The week before last we had orientation activities in Heredia, the city in which we will be living and going to school.  One of the things IFSA does is bring in some University students to accompany us on our outings, so we can ask them questions and get to know some students before classes even start.  During the week we walked around Heredia, San José (the capital of Costa Rica, less than 30 minutes away by bus or train), and the U.  I was very excited to discover that I live close enough to the U that I can walk!  My host mom assures me the walk is safe during the day, and this way I don’t have to pay bus fare every day, which can really add up.  One of my favorite things to do in Heredia so far is go to the movies – less than $4!  Here are some pictures of a day trip we took to a mountain/ranch hike:

One of the language nuances we have noticed between English and Spanish is words that start with “s+consonant” in English always start with “es-” in Spanish.  For example, school –> escuela, space –> espacio, Spot –> Espot (the name of one of my host family’s dogs), and, most directly applicable to me, Stephanie –> Estephanie.  We tried to get the Ticos to say it without the E in front, but it is very difficult for them.  So Estephanie it is!

This past week we started classes (finally!).  Most classes only meet once a week, which means more free time to do homework/readings, but also longer classes – a 3 or 4 hour class is pretty standard.  I have trouble focusing in English for that long, let alone having to be extra-alert to understand the class in Spanish.  Afterwards my brain hurts a little bit, but hopefully it gets easier as the semester progresses!  Another thing that is taking a little adjustment is doing long readings in Spanish.  It just takes me forever, because I have to understand not only the words but also the meaning of the article, the point it is trying to make, etc.  I don’t want to come to class unprepared, so I have been trudging through it.

This is the church of Fatima during mass.  It has no doors, so everything is open to the street, which I think gives it a very welcoming feel.

The UNA (Universidad Nacional) is really pretty!  Most of the buildings have an open-air courtyard in the center, so even when you are indoors it feels like you are outdoors.  This seems to be pretty standard for Costa Rica – instead of running air conditioning, they maintain access to fresh air and the plentiful breezes that come from the ocean.

This is one of those central courtyards in a classroom building at the U. All four floors open up to the courtyard, so fresh air is never far away!

My daily walk to school

So far I am really enjoying my time here in Costa Rica.  IFSA explained to us what we can expect in terms of the inevitable culture shock – homesickness, rejection of host culture, craving foods/environments that remind us of home.  I haven’t really experienced this yet, but things are beginning to feel more permanent.  Not everything is brand new and exciting anymore; I feel like I am in a “settling in” period now.  However, although I am sure culture shock will hit me eventually, for now I am content to be blissfully at peace in this paradise!

So I’ve been home from New Zealand for 3 weeks now and everything feels “back to normal.” I miss the friends I made and I think about them all the time. I have stayed in contact with many of them and plan to keep that up! I helped keep the sadness of leaving away by surrounding myself constantly with friends from home. I’ve been able to see a lot of my friends from home and catch up and hear all about what I missed while I was away. Nobody particularly cares to hear much about New Zealand and that’s fine with me – I didn’t expect them to want to hear much about it. Of course everyone asks, “How was New Zealand?” and I give the short answer of, “It was amazing/awesome!” but there isn’t much to say beyond that because explaining everything would take hours. The best way I have been able to make people understand is to talk about how I made a whole new life there with real best friends and then it was suddenly taken from me in a flash. Suddenly it’s gone. It was not a vacation – I hate when people refer to it that way. It was 5 months of real life with real school and real people who are now my life-long friends. It wasn’t just some free vacation. I worked really hard to get myself there and pay for my time abroad. I earned it and I made the most of it and I couldn’t be happier about the time I had there.

This past weekend I met up with a study abroad friend in Cleveland and we drove to Maryland together to see 2 of our friends from New Zealand. I stayed at the home of one of my flatmates from New Zealand and it was amazing to see her again. I am glad we were able to make it work so soon after being home!

Traveling in the future will be that much better now that I have friends all around the country and all over the world. I can’t wait to keep traveling. I can’t wait to go to Spain and visit some of the friends I made there. I can’t wait until my friends visit me. Despite having to leave my friends in New Zealand, seeing them again has given me something awesome to look forward to!

Tonight is a night for productivity. I’m currently sitting in the old common room of Ilam Village waiting for six 50-minute lectures to save onto my desktop. I just finished one of my first online quizzes for my New Zealand Biodiversity and Biosecurity class.  Once these files save, I will move on to another online quiz for Freshwater Ecosystems. In the meantime, I figured I would be slightly productive and update the virtual world on my New Zealand life.

First off, I am still not used to having so much free time at my disposal. At first it was a shocker, but the upside is that I actually have time to cook meals for myself. I have the time to walk to the grocery store, buy fresh vegetables, prepare, and consume them before they turn rotten. Plus all of that walking means I don’t have to spend $70 NZD on a gym membership.

