My Advice on Going Abroad

This advice can make or break your semester (or year) abroad…

Come without expectations 

Don’t have fixed expectations or ideas of what kind of experience this *should* be. You may have preconceived notions of a country, its people, and their culture, but leave that all behind as you board your flight.  You will enjoy your experience tenfold and be a MUCH more enjoyable person to be around. A person with rigid expectations comes into a new experience, and the chances of connecting with people naturally become slimmer.  The reason why everyone wishes to travel is because it is valuable. Why is travel so valuable? Most knowledge is experiential rather than communicable. A lot of your experiences cannot be written down. The most crucial learned knowledge about a culture is how you feel when you are there—the noise of its streets, the ambiance alluded to by the way people dress, and how respectability is conveyed. You can read a million things about Belgium without truly understanding how it feels to physically walk around its streets.

Be receptive 

I don’t get embarrassed often, and it is rare for me to experience shame. But every time an American corrects someone’s pronunciation of English words, I quiver and wish for Earth below me to swallow me whole. Please, be receptive to others, (this includes the way they speak, eat, live, etc…) When abroad, you want to tint your experience with openness. Do not rush to rectify others’ behaviors or to outwardly react. If you are always quick to react: are you surrendering to the newness of this experience? 

Represent Yourself Well

I’ve always thought that studying abroad could serve purposes similar to those of a diplomatic assignment. Sometimes, you arrive with others in a delegation from your university. Other times, you might be the only person from your school. Often, exchange students from all over the world happen to choose the same university as their host. Upon arrival, the host university will likely create a cohort of these students, making for a smoother orientation process. With this stage set, you can see how going abroad is much like going on a diplomatic mission. Meaning that you do not solely represent your person, but you must also be ready to represent the university, city, and country you come from. Your audience is not only the student body of your host university but also all the other exchange students who are there to share the experience with you. That is in addition to any other identifiers that you or others have placed on you. I won’t concern myself today with clarifying if this is a good or bad thing, but it is a reality. Bearing this in mind, you should always put your best foot forward and try to show up as your best self.