My Experience As A Peer Mentor

Throughout my life, I have moved numerous times and with each new experience, my desire to travel only grows stronger. It is natural that I would be interested in studying abroad then, but upon my return to the United States, I realized that my semester spent in Florence, Italy was much more rewarding than I could ever imagine. I went from a guy with a passion for travel, to one who is excited by the doors an international education can open.

Like all study abroad students, I was eager to share stories with friends and family alike, but these interactions did not accurately represent my experiences. I needed an outlet to remain involved with the international community, advocate the benefits of an international education, and discuss my eye-opening semester with Academic Programs International (API). With these thoughts in mind, and the University of Georgia Study Abroad Fair just around the corner, I decided to go out on a limb and ask one of API’s University Relations members how I could get involved.

I was pleasantly surprised when our brief conversation sparked the opportunity to work as a Campus Advocate for API. This role enabled me to aid prospective students, highlight my experience with API, and host events to raise awareness of study abroad opportunities. More importantly, this position spurred my desire for greater involvement as a Peer Mentor.

The role of a Peer Mentor comes with greater challenges, but with these come greater opportunities for involvement. As an introduction to the organization, Peer Mentors are flown to Austin, Texas to meet the men and women that made each of our study abroad experiences possible. The trip to Austin brought my experience full circle as each of the Peer Mentors shared the same appreciation for international education. Throughout this past year, I utilized the motivation cultivated in Austin to develop a variety of awareness, advocacy, and analysis events. The role challenged me each month to strive for a better event with greater impact.

One of my favorite memories from my work over the past two years was discussing study abroad with a then-prospective student named Alicia. As a Campus Advocate, I encouraged her to study abroad and later gave advice on what to see while in Italy. Upon her return, I persuaded Alicia to get involved with international education on campus and share her knowledge. Her devotion to international education and participation in events emphasized why I become a Campus Advocate & Peer Mentor.

In all, my involvement post-studying abroad has further developed my appreciation and knowledge concerning international education as well as the necessity of global awareness. Looking back, I welcome the academic & personal challenges presented by the aforementioned positions and their role in shaping my international life. In fact, my continued efforts prompted my most recent global experience— an internship in Kunming, China!

Grant Emory is an API Peer Mentor at The University of Georgia. He studied abroad with API in Florence, Italy.

The People You Will Meet

While studying abroad, I learned two things. (I actually learned many, but I’ll stick to two.) The first fits with a quote I stumbled upon while reading Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert: “To travel is worth any cost or sacrifice.”

I knew that I loved to travel before I chose to study abroad (Not that you need to. You just need to be willing to make a new place your home. It is incredibly easy and fun if you are open to it.). Jetting off for the weekend to visit a new country, letting a new language caress my ears, finding a new food to eat, a new friend, acquaintance or a local oddball – this is what makes me tick. I learned that this is why I travel. To meet people, to see new places and to fulfill my foodie desire to eat everything. But that’s another story.

Deriving from the first, the second thing I learned is to meet everyone that I possibly could. The people whom I met and befriended, or those that I ran away from as fast as I could, became the heart of my stories and the charming point of the lands that I visited. Here is an introduction to just a few of those people who impacted my life and added to my own story.

Two of my roommates and I decided to spend a four day weekend on the Island of Elba. A truly rugged beauty, Elba is an island filled with wonderful people, many of whom would not or could not speak English to us. While my Italian is proficient enough to order in a restaurant and doling out or asking for directions, I do not have the words to strike up a conversation with a passerby. But without fail, I found food as a uniting measure.

In Elba, my travel companions and I dined at a small family-run restaurant. When we arrived, we were greeted with a rushed “Ciao, dieci minute per favore” (Hello, 10 minutes please) from a flustered woman who had to be the mother of the place. We waited around for 20 minutes before being seated with a gracious smile at a nice outside table overlooking the Terranean Sea glittering in a velvet night. The view was worth millions, but the bustle of the place held my attention.

The menus were solely in Italian. The woman who seated us solely spoke Italian, though I have a sneaking suspicion that had we not know how to respond, she would have helped us out. It was a very Italian experience.

