It’s only a semester. These words became my mantra during the eight hour flight to Copenhagen, where I am spending this semester. I had done my research— The Danish Institute for Study Abroad, the program I am enrolled in, is a program specifically for American students, and it came highly recommended. Google said Denmark was the happiest country on earth. But from the look of the hotel lobby where they had packed the other 1500 DIS students, each groggy from their respective flights, it was clear that the country had just gotten significantly duller.
During the first few weeks, I severely missed my home. My brother was starting college, my friends were moving back into Barnard dorms, and I missed my a capella group and my sorority sisters and my city. Knowing life was continuing in Morningside Heights without me made me sad. The constant stream of social media updates of those I love made me feel alone. Walking home at night with people I didn’t know very well, kicking beer cans on our urine-soaked street, I kept telling myself, it’s only a semester. It’s only a semester.
But the days passed, like they always do, and I found people. We went to Paris, we went to Stockholm. Dublin, Amsterdam, Lisbon. We went to Munich. Next week we’ll be in Barcelona. I’m meeting my friends from home in different cities and collecting some on the way. Slowly, my abroad experience began to be about milestones. Today I talked to my mom on the phone and didn’t cry. Today I spent less than two hours in the grocery store. Today I didn’t get run over by a bicycle. I’ve learned things, like I can survive without my cell phone (shoutout to crappy European data plans.) The word for avocado in Danish is spisemodne. RyanAir seats do not recline. Denmark has given me moments of perfect wonder and moments of perfect misery.
So as of yesterday, I have completed half of my abroad experience. 59 days. What people don’t tell you is that it doesn’t matter what city you choose. Or what program. These things can, and do, enhance or detract from your experience, but in the end, abroad is about you. Understanding how you adjust. Learning how you react, learning how you respond. Realizing who you are when everyone and everything you love are an ocean away.
When it is bad, I remember that one day I won’t see that view of the Church of Our Lady on the rainy walk home from Norreport Station. I will never be able to book a flight to Europe two hours in advance again. When it is bad, a semester feels so long. But when it is good, when the sun visits Copenhagen and gives sparkle to every puddle and raindrop, when the world is a blonde toddler asleep on the back of her father, or a warm cinnamon roll that, directly translated from Danish, means “sugar snail”, when it is good, well, a semester feels like the shortest thing I’ll ever do.
I don’t have it all figured out. I have not met my best friends for life. But I’m here. I’m traveling, with people who make me laugh, often. I spend most days with a book or by a body of water. I spend most nights buzzing with wine. I’m alive. I’m happy. And I am stupidly lucky to see the world like this— even for just a semester.