But what a half term it has been! To start I was lucky enough to go on a mini tour of Europe, to the vibrant cities of Amsterdam, Paris and London…I don’t think I’ve ever walked so much on a holiday! But the trip was brilliant nonetheless, and it was great to see such variety between the cities, despite them only being train rides apart. London, I think, will always be my favourite city though, mainly because of the diversity it has. That and the tube system always amazes me!
However, I did also decide to spend some of this half term being productive, and that included me and my mum visiting Edinburgh University to have a look around. We decided to do a self guided tour, and of course, it happened to be chucking it down for the duration! The city itself however was beautiful, despite the rain, but I feel as if I am still no closer to knowing what I want to get out of University, so I still feel relatively clueless about it all. I almost want someone to tell me what to do. With teachers and parents constantly talking about how all of these choices are ‘very exciting’, which I suppose is true, but at this moment in time, all it feels like is a bad headache.
The Halloween party last week did help to alleviate this headache however, the personal highlight for me being one of my friends managing to fall into a fountain and getting herself drenched. The debrief on the Uber ride home with your friends is definitely a favourite part of the night!
But now (unfortunately) it’s back to school, and let me tell you, it has been an intense couple of days. To start off with because I still take 4 subjects, I have had absolutely no free periods for the past two days, which would be fine if then ,when I got home, I was able to use that time at home to get my actual work done, but of course that never seems to be the way! No, that time always seems to be filled with extracurriculars, supercurriculars, volunteering and all the other little jobs that have managed to accumulate throughout the day. When you finally manage to finish all of these other jobs, you have basically no evening left to do the work you actually need to do!
And would I choose to spend my free-time doing so many activities? No of course I wouldn’t, but they are the hoops you need to jump through to even get considered for university nowadays. I mean, would a lack of Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award really affect my ability to do economics in the future? Obviously not, but the repetition of ‘CV’s’, ‘Personal statements’ and ‘the need to differentiate yourself’ is playing like a record in my head, so in the end, I sign up to do it. I was also asked today whether I could attend a 3 hour open evening in which I tell younger students about the subjects I now take for A level, and that was a definite no from me! I feel like I’ve only been doing the subjects for five minutes, so how am I supposed to advise younger students that I’ve never met before, to do a subject I still know next to nothing about?
I have also made to decision to replace Thai boxing with Yoga, as the last thing I want to do on a Tuesday night after a full day at college is to be shouted at to do twenty push-up’s because I am 0.2 seconds late for the class. There’s that and I do love yoga anyway. And when I say I love yoga, I mean I like the 10 minutes at the beginning and at the end of the class when you can just fall asleep on your mat to relaxing music.
But on a more positive note, I’ve finally decided my song for the Christmas concert (excuse the pun). Drum roll…All I want for Christmas by Mariah Carey. I must be crazy! It’s one of those songs that I always love to listen to it, but it is extremely hard to sing. I have already been ordered by my singing teacher that I am not allowed to be ill for the concert, so wish me luck!
