Well I’m home, the last week over and gone and finished and here I am already wondering what to do next and how to carry on. This week went so fast in so many ways but also seemed to drag as saying ‘goodbye’ is always horrible. As I mentioned last week, we said goodbye to Rob on Sunday evening with vodka watermelon; Monday evening I was sitting in Rachel’s room watching her tidy idly wondering if we were really leaving. After the beginning of the year, one would have thought I’d learnt my lesson: Don’t pretend that things aren’t going to happen.

It was hardly surprising then that I was doing a great job of exactly that- I carried on as usual. The beginning of the week was just a blur of work and bad spelling, I worked every hour possible to get my report completely finished but by Wednesday it was pretty much complete and ready to print Thursday morning.

The evenings were anything but normal (or at least our concept of normal), Tuesday night Rachel and Andrew spent their hard earned Auchan points on expensive bottles of ‘bubbly’ and wine and we sat and chatted in our cleaning clothes- I think I was pretending to start sorting my room out (another symptom of pretending things aren’t going to happen.)

The ‘goodbye’s’ started in earnest on Wednesday, we held a ‘petit fête’ chez Andrew for all of our closest friends, Shusaku, Clara, Phil, Anne and Anna, Sana, Rachel’s sister had already arrived by this point (she came over to help Rachel and Irene to get all her stuff back) and she spoke to the Anglophones. It was nice to have one last French evening but Shusaku and I spent the evening chatting to each other as out of everyone I think I will miss him most because I don’t know when I will next see him.

On Thursday we continued the ‘aurevoir’s’ with a ‘pôt’ in the labs, that is to say a drink with everyone, I was glad we organised it, even though it cost us a small fortune in cake and Cremant d’Alsace, since we could say a proper thank you and goodbye rather than sneaking out the back door. It gave it a proper finish and felt final, I was worried it would be a non-event and feel odd but it was nice and yet horrible to have to ‘bisou’ everyone knowing I may never see them again. Still kissing cheeks with 14 people is not easy and I’m glad I won’t be doing that again for a while!

Lydie wasn’t able to come to our gathering which I was sad about, I gave Gabin his present but I had to leave Lydie’s on her table on Friday as she wasn’t there again. It was a shame because I had really grown to like Lydie and she helped me so much, I hoped she liked her present. It felt weird walking away from labs, after going in nearly every day, saying goodbye to Gabin was awful, it was surprising to discover how much I had grown to like him and how much I will miss him- I didn’t expect to feel so sad!

There was no time for sadness though as Irene was taking us out to the 3 brasseurs (flammekeuche place) for dinner- if you ever go to Lille I highly recommend this place, it is reasonably priced, they do amazing beer and flammekeuche are the next big thing if you ask me. It’s just off to the left as you come out of Gare Lille Flandres.

Anyway, we managed to get in the kettle again which was fun and afterwards we headed over to the Oz bar one last time with Sarah where, in a typical us move, Rachel and I decided we wanted the blue drinks everyone else seemed to have even though we had no idea what they were. So Rachel, with a coquettish giggle asked for ‘six of those blue drinks please,’ well, it was our last night- they turned out to be cocktails that cost € 8.50!

When we got in at 11.30 I finally realised that I was leaving the next day- I looked around my room, it was total chaos and no hint of packing. In a panic I started throwing things into bags and by the time I fell into bed most of my packing was done- I had about four hours sleep before I was up gutting my room and bleaching every square inch of it. A few tea breaks later and Rachel was leaving, it was odd because I know I will see her again, if I have anything to do with it I’ll be seeing her every other week! But it was still sad to know that it was the end of an era.

There was no time to dwell however as I still had a room to sort out, by one o clock I had finished all be it exhausted and with the migraine from hell! Sarah popped over to give me back my book and seemed reluctant to leave so we sat and chatted and waited for my parents. It was an ominous feeling, knowing it was the end and that I was going away for good.

As we packed the car (in record time thanks to all the help from Andrew, Sarah and Kalyleigh (Andrew’s friend)) I remembered back to my arrival and how it seemed only moments ago in time, but I don’t recognise the girl who arrived at Boucher and panicked about not having a washing machine.

In typical French style at half three my room was empty and spotless, my report had been collected and I was ready to hand over my keys and yet there was no one about. The office had been closed all day- this did not surprise me at all and I’d written a letter to post through the letter box just in case. And so came the final goodbye’s, Sarah and Andrew, we looked at each other as if we were doing each other a disservice and hugged for a while- words weren’t really enough by this point.

My parents and I wasted a few hours in Lille, buying some Macarons and having a final croque before getting in the car and heading to Le Tunnel sous la Manche. I was home by ten feeling sick, exhausted, sick and sad to leave, happy I went, relieved to have finished all my work and dreading unpacking everything.

I’m going to post one last blog after this one, I want to settle back into home and reflect a little on the year before writing a concluding piece but for now I’ll finish by saying that I wouldn’t have missed or changed this year for the world!