Pre-Trip thoughts (and worries)

This is entirely copied from my Blackboard post for my Third-Year Writing Abroad, so if it doesn't apply to you.. too bad. I'll come back and edit it later.

Dear friends also traveling abroad,

I hope you haven't experienced the pre-trip struggles that Brent, Eric and I have (or maybe I'm the only one who views them as struggles). After 6 emails in one week to the program liaison in Cape Town and no responses, I'm stressed and well on my way to nervous wreck. Thankfully, Dr. Monteverde and others have been more than willing to answer our questions, and my visa finally arrived last Thursday, which helped.

Confession time: I am a planner. I like to know when things are happening and how they’re happening. I like to be in control and I don’t like to deviate from that plan. So the thought of waiting around for a plane to take me somewhere that I’ve never been before is a little nerve-racking.  Luckily I’m traveling with 2 other Belmont students, Eric Taft and Brent Shively so we just keep calling and sending text messages covering details and packing lists over and over again. As with writing, I’m great at planning but not so great at putting the planning in effect, so I have a very thorough packing list, yet very little packing done (I’ve still got 48 hours!). Eric, Brent and I found our other friends in the Connect-123 program this semester on Facebook so I’ve already been talking to some of the people that we’ll be spending all of our time with, and they haven’t packed either, really.

So my expectations for this trip definitely include ecstasy at the thought of it being summer in 48 hours! With all of this ridiculous snow Nashville has gotten I’m ready to get out of it. I’m also excited to have an internship opportunity while I’m there! That will be an experience many other people won’t get, and even though I know it will be a difficult situation with no transportation other than a bus or my own two feet to get there, it will be something irreplaceable. The university that we’ll be going to will be a little bit bigger than Belmont (15,000 students, and a decent portion international) but they’re having us attend freshman orientation! So we have not just one orientation, but three. I expect these first few weeks to be sort of like freshman orientation at Belmont and Welcome Week all stretched out to 3 weeks. Luckily we’ve got some really fun things to do in the meantime, with plenty of trips to the beach and the mountains already on the schedule (which Belmont definitely didn’t do). Hopefully the first 3 weeks will go smoothly, because our semester at the University of Cape Town doesn’t actually start until the middle of February.

I plan for this trip to be a really fun and new experience, but I also fully expect it to be a really big struggle. Having lived in Nashville all of my life I have realized it’s time to branch out, so now it’s just finding the inner strength to thrive in this situation and not let my anxiety or need to be in control of my schedule cripple this opportunity. It’s time for me to give up the reins, and just trust that this will be a wonderful experience of a lifetime. And I’ll get there, once I finish packing. Hope all of your travels go smoothly!