All I've Learned as @ZoeInIceland
As I scroll through my abroad Instagram, I feel so many things. Nostalgia, regret, longing. I often find myself revisiting it to reign in the storm of “life confusion” that clouds my brain every morning. The growing sense of anxiety over everything I have to do and everything I haven’t done yet. The sense of comfort that these pictures give me is embarrassing.
Studying abroad changed my life. The most cliché statement, yet somehow, I still feel different, that my experience was different, that I was special.
Compared to before I left for Iceland and now, my values have fundamentally shifted. My future career and lifestyle that I thought were black and white, now grey.
"Today is [my roommate] and my last day in Iceland 🙁 many tears have been shed the past week. So thankful for the past 4 months, no regrets leaving the most amazing country (emoji Icelandic flag and pink heart) (also this is my last post and that makes me emotional)” Posted by @zoeiniceland on April 24, 2022
My last and most recent post on @zoeiniceland show my final moments in Reykjavik with my roommate
Most tourists don’t know that Icelanders party almost as hard as those in London or Spain. Why would they when their week of travel is mainly filled with the Golden Circle, visiting waterfalls and soaking in the Blue Lagoon? Residents of Iceland however know it’s a rite of passage to stay at the club long enough that when you exit the dark bars illuminated by flashing lights, the sun is already out. On my last weekend in Iceland, I finally achieved that, walking past rainbow road and the famous church of Hallgrimskrikja, seeing them slowly start to come alive again with the morning golden hour sun. Knowing this was likely the last time, I soaked them in as hard as I could. Soon my idyllic life would be over and I’d be shipped off to New York City.
It’s not really a fair comparison, New York City and Reykjavik, Iceland. First off, they are quite literally the antithesis of each other. I can’t think of another city that is the opposite of Manhattan, where Iceland is covered with pristine natural wonder, New York is majority man-made. Another reason is the fact that I had a full time 10-week internship while in NYC as an Investment Banking Intern. Very different in comparison to being a study abroad student with a light course load in Iceland. Investment Banking as a career isn’t for the faint of heart. My job often entailed working 100-hour weeks with only Saturdays off. Working on three hours of sleep for weeks at a time changes a person. I watched as friends and fellow banking interns slowly lost the life behind their eyes with zero doubt that my eyes matched theirs.
I received my offer when I was 19, just finishing up my sophomore year in college, over a year before the actual internship was to take place. It’s a rigid interview process that took months of studying a 500-page guide and cold emailing hundreds of bankers. I worked so hard to be hired, for this “amazing opportunity” that my manager Taylor never let me forget I was lucky to have. Not that I worked so hard for hours and months to get there myself, no, I was lucky that this bank gave me a chance. When Taylor joined the zoom call for my mid-summer review, I truly understood why people say no one in corporate cares about you. He berated me, telling me that if I didn’t change my actions and turn this ship around, I wouldn’t get the “coveted” return offer. This was after I had been working with him for the past four weeks, turning in deliverables past midnight every night, being so stressed out that I was losing hair. I cried. Nothing I did was going to be enough for him.
Taylor made me feel like an ungrateful brat. Someone who was squandering away the best career I could dream about, but just because it was his lifelong dream didn’t mean it was mine. I had approached this internship as a test run for if I could stay in the career path post grad.
Because of that, he considered me a terrible hire.
I gained 20 pounds from stress eating and not being able to even walk outside due to constant work, finding a lot of solace crying in my bed. I did however make $20,000. In 10 weeks. All it cost was my time and my entire reserve of self-love that I saved up.
The world is broken.
From someone who found a pocket of happiness in Iceland, coming to New York City was a sharp slap to the face. Coming back to everything I knew, yet feeling like I had changed was like trying to fit the final piece into a puzzle only to realize the piece was just slightly off. The piece would never be able to fit again.
.
In a time where I was against dating, I somehow met someone. It’s strange how it happens like that.
My abroad boyfriend [S] was adamant that he wasn’t a feminist, pushing back against the concept itself, yet somehow, he treated me with more respect than many of my adamantly feminist friends. He treated me as though I was an intellectual, interesting, beautiful and desired person.
