existential angst

What does it mean to settle down? Will I ever settle down? Should I?

Everything that I know about human beings seems to suggest that I should, at least in the long run. But I don't want to. At least not now. I don't feel ready for it. Right now I would settle in Brussels. Right now I like Brussels, especially on warm summer days. But I can't help but feel this isn't where I should live forever. It seems like a good city to be young in, but not old: there's lots of young people from all over the world and its cheap, and fun.

But I can't help but feel its not really the place for me long term. So what am I doing here now? I'm not so young any more that I can just keep fooling around. I'm 28 already, and I don't even have a job. And that is more or less a direct result of playing around, and thinking of the present. I've never been much of a planner, and now its starting to catch up to me. Everything I do, I do it for the short to medium term, which is fine while you're young, but soon enough you have to have a real strategy.

Right now I feel like I'd like to live somewhere warm and sunny, but I can't just move somewhere warm and sunny can I? According to some philosophies, sure... But if I did, I'd be setting myself even further back financially (in all likelihood) and socially. I've had a lot of fun, but I can't help but feel I've left behind a lot of friends scattered around the world. The problem with Brussels is they're all liable to jet off at any moment. And that's fair, as so am I.

In some ways this is all cool, I like the idea of experiencing lots of different things, meeting new people, seeing new places. I wouldn't trade it, and I'd do it again. But it increasingly seems indulgent and a little bit entitled as I look back on it. Maybe I need to buckle down a bit and see how a long term stay treats me. I've never lived anywhere longer than 4 years, and that was pretty fake since I went away in the summers. Other than that, I lived in Van for just over 2... Korea for 1 and a bit... And I miss both Vancouver and Korea, and Denmark and Halifax, and I'm sure I'd miss it here if I left.

And no matter what, I've left behind my family, wherever they are, scattered to the winds. I suppose they have all left me as well, and I will never live with all of my family again, I'm sure, but I can't help but feel it would be nicer if they were all closer. Somehow accessible. If I ever had kids would I want them to have the same experience as me?

Most of these things don't affect me on a day to day basis, but when I think about them cumulatively they have an effect, and if not now, they certainly will. I'm pretty adaptable, but that is maybe more dangerous because it means I don't notice how changing and unstable my life is, and maybe I should? It's like how people with low alcohol tolerance are much less likely to become alcoholics.

DANMARK...

I went to Denmark recently. og Det var uhyr godt! Here's some pix.

It was a very traditional Danish summer holiday, and by that I mean there was a lot of rain mixed with sun. Spent some time in the countryside as you can see. It was cool to see the whole family again. They were all super dynamic... as you can see from the pix as well.

Working

I've been working. I may have over-stated the case about monkeys. As it turns out you need to be a trained poly-linguist. Well, you need to be able to retrieve fax numbers from non English speakers anyway. This I can do, but not so well with monoglot inhabitants of the Balkans. Other than that, mostly you have to be able to keep a byzantine system of categories and filing systems in mind while trolling websites for potentially interesting speakers and attendees for our exciting conferences. Check out the website here. In general my co-workers are pleasant, and I won't bring up those that aren't. We have a surprisingly high number of Americans and Canadians working at Friends of Europe.



I also went to Bulgaria. I experienced a Balkan Orthodox wedding in all of its glory. Hard to really convey it. Pretty much as you might expect. First we went to a big deal religious ceremony, with some interesting touches. I enjoyed the part where the wedding party had to walk around in circles with the priest, while wearing crowns. I'm told that western Christianity lost the "tactile" part of ceremony a while back, and that's we "we" tend to have less dancing and moving around in our ceremonies.

After the religious portion we moved on to a civil ceremony outside at the hotel. Quickly dispensed with, we moved on to a boozy meal, complete with speeches and entertainment, part of which included the three bona fide foreigners reciting the first paragraph of the Bulgarian national poem. (Or so I'm told) We brought down the house. This was all followed up by a lengthy evening of festivities and dancing. Unfortunatley I was scheduled to wake up around 7 the next morning in order to get back to Sofia for my flight, or more accurately, Janek's flight. Mine was 7 hours later, so I spent my time trying to fool the Radisson staff into believing that I was an important and worthwhile guest who was just spending some time in their lounge. All in all, Bulgarians strike me as being very pleasant on the whole.