As I watched this woman, she became someone that I knew as a mother. As cheesy as it may sound, having a lack of motherly hugs in your life gets a little sad, and I knew this woman was one that could administer happiness-boosting hugs in an instant. She never hugged me, or spoke English to me, but she did smile and was loving to the three American girls who could not have been more out of place.

On my spring break, I took the opportunity of cheap airfare and friends of friends to travel to England.

When planning the trip to England, my study abroad friend and I decided not to stay in hostels or hotels, but to seize the opportunity to stay with friends and their families.

The first home that I stayed in offered the warmth of a family – and tea. Whenever entering their home, or the home of one of their friends, tea was always offered. After living away from my family for a bit, it was so nice to walk into a family home and have someone say “here’s your tea with one sugar” – just the way I like it. They didn’t have to do this and they will never know just how much that mug of tea made me feel at home, while I was 3,980 miles from my family, and 722 miles from my adopted home.

Of all of the people to leave a mark on my life, three will leave the deepest. Girls that I know will remain my friends forever. (Heck, we’ve already planned a reunion in five years where we are going to rent a camper and drive around Europe – I’m only halfway joking.) Two of my roommates and one other girl that one of my roommates happened to share a seat with on a bus - will be my friends forever. They are the people I went to dinner with, the people I chatted with as I got ready, the people that I shared outlandish things that I found on the Internet with, the ones I lamented with when my grandma died, the ones that I sat in a piazza with, the ones that didn’t judge when two gelatos were ordered - from the same gelateria - in the same hour, the ones I traveled with, and the ones that became so much more that just friends.

Words can never describe the bond you will form if you just let yourself be open to meeting new people. Of all the people I met, the few that I described above don’t even scratch the surface of it all. There are so many that I met and got to know and became friends with, or just had a passing conversation with. So many people that I walked down the streets laughing with, studying with, or fretting with.

They all helped me grow and they all added so many elements to my study abroad experience to make it wonderful. The only regret that I have while sitting here in my home in the United States is that I didn’t have longer with all of those wonderful people.

Lauren Kremer is a student at the University of Cincinnati and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Lauren is studying abroad with API in Florence, Italy. 

It’s Ok to Want to Come Home

“I’m going home. I’m going home, for home’s the place to be. The dream that I was searching for, was waiting there at my front door. I’m going home, to you and me. ”

-”Going Home,” Irish Ceili Band

I’m not the same person I was when I left the States. That doesn’t mean I’m not looking forward to going home.

My last week in Ireland, I just wanted to be home. Exams for me had been done for a month, I had down my international adventures and with the national bus strike going on, I had been to all of the places that I had wanted to see and could get transportation to. I was ready to be done.

I wasn’t even sad. Every semester around finals, I yearn to just be done with school and get on to the next thing in my life, whether that be winter or summer break. In this case, I had a week at home before flying across North America for my internship on the West Coast. I was done dealing with an 8 hour time gap between me and my employers. I wanted to see my family again. I was finished with Galway.

Home sick? Maybe. I loved Galway and I wouldn’t have done as well with any another API program. I whole-heartedly enjoyed my time here in Ireland. I still wanted to go home. I even made a list of things I wanted to do when I got back. Well, more like things I had to get done before flying to Washington. My anticipation about returning is dwarfed by my apprehension about the near future. It doesn’t help that everyone around me was crying because they have to leave. 

I had to remember that my experiences and hopes were not theirs and it didn’t do any good to compare them. That’s when I realized:

It’s ok to want to come home.

Carolyn McKenna is a student at The College of William and Mary and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Carolyn is studying abroad with API in Galway, Ireland. 

It Is Easy To Feel At Home If You Try

I came to Spain with a heart that was only partially open to the world. I was afraid of the huge cultural adjustment, of being homesick for the first time. I wasn’t 100% confident in my Spanish, either – but I still came. I took a huge leap of faith when I got on the plane to Madrid, and I trusted my instincts – I trusted that everything would be OK in the end. I marked the date May 24^th in my planner, circling it in red and writing, “When I go home.”

And now that it really is the end, I know that I was right to take that chance – but also very, very wrong about just about everything else. Each moment I’m here, I gain a bit more faith, a bit more trust, that everything has worked out how it was meant to. I’ve grown as a person more than I thought I could in only four months. But the biggest thing I was wrong about is this: May 24^th is not the day I go home. It’s the day I leave it.

