All My Bags Are Packed, I’m Ready To Go

 

I have always wanted to travel. Unlike my brother, who is perfectly happy not to leave Mount Pleasant, I want to see the world. I want to experience new things, see new places,

The 52nd Parallel. Goodbye 49!

and meet new people. Therefore I chose to study in the exotic land of the United Kingdom (cue laugh track). I will be living in Cardiff, a small city parallel to London, about two hours west. Cardiff is not in England, it is the Welsh capital of Wales, a nonindependent country which with England and Scotland create Great Britain. Add Northern Ireland and you have Her Majesty’s United Kingdom.

 

For some of you reading this, moving to a new place may seem like a slightly-annoying-but-mostly-exciting-normal-part-of-life. For me, it is a new and daunting sensation that until this point has been portrayed as extreme type-A organization. Now, it has hit me that I am leaving the one place I have ever called home to live 7771km away.

I got embarrassingly sappy this morning. I was listening to John Denver and Andrea Bocelli on repeat while petting my beloved kitty, until I caught the judging gaze from a life-size cut out of Benedict Cumberbatch on my wall. “Sophie, sentiment is a chemical defect found on the losing side.”I pulled myself together. I don’t agree with Sherlock. Sentiment is not a defect, it is a strength. But I am not marching to my death. I am taking an air-conditioned ride to my dream land. Tonight, I leave for the journey of a lifetime.

This is a big change. I’m sad, I won’t lie. I will miss all of you. I will miss my home, my beautiful city, and probably more than anything, Asian food. But I am also ready, and fantastically excited to see what this year abroad will bring.