I have been in Auckland for a little over two weeks now, and every day I have been blown away by the beauty of my surroundings. Auckland was not quite what I expected. I heard it was a big city so I assumed that would mean lots of tall buildings, very little nature, and streets that weren’t the cleanest. However, it has completely surprised me. There are parks all around and everywhere I look there are unique-looking trees that I would never see back home. The streets are very clean and it is easy to get around by walking.

One of my favorite things to do here is go to a museum on a Sunday or after school and just fill my sketchbook with sculptures and paintings. It's heaven! I've wanted to go to the Louvre and other Parisian museums for as long as I can remember, and it's wonderful that I can go whenever I want now. I'm going to miss free museum admission so much!

This morning, just before noon, I was standing in front of a grad-level human resource management class, gesturing shakily at a PowerPoint presentation and talking about American culture. Forty Moroccan students blinked at me from their desks. It was bewildering.

After just a few weeks here, I have already fallen into a pretty steady routine.

On Mondays and Wednesdays I have class 9-11 a.m., and then 2-6 p.m. This may seem like quite a big chunk of time, but my teachers always try to get us outside of the classroom with museum visits or city walks.

I’m writing this from my home in Denver, so I don’t have any thoughts of my own yet regarding Buenos Aires. I have, however, through a lot of frenetic googling, synthesized a lot of other people’s thoughts regarding Buenos Aires. I’m going to share with you my top finds.

Castles, Mosques, Churches, Tapas, Mountains, Beaches, and Sunsets…

The time has come. You’re studying abroad! There are undoubtedly an abundance of thoughts and emotions racing through your head. The moment you’ve been waiting for has finally arrived.

Welcome back! Since studying abroad was such a foreign (pun intended) concept to me before traveling to Ecuador, it's not at all surprising I have learned enough helpful hints that I needed to write not one, but two blog posts examining them. I clearly have a lot to say, and I like to think that what has been useful for me will prove useful to you as well, so without further ado...enjoy Part 2! 

I originally intended to just make a bonus section at the end of this blog post examining a couple of things I have learned while abroad, but before I knew it, I had written enough helpful hints to fill up two blog posts. With that in mind, bienvenidos (welcome) to my Helpful Hints Blog Post Part 1: Unexpected Lessons I’ve Learned.

This past weekend I went on my first fieldtrip with my Mediterranean Ecosystems class. We explored the sub-Mediterranean region of Spain and we got the opportunity to explore massive caves and hike in beautiful national parks. Hiking has, in fact, been a kind of theme for me this semester. Since nature is so beautifully intertwined with the city life here, Granada is the perfect city to scratch your itch for beautiful, doable hikes.