I have some catching up to do. I'm more than half way through my exchange year. I've experienced my first Thanksgiving away from my family. My first Christmas away from my family. My first New Years away from my family. My first Kings Day, ever. It's march already. My birthday is in a week. While I have so many emotions, I would give anything to see my family right now, I also feel normal here. Spain has become a home for me. All of the things I do daily, have become a routine for me and I no longer feel like I'm exploring an unknown world alone. I don't really feel like I'm wandering around clueless. And while that's a great thing, (WOOO LILLY YOU MADE A NEW LIFE IN SPAIN, GO YOU!), it's also kind of a bummer. Maaaan, everything is now NORMAL. Since when is NORMAL good or exciting or fun? It's not. I'm at the point where I know my way all around the city, have eaten at almost every cafe that's worth eating at, can communicate about 98% of my thoughts and feelings quickly, at a pace where I only slow to think of words I don't know off the top of my head. I'm officially an American Spaniard! Woooo! I'm past the halfway point. Six months gone, 4 more to go. How depressing is that?
I remember this time last year like it was yesterday, literally. It's about the time of the year where the Speedwell Scholarship winners have just been told that they got the scholarship and will officially be going to the non-English speaking country of their choice. This time last year, I was having trouble sleeping at night, thinking about my upcoming year in Spain. How crazy is it. I can EASILY recall my emotions, thoughts, feeling and everything during my anticipated year abroad ONE YEAR AGO, and here I am. Closer to my departure date than my arrival date. Never in a million years did I ever think that this would actually happen. I'm an exchange student living in Spain. I have Spanish friends, friends from ALL OVER THE WORLD, I speak great Spanish, I know my way around a few big, famous Spanish cities, just from memory. I eat chorizo, drink coffee, clear my plate with bread, and say "sta logo" (jajajaja you won't understand that unless you've been to Spain) all on a daily basis, like second nature.
I guess that just stands to say that what everyone told you about your exchange, is right. Your host country will become a home to you. You will begin to know it and recognize it like the back of your hand (in theory because really idk if I could choose the back of my hand out of a group of others) and it will all become NORMAL. That's the problem. DONT LET IT BECOME NORMAL. The moment things become normal is the moment that your exchange year ends and it's June and you are on your flight back home. I am saying this to you, encouraging you to make the best of your experience, and I'm saying it to me too, because right now my life is normal. Walk through streets that you've never seen before. Take pictures of things that have become "normal" to you because in a couple months, you won't see them anymore, possibly ever.
These past 6 months, I have experienced thins that I will most likely NEVER experience again. That being said, I also experienced things that like 70% of the American population will never even experience once. I'm beyond honored and couldn't be anymore proud of my decision to try something completely different, something that most people are too scared to try, too scared of change.
But the real important thing is that you will spend your entire life looking at peoples pictures online and think "wow I wanna climb a mountain" or "man I wanna walk the great wall of china" but then you don't do anything to make it happen. You have to make it happen!
Go after what you want, it isn't just going to pop up in front of you.
Lilly Cook
