The Summer Job

I yet again find myself owing you an apology. Virtually the entire summer has rolled on by and I have not been faithful to this blog! I have no legitimate excuses to bore you with. Instead, I shall share some stories from May 30th to today, July 30th in the next few posts.

With all the restrictions that accompany my Visa and DS-2019, the documents allowing me to stay in the U.S, finding a summer job was no easy task. I tried numerous internship avenues, all to no avail. Eventually, one of the girls I lived with in the Spring invited me to work with her in a dorm. I swiftly accepted, and was welcomed by the student supervisor. Looking back, I definitely should of taken her first question to me more seriously."So, are you willing to do anything? You're not scared to get a little dirty are you?". I assured her I wasn't, and with that I was hired.
For those readers who are not so familiar with the college housing system, in the summer students are hired to help refresh the dorms for the new year. The dorms are painted, the floors are stripped and re waxed and each room is deep cleaned. Adjusting to a $7.80 per hour wage rate the first interesting lesson I learned. 7am starts five days of the week was the next. The actual tasks I was expected to complete varied over the summer. I washed, pressed and folded linen from all eight un-airconditioned floors in the building. I scraped chewing gum from carpets and deep cleaned them. I helped strip wax from linoleum floors, inhaling toxic chemicals all day which left me with an awful headache by the end of the shift.
No, it was not pleasant work at all. However, I have taken some valuable life lessons from my time there, making it an overall educational experience.
[1] People often look at manual forms of labor as the kind of work requiring no real experience, so it is generally easier. Yes, the former is mostly true, but the latter is not! Scrubbing, scraping, painting or performing any physical activity for eight hours is hard work. It is a different type of 'hard' when compared to many white collar positions, but it definitely is difficult. For me, not utilising my brain whatsoever was draining. I often felt as if a trained monkey could perform this work which was discouraging, and I felt no sense of satisfaction for what I had done at the end of the day. I hope that this experience of being at the very bottom of the corporate ladder will aid me in becoming a more knowledgable and sensitive manager one day.
[2] This was the first time I had a five day, 40 hours a week full time job. I missed the freedom of being able to schedule my own classes, skip them if I had to and catch up when I felt fit. Through this I realised that when you commit to a company, you must be there when they need you, and not when you so desire. A good bit of knowledge to have for graduation next year!
[3] Working alongside a lower socio-economic class was eye opening. I feel truly blessed to have grown up in a home of opportunity, consistency and unconditional love. It is hard to imagine living a life where no pay check the next week could mean falling into the gutter. Australia is more egalitarian than you think, and this is something so very special and we are lucky!!

I hope you too can see value in these lessons and somehow incorporate them into your own lives.
For now,
xx

Friendship? Yes Please.

This weekend was Memorial Day weekend. This roughly translates to an extended weekend for family and friends to remember lost soldiers and spend some time together under the new spring sun. The weather played its part, and it was a gorgeous three days in Indiana. The only trouble for me was this. I had not made any plans, so as everyone else embarked on a weekend adventure, I realised I was left behind - family-less and alone. It was a very strange feeling, one I had never felt before. I quickly turned to facebook and my cell to contact whoever I thought would be around. They all confirmed my fears to be true. Everyone was out of town and I was truly A L O N E. Netflix would surely not be able to fill three whole days. How was I ever to survive?? My panic led to a wild train of thoughts, which ended right on the topic of friendship and relationships. 

Wise old wiki sums it up perfectly: "Friendship is a form of interpersonal relationship generally considered to be closer than association, although there is a range in the degree of intimacy".
In what seemed my darkest hour, I longed for a friend, anyone, regardless of the "degree of intimacy" we shared. My options were nil. I turned to facebook, and as much as IM'd anyone, my sudden friendship void was not filled. This was the lightbulb a-ha moment. It didn't matter that I had over 400 friends listed. With half of them in a different country and the remaining elsewhere in the U.S, none of them were here, now. Alas, I am from the instant gratification generation. So, I began to truly recognise the importance of tangible friendships in my life. Kathleen Keating, an emotional intelligence expert seems to agree. "We are alone in our separate bodies, yet to live we must connect with each other in order to belong and feel that our needs are met". Yes, social media and technology is connecting our world in a way never experienced before, breaking geographic and even cultural and communications barriers. But what I discovered this weekend is that the actual experiences friends share are invaluable and irreplaceable. The coffee or dinner date, the day at the beach, whatever you share with your friends, hold on to it. They are so important!!! Well, for those wondering, my weekend wasn't all bad, and I did eventually track down a friend who was in town. I really valued the time we spent together, and with this realisation, I feel my little planning mishap turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Yet another lesson learned abroad to add to my list. Hope you all had a great weekend lovelies.
xx

The low down

Welcome to the first post. 

Now for the explanation. Hi! I'm Kendall, the one in the middle in white if you're unfamiliar. I'm originally from Amanzimtoti, South Africa but Brisbane in Australia is and has been home for 14 years. Currently, I am an exchange student at Purdue University in Indiana. I arrived in the U.S on 28 December, 2010 and embarked on what was set to be a six month stint.  March seemed to arrive almost as if the next week and I realised I needed more time, so I extended and am here for almost a full year, departing now on December 19. Needless to say I LOVE IT. Of course I miss everyone and many things from home, but I have experienced so much, grown much more and met so many amazing people. I decided, using inspiration from other bloggers, that I needed to blog. I know I am no longer that 'new' in the midwest, having only started this five months in. However, this blog will cover everything new I run into, learn, love and aspire toward. I hope you'll find these musings of some benefit. 

xx