Sunday, 27 March 2011

New challenges

My last week in Porto was one of the hardest in last times. It was depressing, not just because of having to pack, but also because I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to the friend who has been there for me in the last year and a half. And it wasn’t hard just for me, no matter how many times she said that she didn’t feel like I was letting her down and that she was very proud of me, we didn’t know how to handle it. I would have liked to go out for a drink one last time all together but you can’t force people to do something they really don’t want to. And, as I said before, here comes the difficult part of keeping in contact. I hope we manage.

On the other hand, I’ve been already for a week in this new city, and for now things have been going quite well. I worked a couple of days without making a fool of myself, I found a house and I moved in, and last night I went out for a drink with my new flat mate/landlady. I still haven’t met many people at work and have no idea if I will make any long lasting friends, but that’s not something that can be easily predicted, and it takes time so, for the time being, I can’t complain. By the way, this is what my house looks like, small but nice, I think.

Obviously, this last week, I’ve been busy enough with adapting to a new place. But on my last Friday in Porto, I was going kind of mad on my own in the house surrounded by boxes and suitcases, so I decided to do something I had never done before: Go to the cinema alone.

It was kind of depressing because it was the way I was feeling, but it didn’t feel as awkward as I thought it would. What did I watch? The King’s Speech. Very English and also very inspirational. I thought it was very appropriate that the story was about a king who could not speak in public, and made me remember how, when a was little, in more than one occasion I got a bad grade in school because I could not force myself to speak in front of my classmates, and now I’m going to be the one teaching other people and talking to them for hours on end.

Saturday, 5 March 2011

Life goes on

Yesterday I had some great news. I received a phone call that I had been waiting for over 2 years and, instead of jumping around in happiness, I cried. They were happy tears, I suppose it gives me the closure that I so desperately needed, but also reminded me that my problems are not solved yet, this was only round 1.

Even if my legal status has changed, my mental one is exactly the same.

For example, a few days ago someone’s FB status changed to “in a relationship” and it suddenly struck me that people’s lives also keep moving forward, on the other hand sometimes I get the feeling that, by trying to move on, I’m throwing away the life I had until now, close to the family and with quite a nice group of friends, for a new job that is probably not going to pay any better and will force me to start over once again.

How can I avoid feeling like I’m letting friends and family down? There’s going to be a lot of changes in the next few weeks and I just hope things settle down quickly and everyone adapts to the new situation.

On a completely different topic, I've just spent part of the afternoon watching the movie "Crash". I haven't got a clue about movies, the proof is that I've spent the last year trying to catch up on must see movies and I still have a long way to go, but this one definitely impressed me. Wow!