Do’s and Don'ts from a (Now) Very Wise Woman

DON’T count yourself out. If you’re driven, you’ll make it work. The reason it took me so long to get back into STEM in the first place is because I had convinced myself I didn’t belong in spaces like this. Even with a professor who was unfortunately vocally and regularly surprised that a film major could do well in an ecology course, I did well in the ecology course! 

DO lower your screentime. In the wise words of Cher, “I need to shoot my phone.” Try deleting Instagram from your phone every now and then. Go out of your way to not hide in your room at your host family’s place. Get your work done, but remember to maintain a good work-life balance too! Your academics are important, but remember how unique this opportunity is and live as presently as much as you can.

DON’T swim in the ocean immediately after getting a new piercing. I actually was completely fine, but it stressed my mom out immensely, so on her behalf, I am advising you to wait longer than a week to risk infecting your piercing. (Even if it looks fantastic and doesn’t actually get infected.)

DO buy sunscreen and everything else you need on the mainland because everything is more expensive here, and spend as much time as you can in the water. If you’re considering investing in your own mask and snorkel, I highly recommend it. And while we’re at it… DO wear sunscreen, even on your feet. I have a permanent Chacos tan line now. It’s like I’ve been branded with the word “LESBIAN” across my dogs. So it goes.

DON’T take every picture. I can’t tell you the amount of times I lost or left or forgot my camera somewhere, or the second I turned it on, I realized the batteries were dead. Take it as a sign. Let yourself feel silly and whimsical and decide that this is a message from something – God, the universe, whatever – and live it more fully than you otherwise would’ve. I brought three cameras on my trip here, and I’m incredibly grateful to have had them when I did, but even more grateful to have not had them on the days I thought I needed them. When you spend too much time looking through a viewfinder, you miss the view. Trust your memory, and find other ways to document the moment. Take up journaling if you haven’t already. Call your mom and tell her all about it. Be Walter Mitty with the snow leopard: don’t take the picture. There is beauty in the ephemeral. You don’t always have to take. Sometimes just being there is the gift. 

DO take a lover. Ideally of the homosexual variety. It might mean you have to go back into the closet, or in my case, go into the closet for the first time in your life. It might mean stolen kisses after looking both ways to make sure no one’s around, or loudly inventing a boyfriend at the dinner table to keep them off your trail. It might mean being her translator in the hospital, squeezing her hand in a language she understands. You might tell her you love her on the beach in an island-wide blackout and hope she feels the same. (If you’re half as lucky as I am, she will.) It will mean breaking yourself open when the program ends. Maybe you’ll get back together, maybe you won’t. Neither of you will know until you’re older and wiser and a little less tan. What you will know before then is that it will have been worth it. It was for me. 

I think what I’m telling you is to fall in love with everything. And sure, it’s easy to fall in love with someone whose eyes look like the shallowest parts of the Pacific. It’s a little less easy to fall in love with the humidity, the horse flies, the mud… but I can really and honestly say I fell in love anyway. I don’t think I realized how closed off I’d become until I started opening myself back up again. And thank god I did. I can’t recommend it enough.