A bunch of us wanted to see the new Batman movie, so we decided to head to the theatre on Tuesday since that’s when they offer a discount student price. I asked my flatmates about the policy of sneaking snacks into the movies. And that sparked the whole conversation of the procedure of buying a movie ticket in New Zealand. Apparently Tuesday is an extremely popular day to go to the movies, especially because “there is nothing to do in Christchurch” (quoted by one of my flatmates). However, you can’t just show up 5 minutes before the movie starts to buy a ticket because movie theatres have assigned seating, which is kind of nice if you’re indecisive, but I really enjoy picking my seat at the movies. Our seats were a little too close to the screen, but nonetheless the movie was AMAZING.

Kayak rolling class was cancelled this week since they didn’t have enough people sign up, but hopefully I will be able to go again soon. Needless to say I still had a very eventful weekend. At the University of Canterbury new student orientation, there was a speaker named Gary from Hello New Zealand! He organizes tours around New Zealand. So a few of us decided to tag along on the trip to Queenstown. The ride was gorgeous! We stopped at a few scenic places along the way including Lake Tekapo, and Lake Pukaki where we saw an amazing view of Mount Cook, the tallest mountain in New Zealand. I tried to take as many pictures throughout the trip but I cannot help but feel as though they really do not capture the true beauty of New Zealand.

We arrived in Queenstown around 7:30 pm and checked into Base Backpacker (like a hostel) for two nights. We were given free time on Friday to explore the town where we grabbed a much needed dinner at this quaint place that was reasonably priced, and then hit a pub for some delicious New Zealand beer. I still consider myself to be in the sampling phase when it comes to beer but I can’t really complain because even the “low quality” beer here is far superior to cheap beer in The States. (Side note: In New Zealand, kiwis (or New Zealanders) refer to The United States of America as simply “The States” which is one slang type word that I have easily picked up).

A picture of me at Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo

Lake Pukaki and a view of Mount Cook, the tallest mountain in New Zealand.

The sun is starting to set over Lake Pukaki

On Saturday, we woke up super early (7:15 am) for breakfast, which we happily ate and then returned back to our bunks for a much-needed powernap. There weren’t any scheduled activities until 11:15 so I headed off by myself to explore Queenstown. The sun had already set by the time we arrived at Queenstown the previous night so I was absolutely shocked by how gorgeous the city was during the day. I meandered along until I found an artisans market by the lake. Everything was a bit out of my price range, but it was a really fun atmosphere. While exploring I found a Salvation Army Store and headed in to find my very own New Zealand wool hat for $8 NZD, which is much better than the $40+ NZD they ask for brand new hats. My exploring time had ended, and I had to head back to the backpackers to meet with the group to organize (take a nice calm relaxing breath) bungy jumping! I jumped the Kawarau Bridge Bungy. As described in the brochure: “The historic Kawarau Bridge is home of Bungy pioneers AJ Hackett and Henry van Asch’s first commercial Bungy site. It was here in 1988 that the Bungy phenomenon began. 43m above the stunning Kawarau River, this Bungy Jump is still the most popular Bungy in New Zealand, attracting thousands of thrill-seekers and spectators every year.”

The Kawarau Bridge Bungy Jump

Excitement started to build as we boarded the bus for a 20-minute drive to the jump site. We then had to sign our life away, get weighed, and then line up to jump. My friend, David, went first while I recorded his jump. Then there was no more delaying; I had to finally volunteer. As I walked up to the bridge I started to become nervous, but I just brushed it aside as I tried to sound confident as I chatted with Ryan while he set up my harness. Then I had to stand up and wiggle my way to the edge of the platform and that is when it all suddenly became real. I was standing 43 meters (~141 feet) above a rocky river where I couldn’t help but hear my mother’s voice ring through my ears, “Well would you follow them if they all decided to go jump off a bridge?” I guess we finally got the answer. It took a little coaxing. The fact that it cost a nonrefundable $150 NZD helped with motivation. I definitely didn’t jump on the first count of three, or the second count either, but third time’s a charm and I found myself falling. It was a crazy, amazing, breathtaking feeling. And the first thought that came through my mind was, “man I spend a lot of time upside down in New Zealand.” I’m sure the people reading this are probably thinking, “That girl is crazy!” But yes I would jump again, and yes I definitely recommend bungy jumping at least once!

The proof that I actually jumped.

When I was finally right side up again, I realized just how hungry I was. When you go bungy jumping you shouldn’t have anything in your stomach, so the last thing I ate was two pieces of toast at 7:30 am and it was now almost 3:00 pm. When we made it back to Queenstown, we stopped in at Fergburger, a really famous burger joint. I got the “Bun Laden” which is comprised of Falafel patties dressed with lemon yoghurt and chipotle chilli sauce, lettuce, tomato, red onion, cucumber, avocado & aioli. It was delicious and definitely hit the spot as we made our way up to the gondola.

Bun Laden from Fergburger

The gondola takes you up the mountain to Skyline where you can see a beautiful view of Queenstown. There’s an optional luge activity that you can choose to add with the gondola ride. I took off from the start of the course and started to gain a lot of speed when I came upon the first actual turn. I soon discovered that the luge cart doesn’t have a great turning radius and I wiped out. It took a bit to get the luge cart back on course and from there I literally went at a snails pace.

