This is the question that has been running continuously through my head the past 24 hours - from the last minute packing last night, to waking up at 7am for one last run in the states, to driving three hours to the airport.
Thankfully, it IS real life. I'm sitting in the airport waiting for my (delayed) flight that will take be abroad (eventually) to Athens, Greece! And after 2 1/2 weeks, I'll be flying to Italy to stay for two months.
I’ve spent the last year of my life preparing to study abroad for a semester - from the first meeting with the study abroad consultant at Alma to now. The time flies by, and it never ceases to amaze me!
My mom has asked only about a million times how I’m feeling today. To be honest, I have no idea how to answer. Excited, nervous, bewildered, scared, amazed... I don’t even know where to begin.
This will be by far the longest I’ve ever been away from home (perks of going to a college only an hour and a half away from home!), the longest I’ve ever gone without seeing my family and my dogs, and my first time to Greece and Italy. I know no Greek, and I only know minimal Italian. So yeah, safe to say I’ve been freaking out a little bit.
But I’ve also always wanted to travel. Last May, I took a two and half week class that included traveling all over Germany. After returning, I made the decision that I wanted more than anything to study abroad the following fall semester. After roughly a million pages of paperwork, running around to all of my campus’ offices, and a lot of meetings, I finally decided on Italy and was accepted into the program. I’m so excited that all my hard work paid off and I will be fulfilling a long time travel dream of mine!
Packing has been a bit of a nightmare. As of last night, I had my suitcase all ready to go.
Looks pretty neat, right? Until you see my bed covered in all the stuff I had yet to organize and pack into my carry-on.
Finally, I got everything packed into a backpack, a suitcase, and a purse. I didn’t even need the fancy expando zipper on the backpack! I’m still nervous I forgot something though, but I suppose time will tell. My backpack weighs roughly a million tons, but since it'll only be that full while I'm traveling between places, I can manage it.
My flight has finally started to board, so I'm off! Wish me luck!
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