A tribute to Leuven

Exactly a year ago today I was sitting in my kot in Leuven and thinking to myself:

"Really? Is this it?"

I had been looking forward to Erasmus since the moment I got to know about it, maybe sometime at the beginning of high school or even earlier, I don't remember, but I knew at once that I would definitely do it.

And on February 3, 2014 the big moment arrived, after months and years of eager anticipation. I was alone in the whole house, it was freezing cold, I was sitting in my coat, fully dressed, the internet was not working, there was no hot water in my sink, no food in my fridge, I was exhausted from the travel and to be honest, at that moment, I hated everything. I knew it was just the beginning, but nothing was working and I was really irritated.

Then the orientation days started, I managed to make the heater work normally [this was a long process...] and I bought the basic things to get started with my Belgian life. I started to meet people, always asking the same three basic info - name, nationality and studies -, of which I usually could only remember the nationality and felt really embarrassed when I couldn't remember someone's name after talking with them for an hour. 

Things didn't improve at once. After a few days I got ill like almost every Erasmus student, the weather was horrible, the rain caught me every time I left the house, I had to do all the paperwork and I often wondered why I had been waiting for this for years.

The days passed. Friendships formed suddenly and inexplicably between very different people from very different backgrounds. We went out even when we were ill and tired, getting even more ill most of the time.

Life became surreal. Nights became days, days became nights, and everything started to happen very fast. If I think about March, I don't really have separate great memories, but only one big memory of the whole month as being unrealistically amazing. It was a feeling I [and many others] had never had before and for my part I haven't had that since. There were similar ones, but never like that. I walked on clouds and I sank in quicksand, all this changing from one second to the next.

And yes, there were still problems sometimes, for example when water started to drip from my ceiling, but I just put a bucket under it, texted the guy who was fixing these things and it was done. We soon realised that these problems don't really matter; they all get sorted out sooner or later. You just need a bucket to put under the hole and empty it when it's full. 

It wasn't that crazy an Erasmus. I did things and made mistakes I'm not proud of, but I would probably do those again if I could start from the beginning. I walked home sometimes smiling, sometimes crying, sometimes laughing, sometimes disappointed. I woke up in the morning, thinking of the night before and sometimes I started laughing and sometimes I hated myself and wanted to stop the whole thing and go home. 

And just when it was all getting very out of the world and ecstatic, April came with the Easter break. I really didn't want to go home. I knew I would be back in 11 days but it seemed like an eternity then. After the break I had to admit it was good to go home for a bit, to calm down, have some normal food made by my mum, think about the first two and a half months with all its absurdity and last but not least, to have some yoga. I only realised how I missed it when I went to class, right after arriving home.

And then it restarted! We had two and a half months more to enjoy. Of course, we knew it would be different with the exams, but the second half of April and the first half of May were just like March. Then exams started and some people disappeared for a month, others I only met at the library but still, there were the breaks, the lunches we had together.

It all ended very suddenly. One minute we were all buried in the exams, in the next, people started packing. Goodbyes full of tears [well at least on my part], last going-outs, last Oude Markt, last world cup match, last days... everything became the last. 

And on that last day of Leuven I bought the tickets to Barcelona, so I knew I would see the most important people again in 10 days but saying  goodbye on Oude Markt or at my kot to our life in Leuven was excruciating. I couldn't believe it was over, 5 months are supposed to be longer! And suddenly, I was home again.

Before Erasmus, a friend of mine told me that once you have lived abroad, you never really feel at home anywhere anymore. I had also heard all those horror stories about post-Erasmus depression, but I'd never thought it would be so strong.

August was torture. I had nothing to do, so all I did was think about Leuven and look at the photos and videos over and over again and wished to go back, to relive every moment, even the shitty ones. I wanted to be back in my kot I hated so much at the beginning and got to love so much at the end and where I spent so much time playbacking Queen songs into the broomstick while cleaning. I missed the people, the endless Pangaea afternoons, the Albatros parties, the world cup matches on Oude Markt, the Belgian fries with joppie sauce, the walks from the station after exhausting trips. I couldn't listen to songs I loved in Leuven because they brought back all the memories without taking me back to Leuven. I felt an irrational anger toward people who seemed to be perfectly fine after arriving home. And I felt guilty for not being happy to be with my family and friends. I felt guilty for always thinking "they don't understand this and they can't understand this". I got used to those people in Leuven and I was ripped away from them too suddenly. As simple things as our everyday jokes popped up in my head all the time, only to realise that I'm not with the people who could appreciate them. Because of the lack of anything regular, my normal daily routine ceased to exist and I spent many sleepless nights with bitter tears in self-tormenting nostalgia.

In the meantime people started to disappear. Of course, I didn't expect to have everyone for the rest of my life. I met some people I will never forget; some people I got to know too late but who are still part of my daily or weekly life; some that played only a small part but will stay in my memory forever; some I don't really talk to but with whom I know I could talk for hours if we met in person. There are people I thought would stay with me longer but who slowly faded. The ones who sometimes come back like a flash and then disappear again, only to reappear once more in a random and happy moment.

With September I had to go back to normal life. University, internship, normal wake-sleep cycle. Life had to go on and it did. Occasionally I sank back into nostalgia for a few days or an evening, sometimes triggered by talking to someone from Leuven. But it slowly started to get better. I started to go to yoga regularly again which was an enormous help to process everything in my head. I had no time for feeling sorry for myself and I didn’t want to have either.

Now I have finished the exam period, I’m about to start the next and last semester. I have no idea about the near and far future but I have a job I love, a bit like Erasmus with all the international people.

But exactly a year ago I knew I was going to have the best year of my life so far and I did. And what I really miss at this moment is that exact feeling. I would go back a year in time, sit here with all my packed luggage, set my alarm clock to 3:45am to catch the 6am plane and go to sleep with an indescribable feeling, a mixture of excitement, anxiety and anticipation. I want to meet the same people again, to hear the same jokes again, to go to the same places again, maybe sometimes choosing differently and trying those what ifs I’ve been thinking about, to see how it would change things. To relive every single moment, however bad or good they were.

Now, after one year, a very fast one year, it all seems like a distant but wonderful dream that lasted for 5 months and it seems like years and years have passed since then, but that dream was our reality.

And it makes me happy to see that Leuven people are still in touch, for random nostalgic moments and posts, for Skype language lessons, for occasional meet-ups wherever and whenever possible. And I’m also about to meet some of those important people this and next week. And hopefully many others in the near and distant future, because I couldn't forget you, even if I wanted to.

Thank you for everything, Leuven people.