The view of Queenstown from Skyline

It was around dinner time when we finally came back down. We texted Gary to see if there were any plans for the evening. We wound up meeting him at this restaurant called “Prime” which has some decent early bird (before 6:30 pm) dinner specials. When we finished, we then had to decide what to for the rest of the night, but since we were really tired from our activities we decided to hang out in the backpacker’s tv room where some people had rented the movie “Hostel”. The movie is a horror movie and as a quick summary: Three guys decide to go backpacking in Europe where at this one hostel they find out that if they go to this one area they can meet a lot of women, instead these women lure the guys away one by one where they get tortured and killed by this group of people. Not exactly a good bedtime movie that you want to watch while staying in a backpacker. The backpacker had a computer room, so I coughed up 4 NZD for one hour of internet where I checked my email and facebook, and then proceeded to watch corgi videos until my time ran out.

On Sunday I woke up even earlier in order to head to the pier to watch the sun rise. It seems as though whenever I plan to see a sunrise it’s always cloudy. Nonetheless, it was still beautiful. I then packed up all my belongings in order to board the bus back to Christchurch. We stopped at the lake at Wanaka on the way home, and then moved on to Puzzling World. We didn’t feel like paying the entry fee but the lobby had a lot of mind puzzles to do while we waited for everyone else. The bus ride home was relatively quite since everyone was tired out from the eventful weekend.

The lake at Wanaka

Mount Cook on our return journey. Notice the heavy cloud cover to the west.

While I resisted the urge to crawl into bed and fall asleep, I unpacked my bags and then repacked them with my uni supplies (or school supplies) and found myself in the Old Common Room. My files have finished saving, so I supposed I should move onto my online quiz for Freshwater Ecosystems.

So, I was going to write on the first day. But that didn’t happen. And then I decided to write on the second day. But that didn’t happen either, obviously. And now it’s my fourth day here, and I am just now getting to actually writing this blog post. There’s been so much to do! We just moved in with our host families today and I have a little time to rest and relax, which I am using to do write the blog.

The first thing I noticed when I landed – or before I landed, when the pilot announced over the intercom that the temperature at the destination was 31 degrees Fahrenheit – was that it was really cold. One of the first things that Isa and Mary, the two IFSA-Butler employees that met all of us flying in at the airport, told us was bienvenidos al invierno (welcome to the winter)! And indeed, it really is winter here in Santiago. In the morning and evenings the temperature hovers around zero degrees Celsius. It’s cold enough that one can see one’s breath. As I have learned, however, it warms up quite considerably during the day. For example, on the second day we went to La Chascona, one of the houses of Neruda, and when we left the hotel we were staying in, it was very cold, so I put on a sweatshirt and a coat. But by the time we got there, after eating lunch at Patio Bellavista, it was warm enough that I actually had to unzip my jacket and roll up the sleeves of my sweater. But I realize I am getting way ahead of myself.

On the 25^th, my first day in Chile, I landed at the Santiago airport, Arturo Merino Benitez, around 9. By the time I had gone through immigration, picked up my luggage and gone through customs (all of which went very smoothly), it was about 9:40. I was met by Isabel Yévenes, the resident director in Chile, who welcomed me to Chile. We waited for the other students to arrive and then were driven to our hotel, Hotel Bonaparte. We were able to rest a bit before orientation started. We learned about how to stay safe in Chile – only the section about earthquakes was a bit worrying, but they assured us that it wasn’t as bad as it sounded – and then about the public transportation system in Chile. In Chile, the buses are called micros and together with the metro form the major components of the Chilean public transportation system.

Una micro!

The sign for the Metro here in Santiago.

For the metro, we were all given a Bip! card, which you use to pay for the metro. You can put money on it like a gift card at metro stations and the Bip! kiosks scattered around Santiago and then just wave it in front of the scanners in the metro stations. In Santiago, the price per metro ride depends on the time of day: it’s more expensive during the “rush hour” times when people are going to and returning from work, and less expensive earlier and during the middle of the day. After orientation, we had a very nice dinner at the hotel, after which I and a few other students went to buy some supplies at a grocery store. It was my first experience with the Chilean currency, the peso!

Oh, side story. I exchanged money at the airport at 467 pesos per dollar. But on the first day, we all went to a part of the city where there were many places to exchange money … and there the exchange rate was 490-491 pesos for a dollar. Very vexing.

On the second day we saw a bit more of the city. In the morning we walked to the Providencia (the name of the region of Santiago in which our hotel was) campus of la Universidad Autónoma de Chile – one of the universities at which we can take classes – where we were given a general orientation. They informed us of all the activities we can participate in, as well as giving us Autónoma backpacks. 

From there, we used the metro to get to the Plaza Italia, one of the largest open spaces in Santiago.

