H O L Y M O L Y guacamole it's happening!!! In just a short 24 hours, I will be boarding a plane at JFK with two carry-on items in hand; the first filled with personal items (& goldfish), the second bursting at the seam with a myriad of emotions. Though I'm no rookie to the game of international travel, flying 4 thousand miles across the globe for 4 months will have my mind going in a million directions as I step up to the plate. How can I not be excited when I've been told by everyone that Danes are some of the nicest people alive and have a cultural aesthetic that pretty much translates to "coziness" (hygge). That being said, I feel like I should be more anxious than I am, but I genuinely think my excitement is overshadowing my nerves.
Being stripped of the comfort and familiarity of routine life, whether at Furman or at home, is going to be a new level of vulnerability unparalleled to anything I've ever experienced. I mean golly Copenhagen is a ways a way dontchya know! The feeling of freedom and independence that the mere idea of studying abroad in Denmark gives me is making me wonder where that level of freedom will take me once I actually get there.
Things I'm most looking forward to:
| meeting other DIS students from various universities !!!
| getting insight from my Scandinavian ancestors
| spending time with my visiting host family
| developing relationships with my professors
| my study tours to various strategic communication sites
| visiting different countries with new friends
| feeling independent on my commute to class
| eating my way through Scandinavia
| so much more
All the preparation with packing, figuring out which classes to take, filling out forms, taking care of flights and medication, all the emails back and forth, all the preemptive small world connections throughout the summer, it's all coming together! I can't help but get more and more giddy by the moment thinking about meeting my roommate and moving into the residential community. What will our first adventure be? We'll see!!!
Just yesterday, I was on the phone with a good friend and she told me with great enthusiasm that one of her best friends from school was going to be living on my hall at DIS! Sure enough, she was right! It made me realize just how small the world is while simultaneously considering the magnitude of the network of knowledge, perspective, and passion that DIS fosters. I cannot wait for the whole process to start of broadening my scope of the students I'll be surrounded by and learning from all semester, before I even get to the scope of Scandinavia in its entirety.
Well, that's all for now, folks! Time to finish packing, listen to John Denver on repeat, and eagerly await the journey that lies ahead! Thanks for reading!!!
.. yep, there's a slight paradox between these lyrics and this quote, but it just felt right ..