Every place that I have visited has taken a piece of my heart, changed me in new, exciting and unexpected ways.

Morocco taught me about the importance of perceptions, the ease of making new friends and ignited my now-insatiable craving for travel.

Rome’s magnificence was stunning even through the rain, and I learned how to seek loveliness in everything I do, no matter what.

Greece opened my soul to emotion that I haven’t felt since I was very young, and I felt like that was the point that my heart was reborn, open and pure and ready to take on the world.

The Canary Islands gave me the gift of relaxation shuffled with the joy of spending time with some of my best friends in a place where stress and worries about the future didn’t exist.

Lagos showed me that when life gets you down, all you really need is a gorgeous beach or two, a drink in your hand and a little bit of faith that things will work out exactly how they ought to.

London’s grandeur, lovely grassy parks and fairytale sights captured my imagination and made me realize how easy it is to feel at home if you try.

And interspersed throughout the incredible international scene is Spain – always Spain – my home, the only place I’ve ever felt like I belonged. Granada is my home city, Sevilla my heart city. I learned how to fall in love in this city. Sevilla’s breathtaking beauty and history, the indescribable Fería de Abril and the man with a smile that’s like rain in the desert – both he and that city will have my heart forever. Of all the places I’ve travelled, Sevilla changed me the most.

 But yet… the awe I feel when I walk the streets of Granada has never been matched. The hikes through the Alpujarras with API, the thundering beauty of the waterfalls in Monachil, the warm, sandy beaches just a few hours away, the nights spent at El Camborio and Granada 10 – these experiences are part of me now. Getting the paper 20 Minutos every morning, dodging puddles during the March monsoon (never rains in Granada, huh? 45 days later we see the sun), laughing over crepes in teterías, savoring churros con chocolate at Café Futbol, haggling over gypsy pants in the Moorish quarters, watching the sun set over the Alhambra – these are moments I could never forget. The Sevillano to whom I gave my heart, the amazing connections with granadinos and, of course, the wonderful people I’ve met from all over the world, from every walk of life, have changed me into the best version of myself that I have ever been. Mi alma esta llena de este lugar – my soul is full of this place – and I finally feel at home.

If I hadn’t gone to Granada, I would be lost. If I hadn’t taken that leap of faith, I would be stuck in Utah, with a closed mind and a complacent – but not happy – heart, and a soul that had no home. If I hadn’t given everything, I would not have gotten everything in return.

I cannot imagine leaving this city that has become my home, but I know that the time is drawing near when I will have to. Granada is my home, my heart, my soul. And I know that someday, someday, I will return. I will always find my way back home. Hasta pronto, Spain. Te quiero.

Niki Harris is a student at the University of Utah and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Niki is studying abroad with API in Granada, Spain. 

Thank You, Seville

The weather is warm, the nights are cool. The city is abuzz with spring fever and the flowers are blooming throughout the many parks. As I walk through the streets, I have this tranquil feeling of being in peace, in the moment and in a truly beautiful place that I call home now, Sevilla. But because not all good things can last forever, before I know it, my time in Sevilla will come to an end. The days are dwindling as I try to spend as much time during my day catching the last fleeting memories with my friends.

During my semester I have found a home in Seville, Spain. I have made a new family within my host family and my friends that are all different but united by their love for this city. In true reflection, it has been the most unbelievable semester. I have lived in the moment for four and a half months, experiencing a new adventure every day. I, of course knew this day would come, but I did not think it would come so soon. My API director warned me that the first month seems long, but after that, it flies by. Fly by it has.

The feeling of having to say goodbye to my new friends and family is heartbreaking. It’s a bittersweet feeling mixed with the excitement of returning home and the sadness of turning the page in this chapter of my life. As I pack my bags, grab a few more tapas with friends and soak up the sun, I can’t help but wonder what the next part of my journey holds for me. I am not the same person that left in January; I have seen so many things and been to so many places that there is no way I will ever be the same.

The best advice I can give to those who will study abroad and someday find themselves in my shoes is that this is part of the journey you take when you decide to study abroad. It is a heartbreaking part, but in retrospect if you think about all the things you have learned, the people that you have met and the ways you have changed, it is all worth it. These moments will be some of the best times of my life and I will never forget the feeling of living my dream. Everyone has a different study abroad experience; mine was far beyond anything I could’ve hoped for. I can honestly say words and pictures cannot do justice in representing the person I have become or the things I have seen along the way.