¡¡¡¡¡Estoy el mono!!!!!!

Jeg er aben. Je suis le singe. I am the monkey.

how not to utilize HR resources

**Disclaimer** Linguistic accuracy is far from guaranteed, and these passages are no doubt heavily anglicized! Feel free to make suggestions **

I have settled into a rhythm: I have at least one interview per week. I feel very indulgent with so much free time, and so little money. Being unemployed isn't all bad. That said, if I don't get the latest one I'll be depressed. All they need is a monkey who can type and answer the phone. And it isn't even well paid. If I'm not even good enough to do that, I really may as well go back to working at the Keg. At least you get some exercise there!

Je me suis habitué à une rhytme: j'ai au moins une entrevue par semaine. Je me sens indulgent avec tant de temps libre, et si peu d'argent. Le chômage ce n'est pas si mal. Cela dit, si je ne reçois pas la plus récent je me deprimerai. Tout ce qu'on a besoin est une singe qui peut taper des lettres et répondre au téléphone. Et en plus ce n'est pas bien payé. Si je ne suis même pas assez bon pour ça, je ferais mieux de retourner travailler au Keg. Au moins on s'exercice un peu là-bas!

Jeg har vænnet mig til et rytme: jeg har mindst en jobsamtale hver uge. Jeg føler mig forkælet fordi jeg har så meget tid og så få penge. Arbejdsløshed er ikke helt så slemt. Med dette sagt, hvis jeg ikke får den seneste bliver jeg deprimeret. Alle man behøver er en abe som kan skrive på maskine og svare på telefonen. Og den betaler dårligt. Hvis ikke jeg er godt nok til dette, må jeg hellere vende tilbage og arbejde på Kegen. Man får alligevel lidt motion derhen!

Me he acustumbrado a un ritmo: tengo por lo menos una entravista de trabajo cada semana. Me siento indulgente con tan mucho tiempo y tan poco dineros. ¡El desempleo no es tan terrible! Dicho eso, si no encuentre el ultimo me deprimiré. Todo que necessitan es un mono que puede introducir en el ordenador y coger el teléfono. Y ni siquiera paga bueno. Si no estoy bastante bueno por eso, vuelva para trabajar al Keg. ¡Por lo menos se ejercita un poco allá!

As you can see I have been putting my time to good use!

Comme tu peux voir, je profite de mon temps libre!

Som du kan se, jeg profiterer af mit fritid!

Como puedes ver, disfruto de mi tiempo libre!

broken face syndrome

I did break my face. Simple bicycle accident. No I wasn't drunk, as some have implied. Eventually I broke my sinus, and orbital bone. The sinus was the bad part. They had to operate and put in a titanium plate, which they did in a vaguely horrifying procedure. Fortunately they knocked me out. They went in through my mouth, and I woke up much the worse for wear, with blood in disturbing places, but I have improved relatively quickly since then. My cheek is still "asleep" in the way that it is after a visit to the dentist. It makes me want to be more careful in future. (although I wasn't being particularly unsafe at the time of the accident) Incidentally, the Belgian health system did really well, in contrast to our experience of two summers ago.

electricty

I think I once wrote about my battles over electricity with my landlord. Just in case you're waiting to hear the exciting continuation of the story, I will update you. In short, nothing much has changed. We are still being billed by two companies, and have now received 9 bills since we moved in, not to mention the fact that we haven't paid half of them, so the totals are starting to get somewhat alarming. Unfortunately, despite our big conference held at the end of November, nothing much has changed. At this point at least one of the adults we are dealing with in this scenario is lying to us, since nothing ever seems to havppen in response to the earnest promises. We are going to start deducting the electrical bills from our rental payments in an effort to speed the action along.