Touching the Micros screen to check the time for the second time in 5 minutes, a block pops up in the centre of the screen reading '24 Sep '08 19:50'. Another three hours and ten minutes left before closing time. I am standing on my feet, trying not to look bored or distant, while I listen gratefully to Paul, playing his heart out on the piano to the only three guests sitting in the lounge. They didn't order anything interesting, just three pints of beer, and they've been sitting there for the past hour. Neatly dressed in my hotel waistcoat and bowtie, I keep my hands busy by folding napkins, because I have no other customers to serve, no English tea to brew or cappuccinos to make. My head is not with my work tonight, during afternoon tea I even forgot to serve the customer's tea with a milk jug and sugar pot and they weren't very friendly about it. The guests will probably stream into the lounge just when I start making plans to cash up and go home, coming back from the theater and ordering expensive wines and whiskeys from the overpriced menu on the table and signing it to their rooms without even looking at the cost of the bill or leaving one cent for the waitress. Putting my head down on my pillow long past midnight, I will count myself lucky that it's my day off tomorrow, although most of the day will probably be spent at home, searching for a job on the internet. Any job, as long as it's not this one...If you painted this picture to me years, even a few months ago, I would've thought you were talking about someone else. Never would I have imagined getting myself into this: Living a low budget life in London, sharing a small house with 8 other people and doing some random job just to pay the bills - Not knowing where I'll be next month or what I'll be doing by then. Sometimes I look back and try to remember when was the actual time and place I made this life-changing decision. Where did the sudden urge come from to spend all the money that I had (and didn't have) on a two year visa and moving to the UK?
If you asked me about coming to England previously, I would have told you that I am not one of the many South Africans who are willing to move to England or a year and do some hard labour or a random, unfulfilling job just for the sake of being here. I would also tell you that I would rather be poor than just doing a job for the sake of the money. My whole life I have always been so focused on working hard, getting as much experience and qualifications in the shortest possible time to ensure a good future for myself and to have a career in something that I actually do have a big passion for. I was chased by the idea of starting a career as soon as possible, probably mainly because my haunting study loan was growing big and maybe because my mind had a strange misconception that life only starts once you have a qualification, a job and a stable income. So how did I end up here? I will try and rewind my thought processes.
After completing four years of studies, I felt like taking a break from it. I realised that it was necessary to figure out where I'm headed and why, before taking one step further down that path. You see, being a student is a huge comfort zone. Your life is planned out for you for those few years of studying and in the back of your mind you believe that having a degree will automatically open the doors of the future. In some fields it may be partially true, but the truth is a degree doesn't have much meaning if you don't know what you want to do with it and even less if you don't have the passion, talent and experience to go with it. I would like to believe that I don't lack talent and passion. I worked hard, had good grades, I was one of the top students in all my fields of studying, but one element was missing: direction. I didn't know where I was going. And with this realisation, my student years ended on quite an anti-climax. I had some good qualifications on my cv, a bit of money saved up, I was tired of being a student and I wanted to 'start my life' and take the next step, but I suddenly had no idea in which direction to go, I was stuck. I felt like I needed to break away from that comfort zone to clear my head and force myself to start thinking. I wanted a shock to my system, a change in my life that will open up my eyes and give me the answers I have been searching for. And somewhere along the line a trip to the UK felt like the right answer. I don't really know why, I don't exactly know how it happened, but a few months later I found myself on a plane to London with tears in my eyes. My family, friends and boyfriend left behind, not knowing when I will see them again.
So, now you might ask, is the answers to life questions written in the lights of west end, at the feet of the Eiffel or carved in the stones of the Stone Henge? No. I don't know where they are. I don't know where I will find them or if I ever will. I can only hope that this distraction and change of scenery will force me to find them for myself one day, even though it is much harder than I have ever thought it to be. Even though, at the moment I feel like I am moving further away from everything I have ever worked for, doing a waitressing job out of mere desperation, for the sake of paying the bills. If this struggle makes me a stronger, more confident person in the long run, then I am willing to push through it and keep trying, keep searching, keep going.