I will leave Seville with the happiest of memories close to my heart. I will forever be attached to this city and it will be in my heart. As I begin the next part of my journey, I feel prepared to see things with a new perspective, to grow into the person I’ve always wanted to be and to know I will be visiting Seville again someday soon. I couldn’t have chosen a better program and have found a family in the people I met through API; I have seen more of my host country then I could have imagined and learned about myself along the way.

The city’s symbol is NoDo which stands for “No me ha dejado” which, in English, translates to “It has not abandoned me,” and Seville never will. So, thank you Seville for everything you have given, I will miss you dearly but we will see each other soon.

Ariel Stickles is a student at UMass Amherst and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Ariel is studying abroad with API in Seville, Spain. 

You Don’t Understand.

It’s hard to find the courage to press pause on life at home to go and spend a semester abroad—I think everyone can understand that.  But what I find even harder is to press pause on life abroad.

I now realize something I wish someone had told me before this semester started: Studying abroad is a time to be selfish. They should have said, “This is YOUR time. This is YOUR time and you deserve it. Your time to travel and find yourself. Your time to meet new people and be alone, both at once. It’s your time, Christine. I’ll be here when you get back. Do what you want with YOUR time, don’t worry about keeping up with life at home.”

Why didn’t anyone say that to me? Or why didn’t I say that to myself?  Maybe because I was scared pre-departure, and because a semester abroad sounds like a long time. Well, in reality, it’s not even close to enough. When you fall in love with a city so deeply, there’s really no amount of time that would be “enough.”

Before I arrived, I couldn’t even imagine what Sevilla looked like. I just heard it was beautiful, and that’s all I kept hoping it would be. Then I got here and in hours time, I knew that the following months would be some of the best in my life. And they were even better.

Now, I notice every lamp post and every tree on the sidewalk because I can’t imagine having to imagine this place in my mind when this is over. I don’t want to think about what it looks like. I don’t want to remember. I just want to hold on to it forever. It needs to be stamped onto the backs of my eyelids. I’m not leaving.

…At least that’s how I wish it could be.  But since I know that the inevitable end is approaching, I have to be selfish about the time that’s left.  I need to avoid Wi-Fi everywhere I go. Facebook can wait.  I need to be out of the house. I need to wake up early and be grateful when the sun is out.  I need to stop feeling badly that I haven’t responded to my friends’ e-mails. This is MY time, and now I know that.  

Christine O’Dea is a student at Hofstra University and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Christine is studying abroad with API in Seville, Spain. 

My Foreign Exchange Student Family

My family has hosted two exchange students. Sina lives near Zurich, Switzerland. Nicole lives outside of Rome, Italy. I was lucky to reconnect with my good friends during my time abroad.  

Sina lived with my family while I was a junior in high school. I spent spring break with her family and traveled all over Switzerland. We went to Basel, Zurich, Lucerne, Bern, Geneva, and the Rhine Falls. Her family was extremely kind to me and made sure I never went hungry.  

Sina and I also traveled to Venice together one weekend in April. We stayed with my mom’s co-worker’s brother who lives in Sacile. The distant connection made for an interesting and exciting time. We ate American food that both Sina and I missed.  Italian food is fantastic, but there is only so much pizza and pasta you can eat during a semester.  

Nicole lived with my family while I was away at college for my freshman year. Nicole showed me around Rome, invited me to a traditional meal with her family, and took me to the beach. Nicole forced me to speak Italian, which was great practice. 

It was nice to see Sina and Nicole. It was great to see familiar faces that I don’t usually have the opportunity to see. I will miss both of them when I am back in the United States.  

Sina and I in Murano (a Venice island):

Nicole and I on the beach in Terracina: 

Travis Mack is a student at North Dakota State University and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Travis is studying abroad with API in Rome, Italy. 

Ole ole ole!

Feria de Abril in Sevilla was a week full of adventure, culture, laughter, rebujitos, and the time of my life.  I loved it so much that I cancelled my weekend trip to Valencia so that I could stay the entire week.

