I’ve done it. With one click, I’ve bought my plane ticket to Germany this summer. In just over a month I’ll be embarking on the first leg of my year abroad, but only now does it really hit me that I’m actually going away.
For the past couple of months I and many of my fellow linguists have been oscillating between a wide range of emotions: giddy excitement, anxiety, sheer panic, denial, to name but a few. By now most of the stress of actually finding a placement has passed, but the even more overwhelming stress of Oh-my-God-how-am-I-going-to-survive-abroad-on-my-own-for-a-year has begun to kick in.
The impending horror of having to set up the WiFi on my laptop all by myself is almost too much, though this pales in comparison to a friend of mine bound for Paraguay, who has carried out extensive research on the bugs and diseases which could potentially bring her year abroad to a premature (and rather painful) end.
Tales from returning fourth years don’t help to allay the anxiety. One poor guy turned up in Austria with the promise of a spare room which turned out to be little more than the sofa in the front room, whilst many students bound for Paris were ripped off by an online scam renting out apartments which didn’t even exist, leaving them out of pocket and without a roof over their heads.
That being said, there are plenty of stories to fill an outward-bound linguist with anticipation. One French student became a local hero in the tiny French village he was placed in by leading their amateur rugby team to victory. Just as it is in Oxford, rugby is BIG in France. Spain, on the other hand is a country of football fans, and, as I learnt from a previous visit, you’d better have an opinion on the Real Madrid/Barcelona rivalry prepared before you go.
The year abroad can also offer plenty of amorous opportunities – one fourth year’s top tip for making the most out of your year abroad? “Just get a French boyfriend.” (This only really helps if you do French, of course – not much use if you’re studying German or Spanish, though most of us still wouldn’t say no to a Frenchman…) Just make sure you save the account of your experiences of ‘international affairs’ for brief Skype chats with your stressed Finalist friends, unlike one returning linguist, who spent the best part of a formal dinner regaling her tutors with a full and detailed account of her love life during her year abroad.
Of course, as exciting/terrifying as going abroad may be, it’s still tinged with sadness at the thought of leaving Oxford and the people who make it feel like home, many of whom will, rather inconveniently, have graduated by the time I get back. Though they might have jokingly offered to do a Masters/rusticate in order to keep me company, the desolate landscape of fourth year is a grim prospect to return to after the fun and excitement of the year abroad.
A year abroad also means a year ‘out of the loop’, something that can happen even after being out of Oxford for a week. That being said, most of what we’re likely to miss from final year will be thrilling 8 hour stints in the library with the occasional stress-related meltdown to liven the mood.
I did nearly panic, though, when a good friend informed me he was planning to deactivate his Facebook account for most of third year, (“But how will I keep in contact with you??” Momentarily forgetting that Skype and email also exist…) though the chances of him following through on this threat are admittedly slim. Above all, the thought of not witnessing your closest friends finish their exams, get trashed and then get horrifically, hilariously drunk afterwards is rather bleak.
On the plus side, this does give us one more year to delay finals and, by extension, the onset of the ‘real world’. While most of our friends will by then be slogging away at a 9-to-5 graduate job, we get to live the student life in the city of dreaming spires for a little while longer – a rather appealing prospect.
But then again, who knows what we’ll have seen and done during our year away? After living and working abroad independently for a year it must seem strange returning to the confines of university life. I’m pretty sure there must be at least one student every couple of years who, after finding their true calling in foreign climes, decides to jack in their degree and join a traveling circus or something similar… That could even be me.
Though it may be a compulsory part of our degree, it’s often said that the year abroad is a chance to really discover who you are as a person and what you want from life.
Despite the stress and anxiety, Many linguists have this in mind as they embark on their year abroad and hope to return to Oxford in a year a changed person, though in many ways still the same.