We went to the Patio Bellavista, which is a series of restaurants and shops, all in a rather small area.

After eating lunch we were able to wander about around admire all the wares, before leaving for la Chascona. On the way there, we passed a lot of colorful houses and some very beautiful murals, like this one in the street leading up to the house:

La Chascona, which is at bottom of San Cristobal – but more about that later – was a house of Pablo Neruda’s that he had built for Matilde Urrutia, his lover and eventual third wife. La Chascona, we were told, comes from the indigenous word for wild hair, which described Matilde perfectly. The house was built in various stages and so has a rather disorganized appearance, but the view of the city is amazing and the house itself, along with its gardens, is very, very beautiful. The interiors of the house are very small because Neruda wanted it to feel like a boat, an effect enhanced, during his time, by the no longer functioning water channels that would give inhabitants the appearance that the house was rocking.

After our tour of la Chascona, we went up to San Cristobal, one of the largest hills in Santiago and from which one can see almost the entire city, by funicular.

The view from the top is simply breathtaking. Though the famous – or rather, infamous – Santiago smog hid most of the Andes from view, they were simply too massive to be kept hidden entirely, their white, snow bedecked peaks visible through the white fog.

From the viewing area we walked up the steps to the statue of the Virgin Mary. From there, the highest point of San Cristobal, the Andes appeared even more impressive.

Side story: Must of the public bathrooms here cost money. The ones at Patio Bellavista cost 300 pesos, and the ones at the foot of San Cristobal cost 150. It’s not very much, but it’s something to be aware of!

On the third day, we sat inside most of the day, listening presentations about how to register for classes at la Universidad Católica and la Universidad de Chile, two of Chile’s largest universities. It is very different from how registration works in the USA! First, it’s probably a good idea to give a short introduction to the Chilean education system in general.

First, a brief history of Chilean universities. Unlike most America universities, whose various colleges were always under the umbrella of their respective universities, the various schools (called facultades) of the large and older Chilean universities only came together after they had been operating as independent colleges for a while. Because of this, the various facultades operate very much independently of one another. The prime example for this is the fact that various facultades start classes at different time. For example, classes of the Department of Economics at la Chile (which is what they call la Universidad de Chile) start on March 30^th, but those of the Department of Social Sciences begin on August 6^th.

In Chile, students attend university for 5 years. Unlike in the United States, where students can decide more or less exactly what they want to study at college and can even change their areas of studies, in Chile, the students are stuck in the Carrera that they test into after completing high school. Although this is been changing slightly recently, Chilean students generally have to take specific classes each semester in order to graduate on time. If they miss, or fail out of, a class, which is only offered once every year, they have to wait a whole year before being able to take it again, setting back their education a significant amount of time. If that class never happens to be offered again, they actually have to switch schools and start all over again in order to be able to do that. Also, because of the independence of the facultades, registration is rather complicated for international students. Chilean students have an assigned set of classes they have to take, but for international students who can take classes at all, or at least most, of the facultades, registration involves going to the secretaries of each facultad (which are scattered all over the city) and then asking the secretary to sign oneself up for all the courses one is interested in. For us international students there is a “window-shopping” period, in which we can see which classes we like, if we can understand the professor, and if the work sounds doable.

This weekend, we have to make a list of 10-15 classes that we would like to take at la Chile, 10-12 classes we would like to take at la Católica, 6-10 classes that we would like to take at la Autónoma and 6-10 classes we would like to take at Diego Portales, another private university. We aren’t going to sign up for all these classes, obviously, but it’s just to give us a starting place from which we can begin to eliminate options.

That evening, we went to a humongous restaurant called los Buenos Muchachos. It really was enormous and actually quite cold! But the food was delicious and there was live entertainment with a band and singers. The place had a very festive atmosphere, which was awesome. At the end, everyone got up and danced to the music and had a great time.

I was going to write a bit about my host family (today is just my second day with them!) and my first experiences with Chilean Spanish, but I will leave that for a later blog post because most of you have probably already stopped reading anyways! I realize this blog post has a very rambling nature to it and is extremely long, and I’m very sorry! It’s just that there is so much to say! And it’s really my fault for not writing earlier. I’ll try to write about my host family soon, but until then, ¡chao!

People ask me what I’m doing with my life, and inevitably I talk about Egypt. I’m excited about studying Arabic at Alexandria University, so of course I’m going to talk about my upcoming semester! However, I get one of two responses from people who hear that I’m headed to Egypt: incredible excitement or utter dismay. The polemical nature of these answers does amuse me, though I do take the concern behind the answers seriously.

Looking ahead at the semester, I should have a blank slate of expectations. To be clear: I don’t. I went abroad for 3.5 weeks this past January to Turkey and Jordan. The night before I left, in the midst of a chat with a good friend, I realized that I had seriously no idea of what exactly I was getting myself into for the next month. I knew roughly what to expect getting on a plane for a cross-Atlantic flight, since I somewhat remember flying to London in 1997. I knew roughly what to expect after coming back, since the spring semester was my second at Luther College. As for the month itself, my mind only gave me a blank, sheerly grey space of time. And that month turned into a wonderful set of experiences and learning and laughter with my classmates as well as various Turks and Jordanians. So, learning from the past says I should have little to no expectations heading into something to which I’m dedicated.