Feria officially starts at midnight on Monday with the alumbrada (lighting) of the portada (the Feria arch).  The energy that night was so high and the smiles on everyone’s faces couldn’t have been greater.  Everyone was ecstatic and well dressed, and on my own I discovered why this week is so important in this city. 

I think the best way I can describe it is the way it felt. 

The mood was contagious.  Every night and day I would look back on the last few hours of my experience at feria and it took my breath away.  When I remembered to breathe, I would forget how to wipe the smile off of my face. 

The colors were alive, and everywhere I looked, all there was to find was perfection.  Perfect feria dresses on every Spanish female, and perfect suits on every male. We kept saying how the feria dresses were kind of like the pair of jeans in the movie Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants—they magically fit everyone perfectly!  From toddlers to elderly people and even foreigners, every person I saw wearing typical feria clothing looked flawless. 

The music was loud.  Everyone danced.  Everyone clapped.  It was as if we rehearsed it all one million times before.  It felt as good as it sounded.

The food was, dare I say, addictive.  I was invited into a friend’s friend’s ‘caseta’ (tents where people gather and celebrate), and I had the best tapa I’ve had so far in Spain.  It was fried ham, cheese, and shrimp.  I’ve been searching for something similar ever since.  Nothing has come close.  But the gofres (waffles), churros and chocolate, and other sweets that were sold at feria made up for it.

The carnival rides were worth the fear and lack of gravity.  There were crazy-mouse rides that gave us whiplash, ship rides that swung side to side, bumper cars, pony rides, ferris wheels, haunted houses, and every fair or festival attraction imaginable.

Out of all of the feelings I felt, my favorite was the vibe that I got from the people.  Every person at Feria was genuinely carefree.  Just watching from the outside of a caseta or walking down the street and seeing strangers having the time of their lives was enough to have the time of my life.  Everyone shared and laughed.  Everyone was a friend.  Everyone worked together unknowingly to generate this atmosphere of pure harmony and elated bliss.

This is how life was for seven days.  No work and no school and yet we learned with our own selves about this city and its history.  We saw customs with our own eyes as we witnessed generations of Spanish families passing on the tradition of Feria to anyone who wanted any small part of it.  We got countless offers to learn how to dance Sevillana, invitations into private casetas, and suggestions for more Spanish intercambios to practice the language with.  If people were on that level of generosity on a regular basis, the world would be happier.

On the last and final day of Feria, at midnight on Sunday, there was a firework show.  Hundreds, maybe thousands, of people gathered on the bridges, on rooftops, along the river Guadalquivir, and throughout the city to watch the week’s grand finale.  I spent this time looking back on my experiences during Feria, and in Spain in general.  I was overjoyed and feeling more and more lucky by the second.  So as they say at the end of every important segment in the Sevillana dance, “Ole!” Viva Sevilla!

 Christine O’Dea is a student at Hofstra University and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Christine is studying abroad with API in Seville, Spain. 

Learning From the Tourist Flood

In Florence, February and March showers stopped abruptly, seemingly the second April hit. The abrupt change also triggered some other changes, too.

Firstly, the weather turned gorgeous, usually sunny and increasingly warmer. Secondly, after Easter, the tourist season really hit. When I first moved to Florence, I remember thinking that what I heard was right: it was a pretty touristy city, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Come Easter, though, a tidal wave of tourists from all over the globe surged into Florence, flooding the streets; people walking slowly to take in all the sights or enjoying a gelato with scoops perched precariously on cones. Left and right, people come to abrupt stops to take a picture or whip out a map to find their way.

Of the changes I’ve noticed, the most pronounced one is the fact that I cannot walk in a straight line for more than five meters unless it is either a) extremely early in the morning, b) later in the evening, or c) I am on a small side street, even one directly off of a main street. From above, I probably look like a lunatic when I actually can’t avoid going down the main streets: I bob and weave in between people taking pictures on their iPads, circumnavigate an adorable family here and an elderly couple there, speed up and slow down in the places where I cannot get through the throng of people enjoying the city of Florence. I never knew pedestrian rage could exist before I had a long day of classes and a walk home that used to take me five minutes, took over 15 minutes, during which I’m sure I could’ve been granted a patent for a silly walk from John Cleese himself.

