El fin

I literally do not have words to express myself in this moment in time. I can’t believe how fast this semester went and it’s insane to me that I’m already going home. To say this experience was the best time of my life would be the biggest understatement I could come up with. It was so much more than I ever imagined it would be, and it’s difficult to put into words the things that I witnessed and the things that I’ve learned.

It’s not until this moment, sitting on my eight-hour flight to Philadelphia, that I realize how incredible this semester really was. I literally did it all.

I lived with a Spanish family for four months that didn’t speak a word of English, I slept on the marble airport floor in Switzerland, I rode a camel in Africa, I drank a 98-cent box of wine at the Trevi fountain. I took college classes in Spanish with native speaking professors, I dipped my toes in the Mediterranean Sea and did cartwheels in gypsy pants along the North-African coast. I learned how to drive stick shift in Spanish, and used a “public restroom” in Morocco (restroom meaning a hole in the ground). I got asked for directions for nearby places in Sevilla – in Spanish. I went to an ice bar in Barcelona and navigated the streets of Rome after a few too many swigs of wine. I saw Christopher Columbus’ tomb and hiked 10 miles through the mountains of Extremadura. I wore four layers of clothes so I could avoid checking a bag on RyanAir, and walked into a sex shop in the Red Light District in Paris.

I climbed the Eiffle Tower during a hailstorm, and spent an entire weekend at a hippie festival in a pueblo population: 2,000 with my Spanish friends and no other Americans. I was in two places at once as I straddled the Sevilla/Cadiz border and drank sweet wine made fresh from a winery in Jerez. I cooked paella with my host dad and understood his instructions, drank way too much espresso and danced flamenco at Feria. I ate more ice cream and gelato than I can even remember, and I got maybe six hours of sleep each night the last month. I got into a soccer game for free when I should have paid 60 dollars, simply because I was American, and watched a poor innocent bull get stabbed to death as the crowd cheered. I got my haircut at an ACADEMY and explained what I wanted in Spanish. I cooked fresh pesto in Cinque Terre and ate a 5-dollar M&M-sized piece of chocolate in Switzerland. And that’s just to name a few.

I lived the dream.

It’s almost impossible to wrap my head around this experience, to understand that the past four months actually happened. I feel like I just watched the best movie I’ve ever seen, only to find that I was the main character and it was real life the whole time. I started a list awhile back of the random things I learned from being abroad; these are just a few of the many…

-Never underestimate the power of body language. It really can get you far

-You can survive a whole weekend without a cell phone, a computer/internet and nothing but the sun to tell you the time. It’s possible.

-“Don’t drink and drive, smoke and fly” –Moroccan man

-Public displays of affection are very acceptable practices in some parts of the world

-Open mind, open stomach

-Don’t assume everybody is creepy or sketchy when they come up to you and start talking. Some people really just want to talk, and some of the best friendships start by simply giving someone a chance and listening

-You don’t owe anybody anything, except yourself

-You can sleep when you’re dead. But if you must, grasslands outside of train stations, crowded buses, standing up and/or benches inside of discotecas are great places to get a short nap. You learn to sleep wherever, whenever

-If someone mistakes you for a Spaniard, roll with it

-Using dark side streets or parking garage stairwells as bathrooms is also acceptable and promoted. When ya gotta go, ya gotta go

-Toilet paper is a luxury

-The cheaper the wine, the better the night

-Learn to like the catcalls. In 20 years you’ll be wishing people were screaming guapa at you

-Little kids really are cuter in Europe, and ice basically doesn’t exist. You get used to the warm drinks

-Baguettes with chorizo, salchicha (however it’s spelled) and queso (or just Nutella) make a great meal. Very cost effective and always taste better when eaten in the grass under some monument like the Eiffle Tower or in front of the Ponte Vecchio in Florence. Wine/champagne included.

-Don’t ever take a train in Switzerland without knowing where you’re going or without the appropriate ticket. Having a mean man condescendingly say “Welcome to Switzerland” isn’t as thrilling as when Luke says to Ryan, “Welcome to OC, B****”

Aside from all that, I think the biggest things I learned can’t be put into words. I can say I learned more in the last four months than most people learn in a lifetime. I learned how you really do have to enjoy the time you have people, because you can’t be with everyone forever. I also believe that everyone you meet is there to teach you something. Whether it’s a small detail like how to read a map, or a bigger concept like how to enjoy the present, everyone comes your way for a reason. I have met some of the most amazing people throughout this experience, and I truly believe I learned something from each and every one of them. One of the biggest things I learned is that you have to forget about the past and the future and just live. Live for what you want to live for, not for what someone else wants or for what someone else wants from you.

I think my favorite thing that I learned (aside from all the Spanish) is that people are people. It doesn’t matter what foods they eat, how they dress, how they spend their days or the languages that they speak. People are people and at the end of the day, they’re all the same. They want the same things; love, happiness, fun, etc. The little girls want to grow up to be princesses of some sort, the teenagers run around in mass groups screaming obnoxiously, the college students want to party all hours of the night and the parents want to know you’re home safe after going out. Culture to culture, even on the other side of the world, they’re all the same. People are people.

Cheers to the best semester of my life and thank you all for following me through it J