In contrast, my “feminist” friends have told me they’re smarter than me, have been shocked when I got into Michigan, have told me I am a “5” because that’s average. The friends who’ve crossed boundaries, but I know they’re good people, so I didn’t say anything. The feminist friends that don’t seem to respect me as a person. But they’re feminists, so it’s fine.
S respected me in a way a lot of men in America never have. It wasn’t the occasional compliment or applauding when I did one thing slightly better than expected, it was a quiet appreciation for all I’ve accomplished, and conviction that I was headed toward bigger things. I felt his silent yet warm appreciation when I explained what something meant in English, he laughed and was patient with me when I couldn’t pronounce certain German sounds. He tried to teach me a phrase a day, yet all that’s really left of my German vocab is “Ich bin Amerikanisch” I am American and “Du bist scheisse” You are shit. I wasn’t the best German student.
As I click into one of the four posts from our road trip, I can’t help but smile. Those posts documented our 12-day trek around the country in a camper van where we would spend every waking moment with each other. Together, we hiked on top of glaciers, around volcano craters, soaked in natural hot springs surrounded by 360 views of fjords, and witnessed nature in a way neither of us have ever seen it before. This trip completely changed our relationship. From something safe and stable to having that AND being filled with adventure. S brought me both, the dependable boyfriend that I could cry to and complain to that would still care about me afterwards yet also the boyfriend that wouldn’t hesitate if I asked him to go cliff diving with me.
I need to take a brief break from Instagram after thinking about our trip. Reflecting on how desirable I felt during my relationship makes my heart sadder than expected. Being desirable is top of mind for my current university roommates. 6 girls, one taken, the rest of us single. We cope in different ways to try to feel desirable or beautiful, with some of us crawling into someone else’s bed, some of us finding men at clubs to shove a messy tongue down our throats, and I choose to continue texting S 9 months after we’ve already broken up trying to reminisce on the good times. None of the coping mechanisms are particularly “good”, but chasing the dopamine hit even if it lasts for one drunken night seems worth it. Or perhaps we don’t know our self-worth, to be determined.
S and I continue to talk everyday much to the chagrin of my roommates who have been waiting for me to end it-they just want what’s best for me, but they just don’t understand. We’re not together, but he knows more about my everyday life than anyone else. For a long time, I didn’t understand myself, why I couldn’t let it go and leave it to die like the end of a relationship should. But it’s a great mix of many things. Partially knowing I used to have someone who cared and loved me so much and not having that anymore hurts. Knowing we never got the ending we deserved is devastating. But I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I I’m holding onto a partner that showed me that a combination of adventure and stability was very possible in life. S coupled with Iceland opened my eyes to see all the possibilities out there. Not just what I could see right in front of me, the straight and narrow, but the peripherals. Bringing passion to the forefront, just with a safety net. Being able to hold onto him to tether myself to that mentality has kept me from spiraling.
Saying goodbye to S was heartbreaking. The memory of our last morning together is clear as day in my mind. We had to wake up at 4am because his airport shuttle was getting to my apartment at 5am. He had moved into my apartment a few days before leaving to spend as much time with me as possible. His weird alarm went off, the one with ducks quacking because he needs to rotate alarms every so often to avoid sleeping through them. I felt the pit in my stomach grow as I grabbed onto him, desperate for just a bit more time. We brushed our teeth in silence only broken when I started to cry. Standing at my front door with his suitcase, we were both almost out of tears and goodbyes. He kissed me three times and gruffly said that he would miss me, so much, opened the door and left.
I’m not one to take the dive without looking back. Even after knowing it might be what's best for me.
Silfra Fissure is the only place in the whole world where you can snorkel or dive between two tectonic plates. Eurasia and North America combine in Iceland and create a beautiful underwater gorge with the bluest water I’ve ever seen. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and S convinced me to bite the bullet and to just do it with him. It took almost an hour of putting on a dry suit, snapping two of my nails off, bleeding into the Icelandic ground, and shuffling across the national park before we were on the platform to start the 45 minutes journey. I had zero regrets as I slowly floated in between plates that were bigger than my tiny brain could even imagine. It was humbling, it was euphoric, and it was cold.