But, having that set of experiences in January means I have a starting point for my semester in Egypt. Before Turkey and Jordan, my only knowledge of Middle Eastern culture was from books and college courses. Now I’ve lived in the culture of lore at the center of the grand mixing pot between Africa, Asia, and Europe. I know that the Arabic concept of beautiful art and decoration is incredibly busy. Middle Eastern music doesn’t easily welcome harmonizing, a pastime of Luther students. Even before returning to the States, I began paying more attention to international news, especially since the Syrian massacres began to degenerate into sectarian violence and Egyptians popularly rejected Hosni Mubarak as tyrant. Professors bid me farewell from Luther with caveats concerning heckling. There are probably challenges and wonderful things ahead of me, and I hope I’m prepared for the mix.

Sorry for the long delay, I’ve been here a couple of weeks now. Things have been a bit crazy, but they’ve been really good. I spent my first week in Liberia, doing an orientation program that included hiking, learning traditional dances, and taking a trip to the beach. My first host family was really great, and I hope to visit them again before the end of the semester. They are both retired teachers who were funny and very welcoming. Liberia was beautiful, and it hardly rained, but it was extremely hot outside. At night it felt like it only got down to the mid seventies or eighty degrees. This was mitigated somewhat by a fan in my room but it was still a bit difficult to sleep. I didn’t take a ton of pictures there but I’ve got a few that I can post:

This is the beach we went to called “Playa Coco”. It rained a bit but it was still fun.

This is a shot of our campus in Liberia. It was pretty even though it is under construction.

This is a blue iguana that I followed around for a while. There are a lot of them in Guanacaste.

This is a picture of me and Kelsey in front of a tree that only grows in Guanacaste. In retrospect the tree should probably have been the focal point of the photograph. My bad.

Since we arrived in Heredia, I’ve done a lot. We went on another hike and went white-water rafting at a local river. We also spent part of one day at a spa. They have volcanic mud that they put on your face because it soothes your skin. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me. We went to a museum of art and then one of history during our visit to San Jose, the capital city of Costa Rica. We took a tour of Heredia with some UNA students as guides. It was a lot of fun, but I don’t remember where anything is other than my bus stop. This is important though, since I live in Santo Domingo, a town 15 minutes away from the school by bus. And I can’t remember if I said this in my last post, but there are no number addresses. So understanding the bus routes is key. Also, it is important to be comfortable being lost. I visited a friend in Alajuela, a town 30 minutes away by bus, and had basically no idea what I was doing. The people are friendly though, and if you ask enough times for directions, you tend to eventually find what you’re looking for. Anyway, I’ve got some more pictures here from my second week in Costa Rica. They show some of what I just described and also a weekend trip back to Guanacaste to go to the beach with a host brother and a bunch of his friends. I would like to note that the city is in the central valley, surrounded by mountains, and that since I live on top of a hill the view is gorgeous. I’ll put a picture of the mountains but my camera doesn’t do it justice.

This is Super Yurusti. A convenience store, and the closest thing I have to an address

This is from the art museum. I don’t know what else to say about it.

Here’s the mountains I was talking about. They’re on all sides and they’re pretty amazing.

Horses.

These are the friends who took me to the beach. I know two of them have their eyes closed but whatever. Its hard to get five people to focus for any length of time.

How cool is this picture from the beach?

Hopefully the answer was “pretty freaking cool” because I took like 40. Fortunately I’m only subjecting you to a few.

Last one. The colors were awesome. Although I think my camera enhanced them a bit. I didn’t edit this.

Yesterday I started classes. It’s a bit intimidating since I feel like a foreigner and the professors talk too fast, but everyone is very nice and I think I will get accustomed to the language pretty quickly. Sorry for the wicked long post and the delay. I will try to post more regularly.

Pura Vida!

Sunday, July 8–No puedo creer

7.01 am

I’m not ready.  Not ready to be here.  Not ready to not wake up in the city.  Not ready to hear English.  Not ready.

I cried on the plane watching the lights of Buenos Aires disappear behind me.  Not bawling, just a few tears.  But now that I have arrived in Atlanta 10 hours later, it feels like the last 5 months might have just been a dream.  20 weeks of ups and downs.  I don’t like how cheesy it sounds, but studying abroad has really changed me.  The things I used to focus on don’t seem as important anymore.  I’m not saying I’m not still excited to go shopping when I get home, but I’m more focused on financing my trip/potentially moving back to BsAs than buying a new pair of wedges.

