Karin Reum sits casually at her desk, chatting to her friends on Facebook, as she reveals her insecurities from her first year at Rhodes and how she overcame them. “You’re so far away from home, you carry on living the same way in ‘parallel’, but you have so many expectations,” she says looking straight at me with tired eyes, “I felt like I had to leave the person I was behind.”
Talking to her friend Jamie Du Plooy, ‘insecure’ is just about the last word you would use to describe Karin: “she’s very outgoing, a lot of people think she’s loud, fun and confident.” Karin explains that when you arrive here as a first-year, “you’re thrown into such a mix of different people, people that you might not have ever interacted with in your life,” something that can be very intimidating even for the most sociable and alternative of us. Karin’s clothes are very colourful and unique, “people think she’s this chilled bunggy girl,” Jamie adds, as the other girls laugh. Therefore, being part of the crowd seems like the last thing on this socialite’s mind, yet Karin admits that she went through a phase of “not feeling good and ‘cool’ enough; the total cliché of not fitting in.” She felt like she had to be careful about what she said and did, not wanting to offend anyone. She didn’t feel comfortable enough to be herself, “insecurities resurface because you’re away from the people who know, with whom you can ‘be’ and exist.”
She finds Rhodes University “very groupie, there is such a cult in terms of group dynamics,” people party and move around in specific groups; students from the same society or the same residence will “hang out together.” This makes it harder for someone as versatile as Karin to find where they fit in, “it’s a bit of a battle to find where you belong.” She feels that “people loose their individuality because they are part of this group thing”, people always feel like they have to respond or act according to the group: “let me check with the guys,” is an example of a response she got from one of her male friends. She also thinks that “the whole drinking thing at Rhodes” is reinforced by this idea of ‘the group’, where people feel like they have to drink to be a part of it. According to her friends, she is “quite a hectic partier” but doesn’t buy in to the whole idea of needing to drink to have fun; even though she has had her fair share of ‘happy times’.
Karin also realises that “the uniqueness of this university-town, where most of us don’t have any family or ‘old friends’,” makes us more dependent on one another. And in second term, this led her to question who her friends really were and to ask herself, “are these my people?” Karin wants to share her life with people who enjoy the same things as her and who support her; she believes it is important to find the people “you click with.” It seems that she has eventually found her place here and is content with the fact that “life is not a perfect routine, it doesn’t meet your expectations.” She makes it her mission to meet new people as well as to do different things everyday, “you have to be spontaneous!” Finally, she ends the conversation with “life for me at this moment is just so happy.”
Talking to her friend Jamie Du Plooy, ‘insecure’ is just about the last word you would use to describe Karin: “she’s very outgoing, a lot of people think she’s loud, fun and confident.” Karin explains that when you arrive here as a first-year, “you’re thrown into such a mix of different people, people that you might not have ever interacted with in your life,” something that can be very intimidating even for the most sociable and alternative of us. Karin’s clothes are very colourful and unique, “people think she’s this chilled bunggy girl,” Jamie adds, as the other girls laugh. Therefore, being part of the crowd seems like the last thing on this socialite’s mind, yet Karin admits that she went through a phase of “not feeling good and ‘cool’ enough; the total cliché of not fitting in.” She felt like she had to be careful about what she said and did, not wanting to offend anyone. She didn’t feel comfortable enough to be herself, “insecurities resurface because you’re away from the people who know, with whom you can ‘be’ and exist.”
She finds Rhodes University “very groupie, there is such a cult in terms of group dynamics,” people party and move around in specific groups; students from the same society or the same residence will “hang out together.” This makes it harder for someone as versatile as Karin to find where they fit in, “it’s a bit of a battle to find where you belong.” She feels that “people loose their individuality because they are part of this group thing”, people always feel like they have to respond or act according to the group: “let me check with the guys,” is an example of a response she got from one of her male friends. She also thinks that “the whole drinking thing at Rhodes” is reinforced by this idea of ‘the group’, where people feel like they have to drink to be a part of it. According to her friends, she is “quite a hectic partier” but doesn’t buy in to the whole idea of needing to drink to have fun; even though she has had her fair share of ‘happy times’.
Karin also realises that “the uniqueness of this university-town, where most of us don’t have any family or ‘old friends’,” makes us more dependent on one another. And in second term, this led her to question who her friends really were and to ask herself, “are these my people?” Karin wants to share her life with people who enjoy the same things as her and who support her; she believes it is important to find the people “you click with.” It seems that she has eventually found her place here and is content with the fact that “life is not a perfect routine, it doesn’t meet your expectations.” She makes it her mission to meet new people as well as to do different things everyday, “you have to be spontaneous!” Finally, she ends the conversation with “life for me at this moment is just so happy.”
Lovecats,
ReplyDeleteThe profile on Karin was really well-written. One can get an image of her bubbly being. She is immediately portrayed as the hero who overcomes the hardships of trying to fit in as a first year – which she seems to have overcome with her colourful personality. The profile can be an example of Todorov's model of narrative. Her equilibrium is broken as she arrives in the new surroundings of Grahamstown and her fear of having to leave herself and who she is at home . Karin, secretly insecure about fitting in, restores a new equilibrium by meeting new people around campus. I think it was an important asset to let one of Karin's friends talk about her. This tells the reader that she has definitely ignited people's hearts with her charm. You are concerned about how Karin has overcome her first year despite the social expectations and being part of a group of friends. Karin, carefully defeating her fears, has overpowered the villain that is being away from home and changing who you are in a new world. She seems happy and content – the same ol' girl in a new home.