Seeing the unedited photos of that clear blue water made me silently thank S again for the gentle encouragement, the push, to “just do it”.
It makes me think that maybe here in America I have people pushing me too hard in all different directions. I was “strongly encouraged” to pursue a career in investment banking, by upperclassmen, friends, and mentors. Everyone did it so it felt like I had to do it too to avoid falling behind.
As I scroll to the end of the album of photos, I see a picture of myself where I sort of look like an egg because the dry suit had to be so tight to prevent water from getting in. The goggles are squishing my face so hard yet I’m smiling so wide. It hits me that I can’t remember the last time I smiled like that, and I can’t fathom why.
Yet I now think about the fact that every time I enter the Ross School of Business (my business school) I feel as though I’ve entered the gates of hell, very literally-and it all makes sense. Walking through the doors of the school, my back grows tight from instantaneous stress and all I long for is to shrink into the smallest version of myself. I don’t belong here, I never will.
Just about 90% of my classes are in the Ross building. It’s been four years of feeling as though I don’t belong. Most days that I’ve been a student here, I’ve woken up with a pit in my stomach, feelings of dread encapsulating just about everything else. But I’m four years in, waist deep in business mud, and looking for a business role post grad.
Even though they might not mean to, Ross pushes students into Investment Banking and Management Consulting. This year, in my desperation to find a job and ask more questions, I went to all of my professors’ office hours. In each conversation, I heard something along the lines of, “Investment Banking isn’t a great career path post grad, you’re not alone in thinking this, we don’t know why students are so drawn to it.” I wanted to pull my hair out with each conversation, these were professors that I had previously taken classes with. I wanted to yell, “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell any of us?” instead of the quiet congratulations, I wish someone had grabbed me by the shoulders and screamed “You’re going to hate it! No one likes it!”
Even with full knowledge of being pushed in potentially the wrong direction, I spent my first semester senior year of college scouring indeed and handshake every day. Applying and interviewing for corporate finance jobs and rotation programs that I knew internally; I really didn’t want. I was not going to be the kid in my family that graduates without a job after my parents survived the cultural revolution, immigrated here to America with nothing, and built a life for themselves, both picking up PhDs along the way. Stability matters when there isn’t a backup plan. Where could I possibly take a dive when the fundamentals of my life and my career haven’t even been laid?
But that’s what got me into this mess in the first place. Not properly reflecting on what I would enjoy doing, just going for the golden ticket choice. The one that had the most exit opportunities or had the highest overall salary. I always told myself that I could make decisions for career later.
Later is now.
Still, it feels like I’m in too deep to make a drastic change. But maybe in 10 years I’ll be sitting at my computer writing yet another reflection about the same thing, lamenting on not liking my job but up for the million-dollar promotion.
Or I end the vicious cycle here and get a job that genuinely excites me.
When I look back at the photos, I remember standing on the edge of the platform right before diving in. A bit scared, but in a knowing I’ll be safe type of way. And for a split second, right as my eyes went beneath the water and I saw the pure blue for the first time, absolutely nothing mattered.
Reynisfjara beach in the south coast of Iceland, one of the many black sand beaches in the country
It’s hard to capture how naturally amazing Iceland is on camera. There are places that completely took my breath away, yet when I look back at them now, I can’t fully remember the emotions that were rolling through me. It’s even harder to explain how a black sand beach covered in fog with the backdrop of roaring crashing waves made me feel transcendent. Either I sound like I should be institutionalized or like an idiot. Neither one sounds particularly appealing.
