The perks of being a Design Student

Hello little sunshines! Today it's February 8 and...

Wait, WHAT?!

Excuse me, but where has January gone exactly?!
I mean, it feels like yesterday when I had the second physics test, and then the third, and had to send in the 6th render, and then the 7th, and then the 8th, and then... Oh, I see.

Let's start again then.

Hello people, today it's February 8 and the world sucks.

Ok, maybe it doesn't, but being a design student probably does. Ok, it doesn't.
Just a bit maybe.
Don't get me wrong, I LOVE doing what I'm doing, but the thing is, most of my friends are studying in other fields and yet, no matter how hard a time they say to be having, they still seem to have a pretty decent life besides Uni - DISCLAIMER: I am absolutely NOT denigrating other study fields.

Now, I know this may seem overstating, but being a design student leaves you with little to no life at all, especially if you decide to take a part time job too.
It's not that we have loads of stuff to properly study - even though I'm surrounded by History of art books at the moment - the real problem is the incredible amount of time it takes to "complete" projects, which in reality you never truly complete, as any design/architecture student will confirm.

Unluckily, projects are what we choose this field for - masochists  - so we can't really blame them, that's why I blame 3ds Max instead. For those of you who don't know what it is, it's actually Satan in it's 3D graphics software from, almost.

To give you guys an idea, here's a list of things you can do while waiting for your final render to be done:

1) Get your nails perfectly shaped and polished like in those cool tutorials.

2) Order a pizza.

3) Eat a pizza.

4) Have a long and meaningful conversation with your parents on FaceTime about how beautiful your kitty is.

5) Google Stephen Merchant on YouTube.

6) Laugh your butt off because of his lip sync battle with Jimmy Fallon.

7) Start thinking about all the songs you'd totally nail if you were to lip sync them.

FML.

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What to expect when coming back from an exchange year

Being an exchange student is an indescribable and unique experience, we all agree on this, but how does it feel like to come back to your Home Country?

Here's a little list of "What to expect" based on my friends' and my own experiences.

1)"Where am I?"- this is usually the first question that pops up into your mind right after the general excitement of seeing your family and friends for the first time in months. Be prepared because, especially for those of you who have been in a country where people speak a different language than yours, the day when you wake up wondering How comes I'm NOT in my room? is coming.

2)"Take me back HOME"-do you remember those moments during your exchange year when you were all the time looking for things which would eventually remind you of your Home Country? Or when the only thing you wanted was to be back home for just one sec? Well, it's exactly the same shit all over again, just reversed.

Then these moments disappear, just as magically as they did during the exchange year. And that's exactly when the third and worst moment of all starts:

3)"Host Country, please, STAPH!"-it's everywhere. It almost looks as though the entire World has just found out about the existence of your Host Country -whichever it is- and can't wait to make you aware of it. Every. Goddamn. Second. Be it Norway, Argentina, or even the most improbable tiny village in the far north of Siberia, every news is going to mention it somehow. I'm not kidding, Karma can be such a bitch at times. And for those of you who don't see what harm it could do, just scroll back to point 2.

How do we survive all this?
Come on, that's an easy one! The same way we survived the exchange year: put a smile on your face, a positive attitude on your mind, surround yourself of nice people and make junk food your best friend!

Good luck to you all!

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