Now that the fall semester has officially begun, I see other students going off to start their adventures abroad and I can’t help but think back to what it felt like to head out to such an amazing overseas experience. I had been studying the Italian language for more than a year when I decided to go abroad for the spring semester of sophomore year, and the NYU Florence program offered me everything I wanted – a complete immersion in the Italian language and culture in one of the most beautiful and historic cities in the world. The experience itself ended up being nothing like what I had expected, but it was everything I could have hoped for it to be.
This time approximately seven months ago, I was settling into what would be my new home for the next four months of my life – a single bedroom in an amazing Italian family’s three-bedroom apartment a half hour away from Florence’s historic city center. Only now, as I finish my first week of junior year in my Gramercy dorm, do I realize everything my time in Italy truly gave me. Everyone talks about the excitement of going abroad and living in a new country – and yes, it’s both thrilling and humbling to venture out into a strange country on your own – but not many people talk about how it feels when you come back.
I got to start this new school year with a newfound excitement I had only felt before I even started college. I was excited to start my new classes – my four months in Florence were spent immersed in the world of Michelangelo, Donatello and history’s greatest and brightest, but starting this school year meant un-pausing my career plans and getting back to the fun stuff. That might mean more all-nighters and less truffle pasta but hey, life can’t always be perfect.
I was really excited to see my friends again – you make so many new friends while you’re abroad as you bond over tasty new food, boundless travel opportunities and foreign language struggles; but being so far away from home definitely gives you time to really miss the friends and family that are usually just a phone call away. That friend who calls you 25 times a day suddenly isn’t that annoying when there’s an entire ocean and a six-hour time difference between you (though they still manage to find their way around the issues to make the minimum ten calls for every day of the week and you kind of love them even more for it).
But most of all, I was excited to come back to New York. Not that I didn’t love my time in Florence because I did, but spending four months in a city that is the exact opposite of New York City gave me a sense of appreciation of where I get to study and where I get to live most of my day-to-day life. I can’t begin to explain how many people I met in Italy that told me they dreamed about living – or even just visiting – New York. Their eyes would light up in excitement and wonder as I answered their boundless questions, “What is it like? Is it really like in the movies? Do you really take those yellow taxis everywhere?” This magical city is the stuff of dreams for so many people and here I get to live out my life in it by choice, luck, and probably a little bit of magic too.
Do I miss having the opportunity to travel across Europe on a weekly basis? Definitely. Do I miss living in a country with some of the best food in the world? Absolutely. But now I have a plethora of memories and experiences to carry with me as I finish my time at NYU, as well as a second family on the other side of the ocean I can visit when I start getting homesick for some pasta con tartufo.