It didn’t really hit me as real until I was waiting in line to board the plane behind a giant group of teenage Americans. (and it still hasn’t really kicked in that going back isn’t definite…yet) But they were probably around 15-16 years old and it seemed like there were 100 of them. all talking, mostly complaining, in English and just being the epitome of obnoxious Americans.  The idea of going back to that made me sick to my stomach.  I wanted to tell them to calm down and quit complaining, but I didn’t want to talk to them in English and give it away that I’m American too.  So instead I walked around their giant group and let two Argentines in front of me as the line finally started moving.

But thank god when the girl who ended up sitting next to me responded to me in Spanish after I asked her “de donde sos?”  funny thing was, she’s from New Jersey, but is living in Buenos Aires now.  She said she was relieved when I spoke to her in Spanish bc she was afraid I was with the group of kids.  She was probably the best plane friend I could have asked for, because, for one, she wasn’t an obnoxious American, and also she had been through the same thing as me a couple of years earlier after she studied abroad in the city.  Instead of giving me a weird look as I began to tear up, she gave me tissues.  After having met so many (not obnoxious) Americans like her in Buenos Aires, it makes my dream of moving back seem more tangible.  We exchanged information and I told her she might be getting a facebook message soon from me freaking out with reverse culture shock.

Sitting in the Atlanta airport, I’m already overwhelmed hearing English everywhere.  It’s not as easy to zone out on as Spanish, so it’s kind of giving me a headache.  Good I’ve still got some of the good Argentina ibuprofen (I think it’s prescription strength).  I just called my mom and left her a message in Spanish bc I don’t wanna do it yet.  I don’t want to speak English and be one of them.  I was fine speaking English with my plane friend because we knew Spanish was an option.  For some reason, that was more comforting.  But now, it’s kind of scary because it means I’m here to stay.  And I don’t want that right now.

I’ve been excited to come back to the warm summer on the lake since the cold started in BsAs, but now that the time’s finally arrived, the cold is looking that much better.  But I can’t lie that I am still really excited to see my friends and family.  and to eat a giant salad. with jalapeños.  and to not have to spend money every day.

I don’t know what to think right now.  It’s all just weird.  just got to go day by day, I guess?

A little introduction: My name is Rachel, and I am a Junior at the George Washington University in Washington, DC but I’ve spent most of my life in Memphis, TN. I’m majoring in International Affairs, have taken a few semesters of French and Italian and hope to minor in English Literature. I have a few stamps on my passport (Paris with a friend, Athens and Istanbul on a high school trip), but have never left the country for much longer than a week- this will be my first big trip abroad.

It has been a hectic summer. Not only have I been incredibly excited to go to Galway in the fall, but my plans on how exactly I’m going to get to Galway have been in a constant flux. What was once a simple flight over soon became a month long backpacking trip through Europe before IFSA-Butler’s orientation, and then was finally slimmed down to a two week long backpacking trip.

Through IFSA-Butler’s student network I met another Rachel going on the trip who was interested in going on a backpacking trip before we began classes, something that I had always been interested in but never had the guts to really go for it. Luckily, Rachel and I will be traveling together through Germany to Prague, Amsterdam, and northern England before heading over to Dublin to meet up with our group.

This is a rough map of the route I will be taking to arrive in Galway.

We still have some work to do when it comes to our plans, but our tickets have finally been booked and now all I have to do is prepare and pack…which the closer the day comes the harder I realize this process is. I still don’t know how I am getting my luggage for Galway across the Atlantic, or know (or own) what I need for a two week backpacking trip. I still need to register to vote overseas (still a little sad that I will be missing the presidential election campaign in DC this fall- but I’ll just have to be there for the inauguration in January), and there are several loose ends that need to be tied up before I leave the country on this adventure.

I know that I am going to have probably the best time of my life, but with my departure date less than 3 weeks away and so much left to do, mostly I feel stress and anxiety when I think of leaving. Especially with the backpacking trip, this will be the most in charge of my life I will have ever been. Finding food, places to sleep, deciding where I want to go and what I want to do (and can do) is thrilling but a little terrifying as well. A little more superficially…two weeks is a long time to go without a cell phone! I know I will be scoffing at all these fears in a matter of weeks, but at the moment I’m an anxious ball of stress with a to-do list a mile long!

“If there weren’t any other people, there wouldn’t be any you because what you do, which is what you are, only has meaning in relation to other people.  That is a very comforting thought when you are in the car in the rain at night alone, for then you aren’t you, and not being you or anything, you can really lie back and get some rest.”

Robert Penn Warren,  All the King’s Men

Now that I’ve been home almost a month and finally finished recounting my adventures abroad, it’s time to reflect back over the semester and close the blog.  I cannot believe how quickly it went by.  It seems like just yesterday I was starting to think about packing and writing a draft of my predeparture blog on scrap paper during slow shifts at work.  It’s now five months later, and I don’t know where to begin.

Being back home is a difficult feeling for me to describe.  I haven’t even quite reconciled it with myself.  In a lot of ways, it is like I never left.  The routines of home slid right back on comfortably and “reverse culture shock” is not a real thing, at least for me.  New Zealand was like a dream, and whenever people ask me about it, I struggle to find words that adequately capture the essence of my experience.  Usually, I just cop out by saying it was amazing and I loved it.  Which I suppose actually summarizes my semester quite well.

