Burnout
Written on October 16, 2022
This surreal sunset happened when I was quickly grabbing food with a friend and we were heading back to a school building to work on our class projects. Even though we were stressed about our work, we had to stop and appreciate the beauty of where we were.
✨Stressed✨
Even though I’m 5,000 miles away from home studying abroad in a gorgeous city in Europe, I’m still going through a common October feeling for students: intense burnout.
Most of my week has been spent focusing on my Brand Identity project, but I still feel as though I’ve gotten nowhere. I have a very long list of assignments to do this upcoming week to finish the project entirely (see below). The days and assignments are all blurring together so it's hard to explain all of the steps involved. Once the project is complete in about two weeks, I will share the entire process and the final result of all my hard work. I’m not sure if I have ever been given such an intensive project before. The amount of work this one project requires in such a short amount of time on top of the photo documentary project and life as an international student is all a bit too much. My head is spinning and it is making it difficult to enjoy any of the work or life outside of class. I’m used to having a calendar that is packed solid and working multiple jobs, but I’m not used to this intense pressure of time running out. I only have two more months in Europe and only two more weeks to finish these massive projects. These projects are important to me as well — especially the photo documentary one — because they will be incorporated into my professional portfolio. I want to be proud of the work I create and put in 110% effort, but I am feeling mentally exhausted. When I arrived in Amsterdam, I was excited to get started on these projects and I had a ton of ideas for them. Now, because of the piled-on assignments, I’ve lost a lot of the passion for it.
I’ve lost a lot of motivation in my photo documentary project as well because all of the theaters I have contacted will either not answer me or have already told me no. I now have to move ahead with a new documentary idea even though I was enthusiastic about my last idea. I have always said that I could do environmental portraits on the street, but I’ve never actually done it. I think I will challenge myself to approach strangers around Amsterdam and ask to take their portrait. I’ve noticed that each area of the city has its own unique lifestyle — almost like there are mini cities within the city. I’ve tried explaining this concept to people from back home, but I think this would be told better visually. My goal is to capture the diversity of Amsterdam through portraits of characters I find throughout the different areas of the city. I can tell a powerful story about the individual person and their surroundings, but combined with portraits of others, I can tell a story about Amsterdam as a whole.
I went out and gave this a shot last Tuesday in Museumplein — the square where the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh Museum, and many other museums are located. I knew that there were many street performers and food trucks in this area and it was a well known location in Amsterdam. I went up to a few of the street artists and asked to take a photo while also asking them questions like how long they had been performing there and where they were from. It was fun to listen to these people and learn about the unique reasons why they were there. Some of them were so engaged in their performance that I couldn’t talk to them, but I would smile and nod toward my camera and they would nod and smile back. This was a slightly awkward experience because it was so new, but I want to do it more often so I can meet new people and take some emotional photos. Out of these five test shots, I liked the photos with movement and energy in them the most. My favorite is the photo of the man playing the hang handpan in the late afternoon sun. He played passionately and had his eyes closed for the majority of the time, but I got a photo just as he looked up at the camera for a split second.
Still slightly Productive!
Unlike the work I’m doing here in Amsterdam, I feel like I’ve made a lot of progress with my preparations to return to Flagstaff in the spring. I finally found a lease to take over for the spring and summer, which is a major relief. I have also been in contact with a few professors within the photography department at NAU and I will be a teacher’s assistant (TA) for the food photography course and I may be co-studio manager for the photo studio in the communication building. I’m not sure if I will be able to take this studio position because I will already have a photography job with SUN Entertainment, my capstone project, and my involvement with the Lumberjack Newspaper, in which I will soon be applying for Director of Photography. Nevertheless, I have opportunities on the table! I’m not sure what I’ll be doing after I graduate next May, but I know that this last semester of college will be a busy one.
I also got to edit some of my street photos that have been sitting on my SD card for a bit now. I have been trying to take photos of what I see whenever I go on walks around the city.
Time with Friends
I got to catch up a bit with two of my besties from Flagstaff, Omar and Ben, for the first time in a while. It was so nice to hear about what’s happening in their lives and make the same jokes even though we are all separated now.
Viola, Luc, and I went on a bike ride to a thrift store not too far from where we live. We all needed motivation to get up earlier in the morning so we decided to go at 9 am. Getting up for this was way harder than it should have been. The thrift store was in an area we had not explored before, and we were excited to see some sheep in the green fields we cycled through. Later, Luc and I found a cafe by a canal in the city and got hot chocolate as I built up the courage to go take those street portraits.
I went with Silje and Lucas to another monthly Dutch Movie Night put on by ESN, the same group that organized Welcome Week. Since it’s October, they played a Dutch thriller/horror movie called Spoorloos (The Vanishing). I don’t really enjoy scary movies so I don’t watch too many, but this may have been the scariest film I had ever seen. The scenario was too realistic and they showed the killer as a completely ordinary guy. Without spoiling too much, there was a scene that made me super uncomfortable and claustrophobic that proved how well made this movie was even on a lower budget. It was a great horror movie and I hated it, but couldn’t look away because I love analyzing films.
On Saturday, Acelya and I went to our third hiphop class. This hour and a half class has really become a highlight of my week. Even though I am completely exhausted from everything else going on, I love getting to move and learn choreography. We found some bookstores, shopping areas, and cafes near the city center for the rest of the day. In the evening, we met up with some of our other friends at the PoolBar for Luc’s birthday.
