I landed in a continent called Europe and then I spoke another language, one from Just William times, called French. With it, I would order a taxi, or a hotel room, or dinner, and the response would be, without exception, word-perfect English. It appears that an A-level (grade C) in French has granted me the linguistic skills of your average Swiss child (with a low reading age). My French disintegrated under the blinding lasers of the Swiss's English. Still, everyone knows: it doesn't matter, so long as you try! And I didn't prefix every conversation with 'English?' so I did better than some.
While in Switzerland (not, unfortunately, for play-play), I was made to do 'networking', or 'schmoozing', or 'speaking to people'. Some of this speaking to people was with a PowerPoint presentation, and this is known as 'public speaking'. I realised some things when I was in Switzerland, utterly failing to schmooze, and dying inside as I publicly spoke: working from home is not good for my social skills.
I have spent the last two-ish months revelling in the absence of office politics, and the absence of the office bully, and the absence of inane conversations, and the absence of people talking when you're on the phone, and the absence of having to get dressed every day, and so on and so forth. What slightly hit me in Switzerland, in lovely beautiful Switzerland, was that I miss quite a lot too. I miss chatting, and gossipping, and laughing, and over-analysing Lady Gaga videos, and Robyn lyrics, and episodes of Doctor Who and Mad Men, and getting the post, and going for tea, and walking the same old walk around the crummy old industrial estate every lunchtime, and uniting against office bullies. Human interaction, basically.
I have spoken to five people today: my boyfriend; my mum; a work phone call; a waitress; a telephone chugger. I sent about 100 emails, I finished reading a book and I'm writing a blog post. I'm achieving a lot more than ever before, and I am feeling intellectually and creatively nourished, so I am not sad about any of it. I just don't want it to go on forever, is all.
Having said that, look at what I can do with a little app I downloaded! I'd never have done that if I had any friends.
First, this is beautiful Lake Geneva with some kind of mountains in the background. I want to say they're the Alps...?
And then it becomes...
I know that Hipstamatic has been around forever (and this isn't even that), but I was impressed, at any rate.
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