Winter Break - Stuck in Sackville

Author: Lestyn V Lobo
Posted on February 3, 2021

The time you realize that all your friends have already booked a flight back home from Sackville, but you still haven’t or maybe can’t, what do you do instead? You are now stranded in the town of Sackville for a month or so eagerly waiting for the new semester to start (some more than others I guess) or maybe just anticipating the arrival of your friends back on campus. My first year here in Sackville and I was left to wonder what activities to engage in over the one-month break after exams. Honestly, I did not know what to expect. Sackville is quite a small place and one can easily find their way around, let alone cover the entire town in under 25 minutes. After exams ended, I stayed at home locking myself in my room with my only companions being my laptop, books, and obviously my cell phone. Now the break has already reached its very end and one might ask me, “so tell me, what did you do? Was it fun?"

Binge Watch an Entire TV Sitcom 

What better way to kick start into the winter break than to already prepare yourself with the TV sitcom you will dedicate your time watching for the next four weeks. For me, it was the TV show Friends – 10 seasons with 24 episodes in each season; that did help me keep myself occupied for the ample of my time. I would often start off with one to two episodes each day until I would reach the point where I would realize that the previous episode ended in a cliff-hanger and I am eager to know what takes place next. I grab the mouse in a haste and click the following episode and the one after until I realize that an entire season has come to an end and it is 2:45 in the morning. I say to myself, “Well Lestyn, you don’t have anything better to do. No other engagements. You are good”, giving myself a light pat on the back. What does happen when you eventually do complete the 10 seasons of the TV show you were engaged in? I moved on to the next and the next, eventually re-watching shows I had already watched three to four times the month earlier. Of course, one might wonder, “doesn’t this seem exciting? Watching your favourite show without any interruptions or worries!” Hate to break it to you, but there was a tiny issue, one that instills fear and worry in us all. 

Anticipation of Final Results 

With the stress of answering an exam finally swept off your shoulder, another dreadful emotion interferes with your ability to rejoice – the how did I really do emotion/moment. From the moment you submit your paper until you get your results, I believe that one is left in the zone where one tries to pretend that all is certainly well, and it will continue to be the same even after the results are out. My biggest traumatic event over the first two weeks of the break was to obtain my results for the Computer Science course. I was confident that an “A+” would appear besides every other subject except for Computer Science. The anticipation of results for this one course was quite traumatic as I was nervous, I might have to re-take the course. Despite engaging in several entertaining activities like watching Friends, eating my favourite foods, sleeping a lot, I could not find a moment of ease. One thing you could choose to do during the beginning of your winter break is to reflect on your performance over the past semester and how you could improve. That is exactly what I chose to do initially until I got my results. Hurray!

Getting Hired for a Part-time Job 

After the end of an exam period, I decided I only wanted to lay in bed till late in the morning, wake up at noon, and start engaging in activities I find amusing; for instance, working out (that does seem a bit exhausting), switching from one movie to the next while munching on some crisps – I really do not know how I did not end up with a holiday tummy. After having my bit of leisure for two consecutive weeks, I decided it was time to pull up my trousers and head onto work. Luckily for me, I had a job on campus already which was to monitor students currently in isolation, so I did not have to waste my time job-hunting (that would certainly be nerve-racking). My advice for those of you planning to stay back in Sackville for the upcoming winter breaks, take as much rest as you want during the four week break because when the new semester starts, you are certainly going to look back at those four weeks of winter break where you had it all your way, just the way we all want life to be, relaxing and enjoyable.