And I'm never going back to my old school (?)

My latest week in Jouy and Paris is wrapping up, as the final internship seminar finishes tomorrow morning. I haven't yet decided when I'll go back to Luxembourg, as I do have a free bed here if I want it, but I'll probably return sooner rather than later. I really should get back to sending out another round of job applications. One thing I've found in my week here is that a lot of my colleagues don't have jobs yet, and some haven't even really started looking yet. (Others do, of course, and I'm happy for them but also rather jealous!) It's nice to know I'm not alone and all that, but it's really getting awfully stressful all the same. It's easy to forget that I don't really graduate until June even though all my coursework is (probably) done. But I don't want to sit around until then, and I couldn't afford to even if I did want to!

In any case, it hit me late this evening when I finally stumbled out of a lengthy seminar on alternative energy: there is a small but significant possibility that this week could mark my very last time at HEC. In a way I hope it is, because my most likely cause for returning at this point would be to re-take the exam I took earlier this week, and I really do not want to have to do that. (Yes, I'm probably being paranoid. Let's hope so anyway!) It has me feeling oddly poignant in light of the fact that I couldn't wait to be done. While the last few months have been pretty miserable, I did have some great times here and I met some wonderful people. It's sad to think that's over. Of course some of my closest friends have already been gone since summer, off on exchange, which already made the campus feel a bit empty in the first place. There is also a chance I'll end up working in Paris, in which case it'll be just a short train ride away but one I'd be unlikely to make - why bother? And several of my friends from here will be there as well.

I guess the thing is, though, assuming I passed that exam and my internship paper is accepted, my coursework is done. Odds are I won't end up in Paris, if only because it's just one of numerous places I'm looking, and the odds of me ending up in any one of them are fairly slim. So this week does mark a greater finality than any of the milestones that have come and gone since July. Since I don't yet have a clue where I'll be going next but I am pretty sure I'll be going somewhere, it's perhaps the biggest finality there's going to be in the whole crazy experience. And it feels like the whole thing just sort of wound down in a rather anticlimactic way. There is graduation, of course, but my presence there depends mostly on where I am living by then and whether I can get the time off from the job I intend to have by then. It's a definite maybe.

But hey, we'll always have the memories, and there are plenty of those. So to all my colleagues, just in case I don't see you again, thanks for the memories. We'll always have Paris. And Jouy, with its three restaurants. And the piano bar. And the Holiday Inn. And the K-fet. I hope we do all meet again, and that we're all gainfully employed by then!