Don’t get me wrong, though; I do not mean to sound ungrateful or anti-touristic. In fact, I’m grateful for their presence, now that I reflect back on it. This tourist flood, while frustrating at times, has really forced me to get to know my city, has really put my navigational skills to the test, and at times made me regret being too stubborn to take a map with me. By the time my mom came to visit me in late April, I could take her through a myriad of side streets without worrying about where I’d end up, or if I’d be able to find my way from there because I had getting from point A to point B using primarily smaller side streets down to a science.

My new favorite activity involves three of April’s gifts put together: enjoying the beautiful weather and unabashed people watching while sitting on the Santa Trinita bridge. Better still is adding gelato to the equation, which is where the third April gift comes into the equation: strawberry season is in full swing now, and the gelateria a block down from my apartment happens to have the best strawberry gelato in the city. Conveniently, said gelato place is located right next to the prime people watching bridge where I have now spent many hours basking in the sun, eating gelato, and hanging out with friends.

The influx of tourists has shown me how far I’ve come since I started living here. They’re like looking back at my during my first few weeks here and seeing the mistakes I made and the ways I stuck out (and some ways in which I still stick out). I’ve certainly adapted and learned to fit in better, despite my tallness and blonde-ness, and it made me proud to come to that realization. By no means am I Italian or fluent in Italian, but I can certainly make my way a lot better now without raising quite as much suspicion as when I first arrived.

Kerstin Becker is a student at the University of New Hampshire and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Kerstin is studying abroad with API in Florence, Italy.

Italy, the land of pasta, pizza, and pomodori (tomatoes)

The food in Italy has been written about, dreamed about, copied with the intent of reproduction, and drawn travelers looking for that perfect plate of spaghetti. The pasta is fresh and the pizza is perfect, but they are not the only culinary wonders this boot-shaped country has to offer.

Poplo, piri piri, quaglia, cavallo, all words that I did not want translated. Octopus, piri piri (no translation), quail, and horse. Anthony Bourdain, a legend of wild eating, once said “Good food and good eating are about risk.” Studying abroad is all about trying new things and the food should be no exception. 

Sausage, egg, polenta, and artichoke stem, the second course to the mystery meat pasta.

It has always been a dream of mine to eat octopus, I don’t know why, or where it stemmed from. I stumbled upon a street cart in Padova that just so happened to be serving whole, lightly steamed octopus, with a light spritz of lemon over the top. The rubbery legs were appetizing, the molted yellow brain not so much. 

Gnocchi piri piri, gnocchi is a potato pasta used in many dishes, it is somewhere between a dumpling and a pasta. Piri piri has no translation, but the dish I ordered ended up coming with various Mediterranean sea life with their heads, and eyeballs still attached. 

The moral of the story is: try new things. You never know what your new favorite food from your adopted culture could be. 

Lauren Kremer is a student at the University of Cincinnati and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Lauren is studying abroad with API in Florence, Italy. 

Finding the Dress!

My journey with my friends was to find a flamenco dress this week for Feria. We were told dresses are very expensive, averaging 300 euros. So, we found a place to rent dresses instead for one day. The shop entrance was weird, like a garage or something. I would have never found it on my own. Anyhow, this is what we found…

Finally found something that fits. ;)

It was soooo much fun trying on all these different old dresses. Felt like I was Jane in 27 dresses ;)

But what I didn’t know that Feria was like walking on the red carpet. The best most expensive, beautiful and fashionable dresses you can find in Feria. Each and every girl was wearing a different colorful dress with a cute hair style and accessory. 

We still walked head held high. ;) 

Maysa Bourham is a student at the University of Massachusetts, Boston and a guest contributor to the API Blog. Maysa is studying abroad with API in Seville, Spain. 

Final Reflections On Saying Goodbye

As the semester draws to a close here, I can’t help but notice the wide spectrum of emotions felt among the students. Their views on going home can generally be sorted into three different categories: those who can’t bear the thought of leaving, others that don’t quite feel ready now but expect to feel so at the end of the month and the rest that have been counting down for quite some time now.

As for me, I’ve been counting down for a while now. Spain has been an interesting experience for me this time around. When I visited in high school, I fell in love with everything: the people, the culture, the location — and I couldn’t wait to be a part of it again. I placed it on a pedestal far above that of my views of the U.S. Upon returning to the country this time, I expected these experiences to follow suit with my previous ones. Somehow, however, I am leaving feeling differently.

