So I’m sat in Hamburg airport’s business lounge waiting for my flight back to London because the year abroad has now come to an end, which means back to British reality: Uni. Which means studying. It feels like I’ve been away from uni for so long, but the year abroad has flown by and it is quite sad that it’s all coming to an end. As soon as I’m back home in Hertfordshire – boom!! All over.
So to update on the past and final month of my year abroad:
My sister came out to visit me in Hamburg at the start of August. A weekend of catching up with my lil chou fleur was just lovely – cocktails, Reeperbahn, shopping, chocolate and “Sex and the City” :] We didn’t know then that that would be the last time we’d be seeing each other for a while though because today she’s gone off to start uni and I won’t see her when I get back tonight. Sad times for us.
At work I’ve seen some more great films so when they start coming out in the next few months – if I’ve seen them, I can give recommendations teehee :p And something that did make me laugh recently was when I was at the cinema in the morning, I arrived and signed my name and all of a sudden a cappuccino was in front of me. Now when I go to the cinema in the morning I order a cappuccino, but the guy remembered my order and I didn’t even have to ask. I thought well not only do I have a ‘local’ coffee shop but now a ‘local’ in the form of a cinema. Good job I didn’t want to order anything else that morning!!
We also had an editorial tennis tournament organised by the lovely work Mädels. Now I must say I was not looking forward to getting on the tennis court and making a fool of myself seeing as I’ve not played tennis probably for about 7 or 8 years and I was never any good. Out of court was always my master move. Want to lose, pick me. I’m not too bad at table tennis but what I am pretty good at is tennis on the Wii. I’ve been out of practice a bit since I haven’t had a TV or a Wii for the past year, so I wouldn’t say I’m overly fit and I was not able to watch Wimbledon to brush up on technique. BUT after some drastic desperate tactic advice from some friends, “Katie Murray” (as I was called on the day) found that drive and from nowhere some technique. I AM NO QUITTER!! We all played in doubles and the competition started. Team colours. Team names. I was in ‘Hot Shots’. The game was on. And it got serious. Real serious. Stress levels rose. And we were all playing hard. There were aches and pains, but we persevered. Now if tennis was my thing, I’d have taken each lost point pretty seriously, but I took it with a pinch of salt and just carried on and enjoyed the day. Sad to say, but the ‘Hot Shots’ were not as hot as we’d hoped. Still, the TV Movie Tennis Open made me realise that tennis is actually fun to play and the fact that I was asked if I’d played tennis before a few times and that I have some Wimbledon-style went purely to my head and made my ego triple in size I think. LOL!! Purely fantastic memories :]
I also took a week holiday, which I must say I do think I needed, and I jetted off to France again pour voir mes proches. Sun, heat, clear blue skies, swimming in a lake (thought I would never do that in my entire life!!), BBQ and catching up. Was so nice and so sad to leave again. This time more than the last because I knew it would be the last time for a good while.
Back to work for the last week and I was constantly reminded by the girls in the coffee shop. The countdown had started for them as well. They were going to be losing one of their most loyal customers. So yes the last week and as per I’ve seen a couple more films. All I can say is now I never want to go back to Seaworld after the documentary made me cry in the cinema. Thank God there was hardly anybody in there who went to see it. Twas very emotional. But Robert de Niro’s new film with Michelle Pfeiffer – that is something to watch – it did make me laugh even if it was bloody and about the Mafia 😛
Cocktail evening with the Mädels for an after-work-leaving-shindig was really nice. Then Friday morning I had a joint interview with Iain Glen. From the name I thought ok, he can’t be that famous. Some research later, boy was I wrong. Game of Thrones, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Spooks, Kick Ass 2 etc. He’s worked with huge names in film, TV and on stage. I must say I was very excited to meet him. And he is such a nice guy. Just had to get a photo with him.
Friday afternoon came as a bit of a surprise. 10 am in the office conference the editor-in-chief thanked me and announced it was my last day and that was nice and I thought that was done and dusted. Oh no. In comes everyone as I’m in the middle of typing out the transcript for the interview with Iain Glen. It suddenly became very hot. Everybody came in and they gave me a box of souvenirs and a card with the Queen Mary 2 on it (just how I arrived). So now I have currywurst crisps, caramel syrup and coffee so I can make my own caramel machiattos, Goodbye Lenin on Bluray and other lovely yummy prezzies 😀 Then I had to say some words. Literally was more nerve-wracking than doing a german oral exam at uni. The german and nerves were put to the test, but I overcame it. Breakthrough!! Well in my eyes anyway :S
So that’s all. I have had a lovely time in Hamburg and it’s definitely been an interesting four months work-wise. The opportunities I’ve had have been so cool and I’ve met some very lovely people. Hopefully I’ll be back at some point in the near future for a night out on the Reeperbahn or something. Who knows?!
Having spent only four weeks in the past year in total in England though and despite having had an amazing year abroad working as a language assistant and at the magazine and meeting so many wonderful people that I will never forget who’ve added to my time away, I am happy to be heading home for a little while to see the family and friends. Don’t think it’ll be too long before I’m abroad again though 😀 I said in one of my first blogs that this would be a trial run, I think it’s more than certain now <3<3
Funtimegal Abroad 