Writing a blog is sometimes like screaming into an abyss. You are faced with the reality that noone is reading your content; no one is listening to your voice. Perhaps no one cares that you vanished for months.
Sometimes the urge to write is backgorund noise; a whisper I ignore. Today I feel the need to write again. I moved to Brussels, Belgium a month ago to do a traineeship at the European Commission, and I’m no longer temp working. This shift in my working life has been positive albeit fractured by the relentless undercurrent of Brexit news and turbulent political sentiment of the moment.
What is it like to work in a European institution when your home country has caused arguably the greatest political upheaval of the decade?
Unsettling. Challenging. Sensitive. Frightening.
I feel more at home in Brussels than I have in my own country (Scotland, with a brief and unsuccessful move to London this summer) for years. I don’t feel queasy and restless when I wake up, and anxiety doesn’t rip through me as I walk to work. I don’t feel like I should be somewhere else. Perhaps this new calm has silenced my urge to write.
I don’t know why this strange city, with its multitude of nationalities and faces, makes me feel at home. I think it truly shows that home is not necessarily where you are born and brought up. Yesterday my friend turned to me in a lift and said ‘This place is full of weirdos. It’s like we don’t fit in where we’re from so we’ve all ended up here’. I think she’s right.
The female perspective 