I have no idea how I’m going to bring everything I want to pack without paying hundreds of dollars more than I have already spent on my $2,000 plane tickets (fortunately, the $2,000 is round trip, not one way). My current list? Well, it’s only partially finished, but it goes something like this:
- Jeans
- Lounging pants
- Boy shorts
- Girl shorts
- Spandex shorts
- Long skirts
- Short skirts
- Tank tops
- Short sleeve shirts
- t-shirts
- Long sleeve shirts?
- Sweater(s)/sweatshirt(s)
- Swimsuit(s?)
- Lots of underpants (so I don’t have to do laundry as often)
- Bras
- Sarongs
- Belt
- Birkenstocks
- Flip flops
- Sneakers
- Hiking boots
- Jewelry/accessories
- Sheets for bed
- Pillow?
- Best friend
- Boyfriend
- Peanut butter (I hear it's hard to find over there)
- Laptop
- Books
- Other, miscellaneous things
If I can manage to pack all of that, I’ll have some 300-400 odd pounds of luggage. I think I might have to cut a few things. Fortunately, getting there and back again is the most expensive part of this whole adventure.
I must admit, part of the reason I decided to go abroad this semester is because others were; especially Erin and Julie. It seemed oddly appropriate for the three of us to go at the same time, if not to the same place, and the possibility of studying somewhere else for a semester had crossed my mind more than once, anyway. So I figured, why not? I can at least apply, and if I get accepted, great; if not, oh well. It wasn't something I had had my heart set on for years before the opportunity arose, or even something I considered seriously until a few months before my application was due.
Of course, applying to study abroad ended up being a much larger hassle than I had anticipated. At first, I couldn't decide where I wanted to go. Because I only speak one language and didn't want to go through the hassle of setting up an independent program, I was torn between England and Australia; England appealing to my English major and her grandiose, romantic ideals associated with European countries, and Australia appealing to my ES major and her desire to romp through rain forests (not to mention that I've gotten rather sick of eight month winters in the past few years). I settled on Australia, my main deciding factor being that I knew I would travel to Europe on my own one day - Australia, on the other hand, I would never visit if not now.
I began going through the paperwork; found out how to apply, what I needed to do, but I had barely started all that when I found myself ill. Not with just a cold or the flu, but with a pain in my head that was so bad I was unable to sleep or eat, let alone attend classes or think about paperwork and applications. After two trips to the hospital and a week at home, it was finally determined that there was a staph infection in my parotid gland, and the reason for the pain was that the swelling from it was pressing on a particularly sensitive bundle of nerves. How did it get there in the first place? I have no idea, but I returned to Allegheny on the day that the final portion of the application for going abroad was due, and I still needed to have parts of it signed by people who I would not be able to contact until the next day. Frustrated and frazzled, I begged the people in the ACCEL office to consider me despite my one-day-late papers. All they could tell me was that they would have to discuss it with the board of people who accepted or declined the applicants. I gave them three doctors' notes along with my application, an explanation for why it was late, and decided that I would not get my hopes up.
I did not realize, until those agonizing days between handing in my application and hearing the decision, how much I had already done so. In the beginning, I could have done with or without studying abroad. It sounded fun to study in a different country, but it was so far off it didn't feel real, and when I thought about actually doing it, it was frightening. Going to a country where I did not know single person? Leaving everything I have; the friends it took me years to make at Allegheny, my boyfriend, everything that I knew and that was familiar? Why, it was just like starting college over again, but instead of going a state over, I would be going to a whole new continent. Why on earth would I want to do that? But somehow, in between my deciding to put in an application (with the thought of "it's just an application, nothing more"), and my actually doing it, I got attached to the idea. It was far off and uncertain, and no less frightening, but I knew that if I was declined acceptance into James Cook University, I would always feel as though I had missed out. Despite my fears, despite the long and painful process of the application and paperwork, this was something I wanted.
I am still afraid. There are little fears and worries that are unlikely to manifest themselves: What if I miss a flight? What if I exceed the baggage limit? What if my plane crashes? What if the arrival service fails? Mostly travel concerns. I still have to accept the offer from the hall I will be living in, a source of much of my current stress, and my parents have just, in the past week, decided that I should get traveler's insurance. There are money concerns and worries that some of the paperwork was done wrong. But there are larger, more realistic fears as well: I'm not one to make friends quickly, what if I don't make any over there? What if being away changes my relationship with my boyfriend? What if the classes I take there are too hard, too different than what I'm used to? What if I just miss everything that I'm used to too much and don't have a good time because of it? What will it have been for? But I think that simply being aware of these fears makes them less likely to manifest themselves. Knowing that they are there, I can make a conscious effort not to let them happen. And hey, in the worst case scenario, I'm not going to be there forever. Four months, a semester, can go by in the blink of the eye, and when I do come home, I'm sure I'll have more stories to tell than I will be able to remember.
I'm excited, too (as I should be). Clearly, I'm not letting any of my worries change my mind. Going abroad is like starting college again, but this time I can make it better. I've become more outgoing since the first time I did that, and can see the mistakes I made last time - I've learned the tricks of the trade at this point, and I intend to use them. I will be entirely on my own, which will give me a chance to find any parts of myself that have been muffled by always being around the familiar, and will undoubtedly teach me things I couldn't learn any other way. And really; I'm going to be in freaking Australia. How could it not be awesome?
(note: the ending question is meant to be hopeful, not ominous)
