What? You're going alone?

This has been the reaction that I've received from nearly every person I've told about my trip. You're going to a foreign country all by yourself? Yes. You're going to stay with a family you've never met? Yes. Really? Yes. It's been so easy for me to simply reply "yes" to all these questions, but now that it's getting closer (9 days away) I'm beginning to doubt my naivety... Perhaps I am a little wacko to be going on such a journey alone?

I'm racking my brain to think of the friends or family members in my life who have or may make such a journey by themselves and I'm having a hard time thinking of more than 3-4 who would truly look at this trip and think "Wow! I would totally do that!" Most people think that I'm nuts. They won't go to the movies by themselves, let alone a foreign country. But I really like to be alone. I like being with my own thoughts and planning my own itinerary each day and eating at the places that I want to and going to the museums that I'm interested in and moving at the pace that I want to while in said museum. I just really like solitude.

And yes, I've done this before so I feel like I can do it again... I know what I'm getting myself into. The major difference is that I'm older now... I'm going to be surrounded by younger folks who are at this for the first time and experiencing things much differently than I am. It reminds me of this pic above. This is a pic of me and some of my dorm mates from when I was studying at Neuchatel University in Switzerland the summer of 1997. We're all eating soggy tomato-tasting watermelon and playing Phase 10... despite all our shocked faces, we really were having a great time. Anyway, the girl on the far left in the ever-so-fashionable denim overalls (whose name escapes me...) is who I think about when I see myself on this study abroad this time around. She was a thirty-something mother of two from New York who was spending her summer improving her French skills alongside the rest of us in our early twenties. She was awesome! But she definitely had a different experience than the rest of us. I can't quite say what the difference was, but she was especially studious and not nearly as homesick as the rest of us. It was like she relished the opportunity even more than we did... Which seems impossible seeing as I loved every minute of it! She just had a different perspective of life and it carried over to how she was experiencing her study abroad opportunity. I remember thinking how cool she was and admiring her for still following after her dreams even though she had a life that wasn't what one would typically think of as conducive to a study abroad.

Anyway, this time I get to be the thirty-something in the denim overalls who may be a tiny bit homesick, but who is relishing every minute of this new experience because I know I'll be safe and I know I'll be home before I know it and wishing for my next opportunity to travel abroad... So don't worry about me folks! I'll be just fine! I'm not the first to embark on a journey like this, and I most certainly won't be the last :)