This is not to say that I do not enjoy talking about New Zealand at every given opportunity.  Just that I’m more likely to talk more animatedly about little anecdotes or stories than the broad picture.  I haven’t quite found a way to give an extended narrative account of my time out of the country.  Which is probably actually okay, since no one really wants to hear you drone on about your travels unless they’ve been there, or are soliciting you for information to plan their own trip.  And it’s probably better that I don’t dwell on everything about New Zealand, because then I would miss it even more.  I think the key to avoiding the reverse culture shock is the same as adjusting to a new country initially: stay busy, and remember the aspects of life at home you enjoy rather than pining for what you want back there.  I’ve been spending a lot of time with my friends, family, and dogs and that means I am (for the most part), too distracted to want to head back (though I did experience a moment of depression when The Hobbit trailer came on and I realized I had no idea when I would be back in Middle Earth again).

Home has been great though.  I’m so lucky to have a great family and friends who I’m so close to that you can just pick up right where you left off as if you were never separated.  I can only hope that the friends I made abroad will prove to be similar in that respect.

I truly believe that everyone should study abroad.  It doesn’t really matter where (though I’m obviously an advocate for New Zealand…or Australia as you can seem almost all of either country in a single semester if you plan it out well), but just go out and do it.  Force it to fit into your schedule. Take out the extra loans to pay for it.  You will not regret a single penny of your time. I could have graduated in three years had I not gone abroad, but then I would have missed out on an incredible, once-in-a-lifetime experience.  It sounds so cheesy, but you really do grow and learn a lot about yourself.  It’s impossible not to, since you’re completely immersed in a brand-new place in which you have no connections.  You have to learn to define yourself outside of who, what, and where you know.  Which is why I’ve included the Robert Penn Warren quote at the beginning of this post.  New Zealand rejuvenated me.  It opened my mind and recharged me for the future.  I may have lost studying abroad as something to look forward to, but the rest of my life has barely begun.

I’m so happy I chose New Zealand, and I will come back again one day.  I did see most of the country, but there are still places I need to see, like the entire west coast, the Catlins, Kaikoura, Nelson, and the Otago Peninsula (I know, I know…it’s a huge sin that I never made it out there since it’s roughly a twenty-five minute drive from campus).  I also will be here in the summer; winter is gorgeous in it’s own way, but I’m more of a shorts and a tank top kind of girl.  I don’t particularly care to walk around with a blanket on (which I wore like a cape, according to my flatmates) indoors.

Thanks for bearing with me and reading through all of this.  I enjoyed writing it and hope I was effectively able to project how much I loved this semester and can inspire others to travel.  I’ll leave you with one of my favorite Tolkien quotes, in homage to my favorite author:

“The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.”

So I made it through my first week of classes (cue applause). I enjoy my courses for the most part, but it is taking a bit of time to get used to the course structure here. At home I’m used to set times for classes, for example: you meet Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9:00-9:50, or Tuesday and Thursday from 10:00-11:35.  That is definitely not the case here. My Antarctica class meets Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. My Freshwater Ecosystems class meets Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And my New Zealand Biodiversity and Biosecurity class only meets on Mondays and Fridays. The sessions for each class also don’t meet at the same time every day so it’s kind of awkward and a little difficult to get used to. Class sizes are also another big adjustment. Susquehanna has a student body of about 2,000 students. UC has between 15,000 and 20,000. Fortunately, it seems as though I have “small” classes. The other annoying thing is internet usage. Free wifi essentially doesn’t exist. Instead of paying monthly fees for unlimited internet usage, you pay by data usage. So if you want to watch movies (or watch your recorded lectures) or even skype your family and friends at home, you’ll eat up your internet quite quickly.

Now that I’ve gotten some complaining out of the way, on to the other things I’ve been doing. The first class I had in New Zealand was Antarctica: Life in the Cold. And it has definitely been living up to my expectations. That night we went to an orientation event where we were given free pizza (what college student doesn’t love free food??). According to some Kiwis, “American Pizza” doesn’t exist in New Zealand. In other words, if you’re trying to find a plain cheese pizza, you’re out of luck. Either way, “New Zealand” pizza is still delicious.

I think I’m really going to enjoy my Tuesdays. The only class I have on Tuesdays is Freshwater Ecosystems, which is an 8:00 class. As I headed back to my flat to drop off my books, there was a free waffle stand. Unable to turn down the free food, I filled up on breakfast and met up with another IFSA Butler student, Alyshia. We caught a bus into Hagley Park and toured the Botanical Gardens (or what was opened of them). It’s a really nice place to walk around. I kind of compared it to Central Park in New York City, but this one is better. Once we got done exploring the park we realized it was only about 10:30. So we decided to catch another bus into the Central City where we walked around the Red Zone. The Red Zone is an area of the Central City that has been closed off from public access because it was heavily impacted by the February 2011 earthquake.

