My Dance with Montpellier Time
So, “Montpellier time,” huh? You hear that and you probably picture sunny afternoons, long lunches, that whole relaxed Mediterranean vibe. That’s what I figured, anyway, when I first heard the phrase tossed around.
I actually tried to get on “Montpellier time” myself a while back. Not by packing my bags and flying over, not then. Nope, I tried to do it by syncing up with a small project I was juggling with a contact based right there in Montpellier. Sounded straightforward, right? They’re, what, six, maybe seven hours ahead of me? Always a fun little lottery depending on daylight saving. Piece of cake, I thought.
The Grand Plan
My big idea was to just shift my entire workday. I told myself, “I’ll start when they start, clock out when they clock out.” Be a proper team player, you know? Immerse myself in their rhythm. I genuinely believed it might even boost my productivity, maybe I’d absorb some of that legendary chill efficiency just by being on their schedule, even if it was through a screen.
- First thing I did: Changed every clock I owned. My phone, my laptop, even that dusty old microwave in the kitchen showed Montpellier time.
- Next up: My meals. Breakfast at what felt like the middle of the night for me. Lunch when I’d normally be having a mid-morning coffee. Dinner before most folks I knew had even finished their workday. It was… an adjustment.
- Then came trying to have any kind of social life. “Sorry folks, can’t join. It’s practically bedtime in Montpellier, and I’m technically off the clock.” Yeah, that went down well.
It was a complete disaster. Honestly, a total mess from start to finish.
How It Really Went Down
Turns out, “Montpellier time” isn’t just about what the clock on the wall says. It’s a whole different way of operating, a different mindset. My contact over there? They’d fire off emails at what must have been the crack of dawn for them, and then poof – they’d vanish for hours. Long lunch, I figured. Good for them. Meanwhile, I’m sitting there, it’s maybe 9 AM my local time, feeling like I’ve already put in half a day’s work, just twiddling my thumbs waiting for a reply.
And the evenings? My evenings were their mid-afternoon. So, just as I was trying to wind down, maybe watch some TV, their workday was in full swing. My brain felt like it was constantly running this crazy time zone conversion app, and I was walking around in a permanent state of jet lag without ever stepping on a plane.
It kind of reminded me of this one time, totally different thing, but stick with me. I was trying to learn this new coding language – let’s just call it “ShinyNewLang.” Everyone was hyping it up, saying it was the future. So, I bought the books, I did the online courses, I really forced myself to think in ShinyNewLang. For weeks, I was practically dreaming in its weird syntax. My old, trusty ways of coding suddenly felt clumsy and outdated. But then, when I tried to build something actually complicated with ShinyNewLang, I just hit a brick wall. The tools were clunky, the support online was… well, “limited” is a polite way to put it. I ended up spending more time fighting with ShinyNewLang itself than actually solving the problem I was trying to fix. I eventually patched something together using bits and pieces of my old languages, creating this Frankenstein’s monster of a program. It “worked,” if you squinted, but it was ugly as sin and a total nightmare to ever touch again.
That’s exactly what trying to live on “Montpellier time” from thousands of miles away felt like. I was trying to force-fit a system that just wasn’t built for my actual life or my own natural rhythm. I wasn’t getting any of that famous relaxed vibe; I was just getting more stressed out and completely out of sync with everyone and everything around me.
What I Took Away From It
So, after a couple of weeks of that chaos, I pulled the plug on the strict “Montpellier time” experiment. We figured out a much better way to collaborate, mostly by just talking clearly about when we’d be around and making sure we had a few solid hours of overlap. Way, way saner for everyone involved.
I guess “Montpellier time,” if it really means that easy-going, productive flow, is probably something you gotta experience in Montpellier. Or maybe it’s just a good lesson that you can’t just change your watch and expect your whole world to change with it. Sometimes you gotta adapt smartly, not just try to copy-paste a whole different way of life.
Still really want to visit Montpellier one day, though. Maybe then I’ll finally understand what “Montpellier time” is truly all about. For now, I’m sticking to my own time zone, thank you very much, but with a newfound respect for how others manage theirs.