While I’ve had wonderful opportunities and awesome memories this semester, coming back has sort of taken the glamour away from the country. Living here for four months I have seen the day-to-day not so appealing aspects that I wouldn’t have noticed in a short vacation – but it hasn’t been a bad thing. It has helped me realize that Spain is not too far off from that of the U.S. Yes, it has a different culture, a different language and numerous other aspects that differ, however it’s just another country in the world that contains good things and bad things, like everywhere.

I know that I had to come back to Spain to explore what else was a part of it and now I’ve sort of had my closure with the country. I’ve learned a lot about it and have grown to further appreciate many aspects, and in an unexpected way I have also learned to appreciate far more aspects of life in the United States.

So for my closing statements for this semester I have to say I’ve achieved a greater understanding of the world (and Spanish thankfully!) and now I can move on and keep exploring other parts of the world as well. Until next time, Spain.

Malea Ritz is a student at UMass Amherst and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Malea is studying abroad with API in Granada, Spain. 

The Best Four Months of My Life

I never thought there was anything worse than having to study for finals, but then I realized that I’d have to do this in another country. And the only other thing that’s worse than studying for finals in Italy is realizing that once my finals are over, I’m boarding a plane to fly back to America. I change my mind everyday over whether I’m excited or not to go home. One thing is for sure; I cannot wait to see my family, my boyfriend, my friends, my dog, my university… I could keep this list going. Like how I also can’t wait to eat pancakes that aren’t crepes and to dry my clothes with an actual drying machine.

There are many things that I’ve missed about America during my time here, but the list of things that I’ll miss in Italy is longer (the majority of which are food related of course):

1. The amazing people that I’ve met here.

2. Hanging out and having so many memorable dinners with these great people.

3. Pizza at my two favorite pizza restaurants (Dar Poeta and Pizza Nerone in Trastevere for all of you API students who are travelling to Rome!)

4. Cappuccinos every morning before class with my roommate.

5. Being able to go on runs to Vatican City and the Colosseum.

6. Bruschetta and Tiramisu (I told you most of these would be food related)

7. GELATO. No ice cream will every compare.

8. The Italian lifestyle: leisurely dinners, speaking as much of the language that I possibly can, saying “buonasera” to the same waiter that I pass on my walk to school every day.

There are no words to describe how unforgettable these past four months have been. I’ve been able to travel to places that I’ve only dreamed about by pinning them on my “Travel” board on Pinterest, I’ve prayed with Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square, I’ve jumped off a 50-foot cliff into the island waters of Greece, I’ve played in the snow in the Swiss Alps, but most of all, I’ve learned so much about myself.

Everyone says that studying abroad is a chance to discover not only the world, but yourself as well. I read all of these API Rome blogs before I came to Italy because I was nervous about what the future had in store. For any student reading this and contemplating whether to go abroad or not, just do it! I promise you, you will not regret a single second of your trip.

These have been the best four months of my life and I still can’t believe I only have ten days left in my favorite city. For now, it’s arrivederci Roma, because I know that out of all of the coins that I’ve thrown in the Trevi Fountain, I will be back in this beautiful Eternal City someday.

Genevieve DiMonda is a student at UMass Amherst and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Genevieve is studying abroad with API in Rome, Italy.

Don’t Let the Stress of Exams Get You Down

Exam time hit my university like lightning. One day it was Easter break, the next I had four papers due in two days. It doesn’t matter if you need perfect grades or if you just need to pass – final papers and exams make even the best student stressed. 

The key to managing the whole thing is to remember where you are. You’re abroad! You should be celebrating! If you’re not careful, even if you are managing the workload, your days could turn into this:

Friday April 12: Worked on research for paper but didn’t get much done.

Saturday April 13: Worked on essay but didn’t really want to.

Sunday April 14: Didn’t do much.

Boring! You could be ‘not doing much’ back home.

So if you’re stressed by studying, remember to get outside every day. Go for a walk. Eat at a different restaurant. Talk to a stranger. 

In a month, you might be glad you did.

Carolyn McKenna is a student at The College of William and Mary and a regular contributor to our Tumblr blog. Carolyn is studying abroad with API in Galway, Ireland.