The more time I spend in Christchurch, the more I realize what an impact the February 2011 earthquake had on this city. For example, I bought a cheap fruit bowl at this place called “The Warehouse” and the cashier told me about how the earthquake destroyed her beautiful china fruit bowl that had dolphins on it that she wanted to pass down to her kids. Walking around the red zone was such a moving and humbling experience. It was one of those moments where you don’t realize how bad something is until you put yourself in the middle of it.

The Christchurch Cathedral

After we finished walking around the Red Zone, we hopped on our bus to go to a place called DressSmart. We saw an add on one of the buses and figured we should make our way there. When we arrived we celebrated our luck in successful navigation of the bus system. We shopped around a bit. I bought a black scarf and a red hat to wear to the Christchurch Crusaders Rugby game that we are going to this weekend.

And then we had to make our way back to UC. We don’t exactly know the bus routes around Christchurch, and we were pretty far away from UC. So we just hopped on a bus that said it was going to the city and figured if it went past where we had to get off then awesome, but it wouldn’t be a big deal if it went back to the center city terminal since we weren’t in a rush to get back. Well, we made it back eventually. The bus turned out to be a local bus so it went through all of the small neighborhoods and took quite a while. It was still early (only about 1:30) so we grabbed our books and headed for a bite to eat at the Greek place on campus and then spent some time in the library.

Tuesday night was a “Night Market” but essentially a club night where we got to sign up to participate in different clubs. I signed up for Cake club, a volunteer club, tramping club, and a snowboarding club (don’t worry mom: we only signed up to submerge ourselves in the kiwi culture).  We then headed back to the Ilam Village common room for some comedy and more free pizza.

Wednesday night we attended our first Tramping Club meeting. In New Zealand, hiking is referred to as tramping. They plan a lot of cool trips, so I am pretty excited to go on them.

The University of Canterbury also has a program for new international students called Operation Friendship. It’s kind of like having a host family except that there are far too many students to match each one up with an individual family. So a few families get together and take in a group of international students.

Here is a photo our Operation Friendship group

Saturday night, we had another IFSA Butler sponsored event. We met up for pizza, and then put on some face paint and headed for the stadium to watch the Christchurch Crusaders vs Western Force rugby game. We passed another shopping center and made a mental note to make our way back there at some point.

The Canterbury IFSA group all decked out in face paint for the rugby game

There was an awesome fog that was rolling in during the rugby game. On the bottom left you can see a knight on a horse riding around the stadium.

The next morning we decided to go to that shopping center and made our way to the bus stop to hop on The Orbiter, which is a bus route that goes around the city. Unfortunately, we hopped on The Orbiter in the wrong direction. It was a beautiful day out, and figured we would eventually make it to our destination so we stayed on the bus. The bus driver soon pulls off at a gas station to take a bathroom break. Fifteen minutes later he stops for ten minutes for his actual break. After we get back on the road, the receipt printer decides to break. The driver gets it fixed, and soon after the rear door breaks. So we have to get off the bus to transfer. An hour and a half later we make it to the shopping center, only to find out that this place is really only 15 minutes down the road from the university.

Alright, so I might have gotten a little bit distracted by life in a different country so it’s taken me a little while to finish writing this blog post. Another week of classes has gone by since I first started writing, so I suppose I should continue with my second week here. I still find class timetables to be slightly confusing, but I’m slowly getting used to it. I’m still loving my Tuesdays where I get done at 9:00 am.

This past Wednesday, I decided to join the Canoe Club, or rather kayak club. I found out that they have rolling classes on Thursdays. So I grabbed my togs (or bathing suit) and gave my best attempt at learning how to right myself when my kayak flips over. It’s definitely pretty hard, but I don’t think I’ll give up any time soon.

This Saturday, we had another IFSA Butler event. We met early to hop on a bus to Hanmer Springs. Even though we had to wake up a bit earlier than I wanted to, the drive to Hanmer was absolutely gorgeous! It wasn’t until we were about half an hour away from our destination that Kylie, our SSC, said, “It’s starting to get beautiful now.” I was kind of in shock, since I thought the whole drive was beautiful, I couldn’t imagine it getting any better! Well she was kind of right. It was difficult to take pictures while quad biking since I don’t have what they call a “life proof” camera. When I wasn’t worried about breaking every bone in my body, I actually enjoyed quad biking. It was a really cool experience, especially since it is something that I would never decide to do on my own. We then went into town and enjoyed a nice soak in the hot pools, which definitely helped soothe our aches and pains from quad biking.

The Canterbury IFSA group at Thrillseakers, where we quad biked.

The view from Thrillseakers.

I cannot believe that I am about to start my third week of classes. I know it’s still early on in my study abroad experience, but I cannot help but feel as though it is all moving much too quickly. A good portion of this week will actually be devoted to studying. I’m looking forward to this coming weekend, as I travel to Queenstown.