Travel

Before you leave, you are beyond excited about new experiences, new people, new adventures… Then you get there and realize that it’s gonna be WAY harder than you ever expected it to be.

That’s what happened to me when I went to the University of Hertfordshire in England. When I was picking a place to go to, I picked schools in the UK and Australia because I didn’t want to add a language barrier on top of the adversities I already figured I’d face. But I didn’t expect to hit the lowest point I’d ever hit.

After sleeping for most of my first two days in Australia, I attended my first orientation meeting and the conductor of the seminar said: Don’t think of everything we do here as backwards, wrong or bad, think of it as something different and embrace the change while you’re here.

Going on exchange for a semester was a big, brave step for me. Before heading over to the UK for six months, I didn’t have much travel experience under my belt. I had only gone so far as the interior of BC, and across the border into Washington and Oregon. And I always had my parents and older sister with me.