Free like a bear

It was Monday 28th January 2019… finally… my last day at work! The time between the day I signed the termination agreement and this day felt quite long. I guess it is normal when you know that something will come to an end and are just waiting for it to happen! Like a divorce! I am happy I had great colleagues who enjoyed having long coffee breaks with me to make time pass by quicker, and my friend and colleague Dr. Knut to entertain me from the other side of my monitor.

My last day at work also marked the start of the countdown until the trip starts… a little bit more than 2 weeks until the big departure on 13th February 2019. 2 weeks to rest but also to get ready and prepare everything.

As usual, my body knows when it will get a break, and I got sick some days before this last day… a nice bronchitis with 39 degrees fever. Quite bad when you organized a farewell party and invited over 60 colleagues! I really shortly thought about letting them have the party without me, which would have been quite unique, but I finally decided against this idea! My friend Mister Paracetamol helped me to survive the day… and I tried not to shake too many hands or give French kisses!

I organized a breakfast with croissants, jams and Nutella… but also got bread with cheese and sausage to make German guys happier! Haha! It was a very nice party and it felt great to have all these people around me, people from all the departments I worked for united for my departure! It’s nice to feel appreciated by colleagues and to have the feeling you will be missed a bit! With a little voice, I gave a little speech, which I think wasn’t too catastrophic given the fact I was not in a good shape! I hadn’t much to say though since I already wrote a quite long goodbye mail to a big distribution list, with a picture of me as a souvenir. It might sound a bit weird, but I loved the idea of making an ironic picture in which I placed some random items to share some hidden messages…

I got some really nice farewell presents, the highlight being money in many different currencies in a big wallet, but also a beautiful carved soap with the company logo (Daniel is such a talented artist-colleague!) and some smaller things like a travel towel or some company goodies.

It was a weird day though, because I had a hard time realizing I would leave this company forever, after going there almost everyday for the past 11 years! It felt a bit like a dream… I guess I finally realized it was over for real after I gave back my company ID and key to my boss and left the office with 2 bags full of breakfast leftovers and old paper stuff I wanted to take with me!