Travels

I can’t believe the living in Maastricht and taking classes part of semester is over.  It has gone by so incredibly quickly.

Yesterday, I took two finals that will determine my grades in half my classes, wandered around Maastricht for what is likely the last time with Molly and Jordan, and then spent the rest of the night packing, preparing for the next three weeks, and hanging out in the room with Ellen before we parted… until 5am rolled around and I hadn’t slept a wink and had to leave for the train station at 5:30.  I am loaded up on more coffee than I think I’ve ever had in my life thanks to the last couple days and sleepless nights of studying, paper writing, people loving, and travel planning. 

Today, I am sitting next to Jaime somewhere in the middle of France, armed with my backpacker’a backpack carefully, strategically, and tightly packed to last me three weeks with some extra room for new purchases.  Luckily, I am wandering Spain, southern France, Italy, and Crete with my two best friends, so we can all borrow and share clothes.  I am prepared to re-wear jeans, sleep only on trains, utilize caffeine, spend more money than I want to on tickets or food, and finally enjoy some nicer weather.

In my blog, I’ve focused on my weekend travels and completely neglected to talk about my weekly classes and day-to-day life in Maastricht, so it’s hard to explain why, although these three weeks are the best part of the whole trip, it was so hard to leave what has become home.  Transitioning from school and weekend traveling to three weeks of nonstop backpacking through Europe is bittersweet—I am so insanely excited for this incredible culmination to the trip, but so sad that it means that the incredible chapter of my life of school in the Netherlands is over.

It has been absolutely unreal.  The beautiful church that I walk by on my way to class; take five, kiwi, and the shamrock: the places my friends and I prefer to hang out at night; the five minute walk to albert heign for groceries; and the place to get free coffee in the CES building are all engraved in my memory forever as pieces of my home abroad.  It’s crazy that this little city in the middle of Europe has become my comfort zone, has turned into a place where I feel like I belong.

I have learned so much in my classes this semester, including how much I really do enjoy class, learning, school, education, and all that jazz.  The material in my classes this semester has been fascinating, and the Dutch perspective has been truly eye-opening.  I’ve learned that in order to understand someone’s motives and choices, you have to get their cultural context.  Instead of looking at the world from my own perspective, as is natural, I need to empathetically look at how others see the world to understand their choices and accept them.

Also, meaning is produced from how facts are discussed and how words are defined.  Words don’t just have one meaning; the way you say something can greatly alter its meaning, and concepts and ideas can very greatly based on how you define words.  I know that probably doesn’t make sense, but that’s the main idea of what I got out of my classes this semester, and it has been super eye-opening for me.  I’ve learned a lot more about truth, the world, knowledge, human nature, international relations, how America and the American perspective is viewed globally, and much more than I ever imagined I would.

It’s heartbreaking to be done with this part of this adventure, but I take comfort in knowing that I will be back.  I am not saying good-bye to a home in Europe forever; I will return to make another city home and experience the world like that again soon enough.  Be it next summer or not until I graduate, I know that, if anything, living in Maastricht for a semester has just made me want to live abroad again.

In the meantime, I will enjoy wandering around southern Europe with a few of my favorite people and making memories that will last me forever.  Even sitting here, on this adventure, I cannot believe that I have been this insanely blessed with this experience that most can only dream about.  I know I am truly living a dream right now, and I am insanely thankful.

Finally, I would like to apologize because I anticipate getting behind on blog posts in the next three weeks, especially because I still have a 4,000 word paper to write for one of my classes and half a semester of Mathematical Statistics II to learn, so I expect those to take up all of my train time, but I promise I will share everything eventually!  Au revoir!