They’re our favourite busy bees, pollinating information and support between various antennae, projects, working groups, NGOs and more. As a CD Member you have a lot to say, both literally and figuratively, but curiously there are some things they never seem to say… The AEGEEan decided to make a list of ten of these oddly missing phrases. If you missed part one, click here.

6. I miss people around me

If you are familiar with the CD House, you know it is packed with people and it is harder to find a quite place than at a Kristian Nairn concert (Nairn also being the actor who played Hodor in HBO’s Game of Thrones). And just like Hodor, when you live and are visited by so many people, you might leave the room with somebody else; so it is important to hold the door.

Most members even have to share a room, so, if you want some peace and quiet, you might want to try the basement… unless you have visitors over, cause they tend to gather there to relax themselves. If you have no nose whatsoever, you could go ‘Michael Jackson’ and try your luck in the room with the oil-powered generator or you can go into the archive… unless there are people there too, in which case you can move even further to the room where, when moving into the house, some, let us say, ‘kinky’ toys were found. Nobody knows what that room served for. #torturechamber #fiftyshadesofBelgium

7. We don’t welcome visitors

There is a hilariously weird scene in Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, where the protagonist, Sigmund, enters the house of Hunding, a man whose clan wants to kill him. Even though Sigmund is horribly injured and cannot defend himself, Hunding cannot kill him, because the ancient Germanic custom dictates to always treat any guests in your house hospitably. This means, in Wagner’s work, that Hunding has to wait an entire day, and feed and take care of Sigmund as if he was his friend, before killing him in a duel.

While CD members don’t generally provide complete free meals and clothing for their guests (or duel them), they do host a lot of AEGEEans from all over Europe over the course of the year. They provide free shelter, in some cases reimburse at least some of the travel expenses, occasionally provide free ingredients for their guests’ meals, and even provide medication, if possible. A CD member surely is as gracious a host as those according to the customs of old.

8. I never speak English

Yes and they are also never kind or open. Furthermore, they never eat, nor do they ever cook well, and they are never, and I mean never, polite. They never use the rest room, they never take time to talk to you, they never go out to have a drink and they are never even in the slightest bit funny or witty. Most importantly, they never understand sarcasm. Honessendaret anglar, CD honietdá ot.

9. We all had dinner on time today

Dinnertime is a curious custom around Europe, because it hardly ever happens around the same time. This lapse of coinciding hours are due to some cultural factors that determine when you are most likely to have dinner.

In certain Eastern European countries, it is customary to enjoy a warm meal at noon or early in the afternoon. In North-Western European countries people usually start eating somewhere between 5 and 6 pm, and in Southern European countries this may be postponed as late as 8 pm.

Because members of the CD hail from vastly different countries, they either have to adjust to a, for them possibly, unusual time… or they’ll have to eat alone or in smaller groups. As if planning to eat with an entire group was not hard already.

10. I never work after 8 pm

Unlike the ‘English thing’, CD members tend to work after eight at night. This could be because they have to have a Skype conversation with some members outside of university-hours, or because they need to go to important European events in Brussels, or simply because the workload happend to be incredibly high that day. Regardless, some working days are extremely long, especially when major events are coming up.

That does not mean, however, that all working days go on until after 8:00 pm, or that CD members are merciless workaholics. Just like you and me, they also like to relax at night, maybe watch a movie or maybe go out and have a drink. We are all AEGEEans after all.

Written by Willem Laurentzen, AEGEE-Nijmegen (based on the original concept of Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen)

They’re our favourite busy bees, pollinating information and support between various antennae, projects, working groups, NGOs and more. As a CD Member you have a lot to say, both literally and figuratively, but curiously there are some things they never seem to say… The AEGEEan decided to make a list of ten of these oddly missing phrases. Here is part one:

1. I hate having to travel to more than three countries each year

“To be AEGEE is to travel” is what the proverb says. Even with the digital age, the most effective and enjoyable way to explore all the nooks and crannies of Europe is to see them with your own two eyes. As a CD member there is another reason to travel. Instead of just going for fun, there are some activities that a CD member simply must attend, most obviously the Agoras or the EPM.

You could compare it to your local board members who also have to attend some mandatory events during the year. Except that, where they generally have to go to an event on the other side of town, CD members have to go to an event on the other side of Europe. ‘To be CD’, it seems, ‘is also to travel’.

2. I can balance AEGEE with my studies/job

AEGEE can be as addictive as a gambling machine, in the sense that you can put more time and resources into it than you can actually afford (and that one can only hope that the input is worth the outcome… it’s probably going to be fine). For the typical ordinary member, procrastinating your studies for one day or two every several weeks would normally not be such a big deal.

Regardless, the higher you go up in AEGEE, the more time and resources you have to spend on it, thus compromising on time to study or work. You might already see this in your local board as some of its members are unsuccessful at completing some of their courses. On the CD level this phenomenon is even worse. Therefore, it comes to no surprise that CD members generally do not complete university courses or maintain even a part-time job.

3. OMG, I got so much free time!

No, you don’t. As stated before, a CD member has to put so much time and effort into his or her duties that there is no time or energy left to work or study fulltime. CD members do have free time, of course, but generally never that much that they can turn to the sky in ululation and boast about their significant amount of R&R. CD members usually have long busy days. Still, at least their long list of duties is part of a function they like to do… and, if you like it, you should do it.

4. God, my work–home distance is horribly long

It is incredibly long, especially if you live all the way to the top floor. However, as soon as you’ve made your way to the ground floor you can finally start breakfast, except that you left some food in your backpack upstairs for some reason; so you have to go back. Nevertheless, once you are back on the ground floor again you can have breakfast and move into the office in the next room over.

This time, however, you forgot your memory-stick, so you go up one floor to the meeting room, where you used it during that presentation yesterday, only to remember that you also used it to store your movie on it for the post-presentation movie night. So, you go down two floors to the basement, grab the stick, and go up one floor again to the office. Congratulations, you’ve already ran half a marathon and it’s not even 9:00 am yet. Forgetful CD members; they get the best cardio every day.

5. I never get any emails

Yeah… if memory serves well, Svenja van der Tol, the Secretary General in 2015-2016, once had to send so many emails, Google wanted to shut the account down because it thought she was a spam-bot… that’s all we need to say about it.

Written by Willem Laurentzen, AEGEE-Nijmegen (based on the original concept of Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen)