My Time in Europe, Good Times!

Thinking back six months, I couldn't imagine what I was about to experience. I was nonchalantly thinking, "Germany huh? Well, let's see how this goes." and I think that was the perfect attitude for me to have. I didn't know what to expect, I was curious to see what living in Europe would be like, and I was just open to whatever was going to happen, the good, bad, ugly, and amazing, because I think that's what going on an adventure is all about, trying new things, experiencing struggles, and enjoying yourself all along the way. Whether it was asking my host family ignorant questions and having them laugh at me, finding out after spring break in Barcelona that I was broke and I would have to eat cheap canned soup for lunch the rest of the time, doing about eight assignments of Dif. EQ per week (barf), or seeing the Eiffel tower sparkle like a thousand diamonds at night, I was living life in Europe as fully as I could.

Two months after leaving Bonn, Germany, and returning to the great state of Texas, my view of the world has definitely been distorted (mostly for the good)! I appreciate many of the things that I have here more than I did before, but I am also seeing other things in a different, slightly jaded, light. I've come to realize, after living in such a different society, that there are things that America are really #1 in (whoop!), but there are also significant problems that our nation sincerely needs to address, problems that won't have a quick fix and will require the bright minds of the future, our generation's minds. Even though I see the world with a more objective perspective, allowing me to see more of our society's ailments and afflictions, I'm also more confident in the world's potential to fix these problems, as well as my own.

On a personal note, this trip was also a personal journey of self enlightenment and discovery. You discover how you handle really tense and difficult situations, like missing your train to Paris because your connecting train gets delayed then taking another train at 5 a.m. the next morning, missing the connecting train, taking a 50 euro taxi, then sitting in a crunched luggage/connecting cabin room, but eventually making it to Paris! On the other hand, you also have the time of your life while going to some of the best clubs in the world in Barcelona, or partying in the streets of Köln with about a million other Germans during Karneval.

This trip has definitely made me think more about my future and what I want to do with it, but I think that it has just helped me realize that the world is much more open than I knew before! With that said, I'm looking forward to applying what I've learned from my travels and just continuing to live life with the same sense of adventure that I had while I had studying abroad. To sum this up, I think T.S. Eliot observed what our whole group experienced pretty well:

"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."