As I sit here in the BCN airport at 6:32 a.m. preparing for my flight home, I’m forced to think back on my abroad experience feeling incredibly full and satisfied. Studying abroad was probably the best thing that could have ever happened to me. Not only did I gain worldly experience but I also gained newfound independence, which I didn’t really expect to be so new to me.

I was walking home one warm weekend morning when I realized how beautiful the leaves make Berlin's streets. Strolling down the same roads I have been on for months now, I've had to reintroduce myself to the places I learned to appreciate for their energy or architecture alone. I still want to travel and see other big cities in Germany, but I think there's nowhere else I'd rather be than Berlin right now.

“So, tell me a little bit about yourself,” says the interviewer on the Eastern Standard Time side of the zoom-iverse. I fidget with the draw string on my sweatpants that are just out of the frame and accompanied by a freshly-ironed button-up as I rattle off my academic and past internship experiences and my experience studying abroad. “Oh wow! Amsterdam! What has that been like! What time is it there?”

In an ideal world, I have a knack for languages and leave my study abroad experience in Siena fluent in Italian. My Italian class is a breeze, and Tuesday and Thursday mornings are enough to double my vocabulary every day. My Italian roommate doesn’t need to speak English around me, and I can understand all the music she plays when we cook. I make being bilingual my personality trait, and when I get back to the United States, I strictly say “grazie,” instead of “thank you.”

Oh boy, it’s been a busy week here in Salamanca. Not only do I have five final exams to take, but I also need to pack up my entire room, say goodbye to my new friends and new city, and emotionally prepare myself for an exciting summer of travel. With that being said, I still wanted to take some time to hop on here and write an ‘end-of-semester’ blog post with some final thoughts and reflections while I’m still in Salamanca. 

While living in Italy, it’s been incredibly difficult to think about my life back home. Summer plans, my senior year in Richmond, and everything in-between seemed like abstract concepts I could ignore while studying abroad.

It’s so hard to believe, but I’m home!

The last couple weeks of the semester flew by. All of a sudden, we were doing all of our “lasts” our last class, our last walk home, our last meal and coffees at our favorite restaurants. It was definitely bittersweet! I was excited to get home, but so sad to leave our new home and all of my friends. At the beginning of the semester, I never could have dreamed that I could have loved Dublin this much! Now, I can look back with such fond memories in such a great city.

These past two weekends I was able to visit Santorini and Positano. While these locations are very different in many ways, their one great commonality is vicinity to the ocean. 

Just the other weekend I was able to take a quick trip to Zürich, Switzerland. Now Switzerland is well known as one of the most expensive countries in Europe, so in an effort to save money, we arrived Friday afternoon and left Saturday evening. While traveling to any country is fun on its own, I had a major motivator to go specifically to Zürich on this specific Friday—one of my favorite singers would be performing there that evening.

While studying abroad, it is easy to get caught up in the whirlwind of everything. Since you are being introduced to a new city, new people, new cuisine, basically new everything, it takes time to adjust and when you finally are adjusted is when the fun really begins. Once finally acclimated, the idea of school can feel like a second or even third priority.