During one of my first trips outside of the capital city of Reykjavik, I remember walking a few meters onto the beach in my full winter gear. My new Icewear hat adorned my head and my snow boots crunched against the sand and snow, but what stood out were the tears bubbling up behind my eyes. Never in my life have I felt connected to nature like I did in that exact moment-and I’m an active hiker and traveler. I’ve been to Zion, Banff, Grand Canyon, Gorges du Verdon, the Great Wall of China, yet here I was choking back tears and breathless sobs as mother nature held me in her unrelenting arms. I felt small, yet so important at the same time.
I chose not to return to Investment Banking after my one summer there. Key word, I chose. People still think I’m not going back because I didn’t receive a return offer, but to be honest, I didn’t even wait to see if they would give me one. HR knew by the 7th week that I was out, this wasn’t for me, and that I’d probably kill myself if I locked myself into two more years of torture.
Something unfortunate I learned this summer was that women do not look out for each other in finance. My mentor Robin and I couldn’t have been more different. The only thing we had in common was that we both were from Michigan, even though she graduated from Michigan State. I think she already had the opinion that I was pretentious before she had met me. University of Michigan students do usually live up to that reputation.
She left me a scathing review for my mid-summer call with Taylor, yet still asked me how I was every day with a fake smile. When she made me cry after yelling at me over the phone, I knew this was it. I was saying goodbye to banking forever.
The sad part was that if I had been a part of a different team or didn’t have the coworkers that I had, I might’ve stayed. Instead, I worked with some bigoted misogynistic men and women that loved the only white male intern and literally shoved me into a corner, away from just about everyone and called it my “desk”.
But maybe, even if I worked at a different firm, the outcome would be the same. I don’t know a single person that works full time as an analyst in investment banking that doesn’t hate their life. In fact, I know very few people that enjoy their first job period. Why is that so normalized to leave business school, get an entry level job and hate it? The need to work a few years in awful conditions in order to move up and pursue genuine passions shouldn’t be universal.
Every week or so I’ll have an emotional breakdown wondering if I made the right decision leaving the banking world. This job would’ve set me up for the next step of my career, yet all I could see looking ahead while in banking was a black hole of despair and misery. There wasn’t even a back-up plan for me, I never had to think about what I wanted to do post banking because it seemed like it was so far in the future. But here I am, a few months before graduation, no job. In Ross, that’s basically criminal. I am the biggest failure this school has ever seen, at least that’s how I feel.
Remembering how I felt around this time last year, the vastness and powerful hand of mother nature making me feel like a tiny crushable bug, I realize maybe this isn’t as critical as I think it is. If I fell into a volcano, it wouldn’t care that I had a job interview later today, it would just kill me. I would be dead, and the world would continue turning. The fragility of human life and the robustness of nature revealing what’s important.
Looking through the throngs of Reynisfjara photos in multiple posts and seeing the waves captured cresting taller than me, I briefly wonder how I might feel if those waves swallowed me. At the entrance of the beach, there’s a huge sign with bright red warnings in dozens of languages. The dangers of sneaker waves and how people have died by being pulled roughly under the waves.
As morbid as it sounds, I think about what my last thought would be, in that split second before being swept away.
One thing I know for sure, it wouldn’t be “darn, I died without a job.”
I wonder what was going through this girl’s mind, because god I barely recognize her
As the only person in the world that knew me before, during, and after studying abroad, I know Iceland won’t be the same. Most of the people that made the experience will no longer be there, I won’t have the same apartment, the world has changed and most importantly; I’ve changed. Yet, I long every day to go back. Both to re-find the clarity I had while I was there and of course, to just visit my favorite country in the world again.
For the past year I’ve been attributing my time in Iceland as my north star. The sole reason why my values and life goals have been fundamentally altered. But in reality, I’ve lived the highest of highs and the lowest of lows in the last year and a half. I discovered what was important to me and altered my values with guidance and wisdom from: living in Iceland for four months, working as an investment banking intern, being a student at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, and growing older.
I’ve hit the end of the 30 posts in @ZoeinIceland it’s time for me to let go of something that I won’t be able to find. As I delete the “peaked as @zoeiniceland” in my personal Instagram bio, I mourn the hope that I’ll get something back when I go back to Iceland in May, no longer as a temporary resident, but now as a careful visitor.