My favorite class here and one of the best courses I have ever taken is my photography class. I hesitantly chose to take this class, knowing that I had an interest and appreciation for photography, but lacking any time of prior knowledge. This scared me a little, but I kept telling myself that if I learned how to photograph in Spain, this would be a passion that I would cherish even more, and this is exactly what happened.

If someone would’ve told me before I left that I’d be in Europe at the time of a global virus outbreak, I wouldn’t have believed them. Yet here I am, studying abroad in Spain when it is in the top five countries in the world for amount of cases of the new coronavirus. I’m not going to lie—it’s stressful. Even though there are only three cases, all contained, in my city, I cannot escape from the constant presence of the fact that things could get worse.

Hey I’m still alive, I survived the airport aren’t you proud??!! I had some Xanax (calm down it was prescribed to me) and that stuff works, baby. Enough about that though since the thing you are here for is what the heck is going on with my time in Auckland.

When I was preparing to come to France I had high expectations for the places I was going to travel and the things I was going to eat. My expectations for food have been somewhat tempered by two months of experiencing an entirely foreign culinary culture, so this post will consist of my observations of the differences between French and American food.

(Written on March 12th, updated March 14th)

Dear all,

It has been a dramatic week. I will follow this blog post soon with a post about my three most recent trips (Madrid, Nerja, Morocco), but right now all I can write about is coronavirus content. 

Hi all! I know many of my friends and family are wondering about how the coronavirus outbreak in Madrid is affecting my study abroad. I am planning on writing a coronavirus post after this one to update you all on my situation, but I’ve been planning on writing about the museums in Madrid for a while, and I don’t want to let coronavirus get in the way of that! For now, rest assured that I am safe and healthy.

To my friends:

You all know me. You know I'm already crying.

"Travel is still the most intense mode of learning"- Kevin Kelly

7 weeks! That's how long I have been in Amsterdam. In a perfect world, I would be approaching the midway point of my study abroad experience, but in reality, I will be heading back home to Sri Lanka in less than 3 days. It feels surreal. 4 days ago, I was in Paris. 48 hours ago, I was making plans with my best friend from college for her trip to visit me in Amsterdam. 24 hours ago, I was adamant that it would be fine, i would be able to stay on and finish my semester in Amsterdam.

In early February, my friends and I planned a weekend trip to Paris for the end of March. When debating whether or not to buy cancellation insurance for our hostel, I remember saying, "I don't think we need it. I really doubt anything would stop us from going, and if it does, I feel like that would be enough of a crisis that going to Paris would be the last thing on our minds."

I have since learned a few things:

1) Do not ever be certain that a crisis will not happen.

2) Buy cancellation insurance.