central and had a wonderful time at Christmas FND. At the end of the party, I let my emotions flow and wished all of my friends a merry Christmas and a happy new year. As my friend and I are known to be real gentlemen, we brought a Chinese girl back to her home. She wanted to thank us, so she asked: “You like duck?” We told her that we like duck, but also like sleep. Hence, we went home and I lay down on my bed and my friend lay down on the floor. That night, I slept like an ox.
On Saturday morning, we experienced the awesomeness of FND. Nevertheless, we decided to go to Leeds and we had a great day with nice Christmas music, a Christmas market and British girls. My friend was taking a great interest in the local beauty and therefore we listened to a girls’ choir for a long time. At the Christmas market, he also helped some underage girls with their drinks while I was trying to buy some Christmas gifts for my family. In the evening, we went to a place where you can eat big hamburgers for a low price. No, I am not talking about McDonald’s, but I wish I was. When we sat down in the pub, we soon found out that there were mostly men and some of them looked quite drunk and violent. Therefore, we decided to go somewhere else and we eventually ended up in a fish & chips shop with decent people. Unfortunately, a drunken woman came in after a few minutes. At first, it was kind of funny and she was telling everybody in the shop that this was the best fish & chips shop in the UK. We could have figured this out ourselves, but it was still nice of her. However, she got more annoying and the staff had to ask her to leave. Nonetheless, I assured the personnel that even the sober guys agreed with her and that this was the best fish & chips shop in the UK (as if we know).
On Sunday 19 December, we made another trip and this time I also asked a Portuguese friend to join us. We went to Saltaire, which is in its entirety a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Even though I had been there before, the atmosphere was completely different as there was still a lot of snow. We visited Salt’s Mill, which is an old industrial building and now contains art galleries, shopping areas and even an entire restaurant. Since the prices at this restaurant were not suitable for students like us, we bought our lunch at the local supermarket and found a great place to eat: Victoria Hall. The other time I visited Saltaire, this building was open to the public and I thought we could just enter and have our lunch here. As soon as we settled down, however, the manager of the property came to talk to us and explained that it was used for meetings, concerts and on that day: a wedding. Nevertheless, he recognised our problem, since there were no public buildings open on Sunday and he did not want to send us back into the snow. Therefore, he allowed us to finish our lunch and if we cleaned the room afterwards, he would not have any problems with us being there. A bit ashamed, we had our lunch and within less than half an hour, we were standing outside again. We were still not fully warmed up, so we decided to visit the church and drink a cup of tea. After a nice walk along the canal, we finished our day as homeless people by standing at the bus stop for half an hour. However, this was not our own plan; the bus was just late.
The next day, I packed my bags and said goodbye to my friends. I had given everybody a nice Christmas card, so I knew they did not have to feel lonely without me. And I did not have to feel lonely either: I would see my friends back home after a period of three months! At first, we were a bit uncertain about our flight, because we heard many bad stories about the weather. Fortunately, our aeroplane was flying according to schedule and we safely arrived at airport Weeze where my father and girlfriend were waiting for us. We drove back to my hometown through the snow, but it was a bit different this time: my home had been in England for a long time and now I felt like a tourist. Luckily, my family made me feel like I belonged here and everybody listened to my stories that night.
Next time, I will tell you more about my experiences ‘as a tourist’ in the Netherlands and also about the trip I made with my girlfriend to London.
Yours truly,
Frans
STUDY ABROAD FAIR
CHRISTMAS MARKET
CHRISTMAS FND
LEEDS
SALTAIRE
DEPARTURE DECEMBER
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