The last exam - End of the French University Career

No motivation to study

After our wonderful weekend together and the trip to Lille, I finally had to do something for my last exam. My boyfriend had to work, too, so after a long breakfast at Monday morning I brought him back to his apartment by car and returned to the student’s residency. After all those holidays my motivation to study again (and in French) was almost zero, but when I know that there is an exam soon, I also can’t relax, so I sat down at my desk and started to finish the summary I had begun the week before. It was a very exhausting and boring process which only consisted of trying to write all the important facts down with as few words as possible and as small as possible. I couldn’t really concentrate, focused more and more on my laptop and Facebook or looked out of the window, it was hopeless.

Running the head free

Finally, I decided to make a break and drive to the city centre to go running a bit in the park. My boyfriend still had to work so he didn’t come with me – actually I didn’t like running alone, but as there was nobody else to come with me, I just enjoyed the sports and the feeling to not having to think of anything. I felt free and wanted to continue running the whole afternoon – everything was better than studying. But of course my body told me to stop after about 45 minutes, and I also had to finish my summary. Completely exhausted I returned to my room and took a shower. Because I was too tired (and because I could always find an excuse for studying) I decided to watch some series before continuing. I fell asleep and woke up much too late. It started already to get dark outside and I still hadn’t finished the summary – and that was not the only thing I had to do until the exam in a few days, of course I had to LEARN all the things of the summary.

Administrative Problems

I spent half of the night to finish the summary before I finally went to bed. I couldn’t sleep well, because I had slept half of the afternoon, and because I was a bit afraid of my last exam. It was an oral exam and I had no idea how oral exams were here in France. The professor was not really helpful, he hadn’t even been able to tell me if there’s a timetable and other important things like that. He just told me to ask one of my course colleagues about all that. So I had written an email to the nice girl that had sent me her notes during the semester before the holidays, but she just told me that nobody didn’t know that yet and I should wait until the week after the holidays for more information. For me, that wasn’t a comforting answer, I am a person who is always worrying about things like that and it didn’t let me relax completely for the whole 2 weeks. The only person that could make me forget all that was my boyfriend. That was something I really loved about him. But at the moment he wasn’t with me, so it was a short night until the next day started – another day of learning.

Time with my boyfriend and other friends

That’s how the next days continued – eating, sleeping, watching series, studying, sports. Sometimes I met my boyfriend for lunch or for a coffee or he spent the night at my residency. I hated so see time running so fast, it was a kind of dilemma. I was happy to see an end of all the studying and courses and exams, and I was really looking forward to seeing my family and friends in Germany again. But I was still unsure about the relationship to my boyfriend and how it would continue in the future – or IF it would continue. I was just quite sure that I would miss our moments together, the nights, the lunch breaks, the afternoons etc. so much. But I enjoyed our remaining time together and tried to focus on the last exam.

In the meanwhile, I met the other friends I had found during my time in France to spend some more time with them. Two of them were German, one girl was doing the same study program as me, also at the same university and I already knew her before, even if I didn’t have a lot of contact with her before. But as we were kind of a team there in France and at the beginning we only knew each other we had become quite good friends during the 4 months. But she had already left before the holidays because she didn’t have that one exam and had already finished everything. So at that moment there was only one German girl left. I met her at one of the Erasmus evenings in a bar and as there were no other Germans and she was a bit lost because she was studying at another kind of university (an art institute) we started to meet in our free time – eating crêpes, shopping or having coffee. We also started to discover the city a bit together and visited the Erasmus evenings together for the rest of the time. The other girls I met several times were the three English girls that I had gotten to know at my first day of the adventure in France. We also went shopping, had coffee or did cooking evenings in the residency. One time, we went bowling all together. They all knew each other for a longer time already, but they still asked me to come with them and take part in their adventures what I really enjoyed. Usually for me it’s quite hard to find new friends in such a short time.

The turbulent Day of the Exam

Finally, it was the day of the exam. I still didn’t know when I had to be there exactly, nobody could explain me how oral exams in France used to work, neither my boyfriend. So I just went there at 9 a. m. Incredibly nervous, something I usually wasn’t before exams, and went to the room where the exam took place. The floor was crowded by people who all had their oral exams that day and it was a mess. Finally, I found the right door and saw two people from my course. I didn’t know them because they didn’t talk to me during the whole semester, but now I asked one of them how it would work. He told me that there was an alphabetic list of all the course members (and as I wasn’t registered officially to any course I was sure that my name was not on that list) and that was the sequence of the exams. I felt a bit lost, so I decided to stay there, wait until the door would be opened again and talk to the professor shortly. But I was a bit unlucky and too slow, so I had to wait and wait and wait. I was desperate, because I was afraid that I would have to wait until 3 p. m. And do the exam after all the others because I wasn’t on the list – and actually I just wanted to finish it. Obviously, somebody of my course saw that and asked me to do the exam before him if I wanted and I was quite thankful for that. And he too! So I went in as next person, a bit nervous, but happy that I had solved that problem and could do the exam right now.

I had about 15 minutes to think about the question the professor had told me before and to take some notes. The question was okay, but I was still a bit insecure about my French and about other questions he might ask. Finally, it was my turn and I told him everything I knew about the topic he asked me for. He seemed to be happy about my answer, but still answered some more, deeper questions. I found a more or less suitable answer for most of them and after 20 minutes my exam was finished. I felt released and was also a bit happy when the guys outside asked me how it was for me and what he asked. Ironically, for the first time during the whole semester I felt as part of the group – the last day I would see all of them during my life. But I thought, it was a good manner to end that semester abroad and the day with the last exam.

The great feeling after the Exam

I left the building and the weather was as happy as me – the sun was shining and it was quite warm for the end of May. So I decided to walk a bit around the city centre, maybe buy something beautiful and have a large chocolate crêpe. That’s what I did before I returned to the residency to relax, watch some series and look forward to an evening with my boyfriend. Now I could only enjoy my time with him, without studying or having to do anything for university – I had finished all courses and all exams and even if I didn’t know yet if I had passed them all, I was proud of myself and laughed a bit about my feelings at the beginning of the semester when I thought that I would never be able to do one single exam in that language. And now I had done them all, had quite a good feeling and had a serious relationship with someone only speaking French to me. That showed me once again how one can change during only some months in another environment and how one can grow and improve with challenges life comes up with. That’s what Erasmus really means for your life – grow with your challenges, learn about yourself and learn to deal with a new environment.

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