“I am washing my face before bed while a country is on fire. It feels dumb to wash my face and dumb not to. It has never been this way and it has always been this way. Someone has always clinked a cocktail glass in one hemisphere as someone loses… read more
Exchange Programs
The Hardest Decisions Create the Greatest Outcomes
I’m going to be honest: the closer I got to my flight date to leave Texas and go to Mexico, the more I doubted I would board the plane. The summer was two months full of obstacles with registration, health clearances and personal things coming up a week before take-off.… read more
Why I Traveled All the way to Australia to Learn German
When you study abroad, it is inevitable that you will face challenges and sometimes be pushed out of your comfort zone. That’s one of the great things about studying abroad. These challenges are what allow you to grow and learn from the experience. In my 5 weeks so far… read more
Le Début
My study abroad experience in Paris is markedly divided into two sections. I moved here the first week of June – nearly three months prior to any official study abroad programming – and spent the summer establishing a routine: venturing into smaller museums solo, devouring literature, and discovering local spots.… read more
The Art of Doing Nothing
I have been lucky enough to study abroad in Japan for three semesters: two at Kyoto University in Kyoto and one semester at Waseda University in Tokyo, which I am now more than halfway done with. Classes abroad have been much less rigorous and intense than those I have taken… read more
Be Where Your Feet Are
There is something to be said about the slower-paced lifestyle in Mexico. Time passes differently here. Opposite to the U.S where everyone has a go-go mentality, “ahorita,” which translates to “now,” never actually means “ahorita.” Punctuality is somewhat less of a priority here. Downtime is valuable in Mexico, so when… read more
Living Without Regrets
People around the world wonder what their lives would have been like had their past selves chosen something other than what they ended up doing. Regret permeates the human condition as much as any emotion, and reflection on the past, such as what I write here, has the ability to… read more
The World Grows When You’re Abroad
“Does the world seem bigger now, or smaller?” I’d met up with my high school best friend in Prague. She was studying abroad in Scotland, and her semester had just finished; I still had about half of my semester left. We were sharing “trdlnik” near the Charles Bridge, and I… read more
Saying Hi and Other Scary Things
As much as I wanted to study abroad, it would have been a lot easier not to. Arranging my housing leases, taking the most insane semester of courses before this one, and leaving behind an entire life of people and things I loved dearly was not easy. While I was… read more
Returning to “Reality”
As of the time I’m writing this, I have about a month left in Sweden. I can see on my calendar that my departure date looms closer, and I can’t help but feel sad about leaving behind the life I have made for myself here. From the very start of… read more