I’m going abroad to study in England next school year. It still feels weird to say. It’s surreal to believe that I am not going to move into Dickinson’s Carlisle campus and see the same familiar faces everyday.
I guess this is something I’ve wanted having grown up watching Doctor Who and absorbing English media. I wanted to know what it was like to be immersed in the culture. At first, I was just going to do a semester, take classes there and come back having lived in England for a bit, but everyone I spoke to looked at me like I was crazy. My uncle basically said he would disown me if I didn’t go for a year.
I want to say it was the pressure from everyone that made me decide to change my application last minute but I actually thought about it. What is the harm in a few extra months? This will really give me time to be immersed in the culture.
Of course it will be scary to live in a country away from my parents, but I am so excited to have so many new experiences that I wouldn’t have, if I had stayed on Dickinson’s campus. I can say being from New York does have an advantage to having new experiences but I’ve always wanted to go beyond that. What is something I can learn outside of America? As a student and a writer?
I have so many questions and little time to prepare myself for being away. I guess I’ll have to deal with it like other new situations. I’m just going to take the plunge and see what happens.