The friendly term yalla was one of three phrases I learned in Arabic when I visited Morocco a year and a half ago. For the first couple of days, I idly wondered why our guide kept saying “y’all” this and “y’all” that - until I stopped to ask him what he meant. How sheepish I felt to learn that he was encouraging us in the right direction and was not, in fact, poking fun at our American slang.

I had the opportunity to visit some friends in northern Germany before I start my semester-long program in Freiburg, in southern Germany. For the last week, I’ve visited many beautiful places, eaten lots of bread, and listened to many people speak German.

Hi beautiful strangers and potential friends,

I am Yupeng Wu, a rising junior at Bryn Mawr College, studying Anthropology and History of Art. I will be sharing my experience in Granada, Spain on this blog in the next few months.

I just went on a trip with my family recently. It was the second time I got to see my parents in the past year. The trip was short but sweet. On my flight back alone, I came across a quote by Sally Wen Mao, a Chinese American poet:

There was an unremarkable amount of snow on the mountains, so we bought lift tickets to commemorate the end of summer and the start of classes. Skiing on the red (intermediate) slopes is a lot like speaking Spanish for me at the moment. I can get down the mountain, but I’m not in control and will likely crash abruptly. 

The food situation at my home university is a bit odd in comparison to the “average” American school. We don’t have dining halls, meaning that every night you are either eating out or cooking. Because of this, I have grown fairly accustomed to doing a weekly grocery run and almost look forward to it. Little did I know this practice would come in handy when I came to Christchurch for the semester, as we don’t use a dining hall either.

Hola! I have completed three full weeks in Buenos Aires, and sometimes it feels like the only thing I know how to say in Spanish is hola and hasta luego. Apart from beefing up my Spanish skills (an expected challenge), I have been overwhelmed both physically and emotionally in ways that I didn’t quite expect. Check out my tips below on getting over those first month's hurdles. 

The ultimate tramping experiences in New Zealand are the Great Walks. These treks are famous for their length, the beautiful scenery, and the diversity in tracks. As several of my Auckland friends and I love to hike and camp, we traveled down to the South Island this weekend to do the Heaphy Track. Along the west coast of the South Island, we planned to take four days to hike the 78 km across mountains, plains, and beaches.

I am writing this post from the comfort of a home I lived in from 2016-2017 just outside of Hamburg, Germany. I took a gap year after graduating from high school and worked as an au pair here, looking after two children whose mother was my au pair when I was a child! It was a cool “circle of life” kind of experience because she has known me since I was young, plus she knew what it was like to be an au pair herself.

Kia ora, everyone! August has just been flying by! Every day I wake up and see the tip of the mountains through my window, and I still can’t believe I am really halfway across the globe from home.