Echo de menos...

Annie Rhiannon wrote a brilliant post a while back where she talked about happiness writing in white...

This struck a chord with me at the time, and I think is certainly part of the reason I haven't blogged, well, pretty much at all since I've been over here...

But I also think, for me, change writes in white too... Especially when the changes are pretty big and pretty scary. The kind of change that is moving to another country, having to learn to speak and work in a new language, knowing nobody there and so not only having to make friends*, but having to make these friends in said new language.

And now, at the end, for some reason I'm surprised that I have not just managed to achieve all of the above** but have actually enjoyed doing it!

But now I'm going home and I'm already in anticipation of my imminent departure started thinking about what I'm going to miss...

I'm going to miss being in the heart of the city. I'm really going to miss all of my friends. I'm going to miss that going out until 5 or 6 in the morning at the weekend is normal. I'm going to miss leaving work early on a Friday. I'm going to miss the 3 course lunches that start at 2.3opm and last at least an hour and a half. I'm going to miss that beer is considered to be a soft drink. I'm sure as hell going to miss the daily cleaning in my apartment. I'm not going to miss the work I've been doing, but hey, you can't have everything...

I have one week left. I'm going to make the most of it.

*If I wanted to have any kind of social life...
** See this earlier post about my expectations