Y2-6: Week 11, Christmas meals, Snowball and going home!

The last week of the semester was also packed with activities but fortunately a bit more chilled because most deadlines were already gone. And it also meant finally going back home in a couple more days.

On Monday I went to my French seminar and then went back home because I had the BUSMS Xmas meal that night at around half six and I decided to skip the Italian oral lesson. I did some reading and reviewed some Arabic at home, so I was more efficient than if I’d stayed on campus anyway. The meal was nice. It took place at the Roman Bath Kitchen, which is a fancy restaurant next to the Abbey. We had the second floor to ourselves. First we chatted for a bit while drinking some “Christmas” Pimm’s and then headed to the tables. We were doing Secret Santa, so they’d laid out the presents next to the plates so that we had to find ours and sit there. I ended up sitting by Stokoe, Liv, Maddie, Jena and Jonathan, whom I hadn’t met before. We did the crackers and opened up the presents- I got a sugar pot.  The meal was nice, the best was the dessert of course! After dinner, we teamed up for a quiz organized by the Social Secs. I teamed up with Maria, Maddie, Monica and Emily. We didn’t win because we lacked some BUSMS seniors, but we had a good shot at it by randomly guessing some questions and ruling the Christmas rebuses (not me though obvs). After dinner some of the people headed to Turtle Bay but I went back home because I had an early seminar the following morning. It was a nice dinner though.

On Tuesday, I had class and did some reading. We spent the two hours of Arabic lessons practicing the oral, which was both useful and a waste of time. I found that after having studied I had a far clearer idea of what people were talking about, which was reassuring because the exam was the next day. I left the lessons with the plan to study and review a bit more that night. In the bus, I randomly ended up sitting next to a guy from Dubai doing his masters, which was such a coincidence! We spoke a bit about Arabic and life. It is always great to meet people who speak the languages you are studying. Needless to say, once home I sorted up my stuff for the next day and then I was so tired that all I did was go through my notes and go to sleep. I had given up on Arabic a lot earlier…Oopsie.

Wednesday was an incredibly long day. I had two seminars in the morning, which I went to. I then did some work in Lime Tree while I had lunch before my Arabic test – Xmas meal for a change. The test was supposed to be from 2:15 to 5:15pm, but ended up being longer than that. The teacher kept saying that we didn’t have to worry that it was going to be fine but all we wanted to do was just get it done. He put Arabic music to “calm us down”. It was a bit annoying because I just wanted to finish asap even though he did it with the best intentions. The exam itself was fine. Except the listening perhaps, but I had already assumed that would be the worst. The reading and writing went well on the most part, although I absolutely winged the translation from English to Arabic script exercise because I had only studied the transcripts and not the actual writing, so I just wrote it down literally as it sounded. That will certainly have an interesting outcome… Then he started the speaking test, which he did individually and by pairs. Considering that it was way past four and that we were more than 15 people, the test was going to take ages and I had to get out of there by 5:15 because the Fencing Xmas Meal was at 6pm and I was already going to arrive late… I managed to do the test with Joanna, just in time to run to CB and get changed in the toilets. I’d literally carried all the stuff in the sports bag so that I could make it to both the exam and the dinner, so I got changed and dropped my bad at Leila’s before catching the bus to go to Aqua Restaurant in town, where the meal took place.

I arrived at the Fencing Christmas Meal just in time for the starters, and ended up sitting at one of the ends of the table which was awkward because I hate the ends… But I had a lovely time. The food was amazing and I could barely finish my Turkey. I sat near Chris, Ali and Fari, and also another Spanish guy whom I hadn’t met before, Alex. We Spanish are everywhere! We chatted, did the crackers, Jess gave out some funny prizes and we stole Chris’ phone and took loads of selfies on it. It was a lot of fun. We then headed to Slug and Lettuce for some drinks before the Snowball. Although I didn’t drink, I had a lot of fun. We started speaking in Spanish; it is always fun to hear Brits speaking Spanish, they come up with the most hilarious vocab! After pre-ing, we went to the Pavillion, where the Snowball was. At this point, only a few of us were left, the ones on the picture. We managed to get tons of free drink tokens and then got a table. The music was not great which was a pity, there was a DJ and a random folk/pop cover group. They weren’t the best singers and were definitely not my cup of tea… But we danced all the same. Throughout the night people started leaving until there were only three of us left. At around half one we decided to leave so I found B and walked with her, Ali and his friend back home. For the price of the ticket, not worth it. For the experience, worth it once during the degree. Anyway, fencing socials always end up being fun!

On Thursday morning I slept in and then decided to start packing my suitcase. It took me a lot longer than planned and so I didn’t manage to finish it, but I did set aside all I needed. I then went up to campus for French oral class, in which we did a Quiz which we did win this time! After that I went to fencing practice. We had the second part of the foil competition. I wasn’t very keen. First, I fenced against Inès after struggling with the kit and cables – they wouldn’t work, obviously I’d jinxed them! She won, and so did the other opponent I fenced, which didn’t come as a surprise. When I fenced Michele, I did manage to win, but by a difference of one point, so that was more due to luck than actual skill. Anyway, for not having trained for two weeks, I think I did pretty well. I fence for fun not to win…

On Friday I had my last few seminars and then packed my suitcases. Begoña saved me because my weight ran out of battery and she had a spare one so I could weigh my bags. Everything fit and I even had weight to spare! I decided to watch a Glee episode but at some point I started talking to Amélie and we ended up just chilling in the corridor, the three of us, just having late (really late) night reflections about life and Bath and how time flies by. I then got an email saying my flight the next morning had been cancelled, which freaked me out but ended up not being true. So much for customer service… 

On Saturday, I woke up really early because I thought they’d be a lot of traffic since it was the first weekend of holidays and I thought a lot of people would be travelling. It wasn’t the case, so I got to the airport extremely early and had to wait for an hour and a half before dropping my bag, and then another hour inside after security. At least I didn’t rush and had more than enough time to sort my things... I had my last Gingerbread Latte of the year and did some work on my essay. During the flight, I watched Glee and “It’s kind of a funny story”, which turned out to be a nice film. I just wanted to get home tbh. After a couple of hours of travel, I arrived at the airport back home. Back to the warmth (literally, 20 degrees), to the sun, to the family and friends, to the good food and my comfy bed. It’s always great to be home.

I got to sleep in on Sunday, sleep as much as I wanted. Then Lara came over for lunch and we made the Xmas tree. This time, red, green and gold rather than multi-coloured. I went through my things and planned the week and watched “Labyrinth”. Basically just being a lazy-ass, but it’s cool because I’m home and I deserve some rest. Although not too much rest because I still have an essay and two exams to prepare, and to go out and enjoy being back in the Islands. Let’s see what the Christmas holidays have in store this year!