Students snorkel in Sydney, Australia (Courtesy of Aspen Moore/CUI)
This piece is from the CU Independent’s opinion section. Any opinions or views do not represent the CU Independent.
G’day! I am so delighted to be sharing this newsletter with you! I will be documenting my experiences, highs and lows and thoughts while being in Sydney, Australia, this semester. I hope to provide you with the real deal of my abroad experience, and I am grateful to have such lovely people to share it with!
This is how I started my first newsletter entry on Jan. 13, 11 days after landing in Sydney, Australia. Sent originally to 33 people, it started a five-month-long set of weekly newsletters that would change my friendships, life outlook and career aspirations.
When I landed, I was anxious. Extremely anxious. I had written in my journal on the plane that I felt like I was going to throw up. I had never been away from home this long, let alone out of the country. I knew no one in my program, unlike so many of my friends who were facing the trials of Europe together. The only person I had spoken to was my roommate over Instagram DMs about what to pack. Nervous, unsure and very uncomfortable, I got on the bus to my new housing.
I laid in bed on the first night, jet-lagged and heart beating 100 miles a minute. I journaled then too, about how scared I was that everyone was going to make their best friends and have the time of their life, and I’d be behind. I’d heard it a thousand times before: “Going abroad was the BEST experience of my life!” “I never wanted to go home,” and the cautionary statement that repeated in my head over and over: “Don’t go abroad, because you’ll never experience that level of happiness ever again!”
A week and a half later, my nerves had settled … slightly. I still wasn’t living my picture-perfect abroad life I had seen on social media from so many others I knew. I felt cheated. When is the best part of my life coming? Sydney was rainy, had confusing transport and lots of hills, and I still hadn’t been to the beach. I realized that my experience might not be picture-perfect. But, it could be good enough for a newsletter. I wanted to show everyone that going abroad isn’t all sunshine and rainbows but instead a lot of different feelings. I had hope that things would get better, but even if they didn’t, I wanted to tell my friends back home what I had learned about travel, new countries, new people and most of all, myself.
The newsletter was divided into five sections: highs, lows, story of the week, topic of the week and pictures.
Highs:
By the second newsletter edition, I had met some friends. On the Jan. 25 edition, my high was leaving for Melbourne for my 21st birthday trip. The next week, Feb. 2, I talked about how amazing that trip was. I saw kangaroos, koalas and attractive men who bought birthday drinks for me downtown. Almost every February edition had highs about the beach; it was Sydney’s summer after all. I talked about clubs and bars that I found amongst the city’s dismal nightlife but turned a new leaf in the first March edition, where I announced my sobriety from alcohol. This month also included the spring break trip of a lifetime: Fiji. Sunrise swims, training for a 10k, nude beaches, improv comedy classes and national parks made up the other March highs. One of the biggest highs of the semester came in April when I finished my first race ever. I had run 6.2 miles and felt on top of the world. I relaxed for the rest of the month with other highs of rewatching “Game of Thrones,” crocheting a top, and taking a painting class. April showers brought many May flowers, with highs including botanical garden visits with my mother and seeing the beautiful green landscape of New Zealand.
Lows:
In the beginning, the lows were plentiful. I wrote in my first edition about how homesick and anxious I was. However, to my surprise, I had a disproportionate amount of highs to lows in every edition after. But they still were there, and I made sure to stick to my mission of showing the ugly parts of life abroad, too. I talked about my body image struggles, how hard it was to see beautiful blondes in bikinis almost every day and try not to compare myself. A big low was when I sprained my ankle on March 7. I was unable to run for two weeks and had to pare back on my workout intensity. This was a big disruption in my 10k training, and I was nervous about completing it. I stressed about my life post-grad. I had no idea what I was going to do or where I was going to live. And I felt very low when May came, and I had to leave my life in Sydney behind.
Story of the week:
A fun section. And I can’t talk about it without introducing the highlight of my entire abroad experience: my roommate Hannah. I was nervous about making friends abroad but was relieved when Hannah and I got along well when we finally met in person. Over the semester, we became best friends. We even pushed our twin beds together in February and kept them like that until the day we left. We spent every moment together, and it led to some pretty hilarious stories. Here’s a shortened version of two of my favorites.
“So Hannah and I were bored on Wednesday night and went to this club called the Scary Canary because there was free entry and a free drink. The music was lively, things were good, and then this woman approached us and asked if we wanted to do a “Wet T-Shirt” contest for a chance to win $300. The woman takes us to a private bathroom and gives us the t-shirts and is like, Okay, you guys will go up in groups of two, and the only rule is you can’t take your underwear off. Hannah and I were so confused. But we are committed now, and anything for $300. We got up on stage and danced our hearts out to Beyoncé and Missy Elliott in front of at least 100 people. We didn’t win. BUT IT WAS SO FUN. I thought I would have anxiety about it, but I didn’t; it was so fun.”
“So we went to Royal National Park and decided to rent a car because it would be faster and cheaper than public transportation. We declined the extra insurance, and the attendant told us that if we brought the car back damaged, we would pay $4,000. WHAT? So I get in the car, on the RIGHT side, and drive on the LEFT side, and I am RIDDLED with anxiety. Any scratch on this car is $4000. So we get to the park, hike, and then I make Hannah drive back. We decided to return the rental car right away because of how stressed it was making us, and five minutes, count FIVE minutes, away from the place, both Hannah’s and my phone died with the navigation. So we are on the highway, and Hannah exits into a random parking lot. We decided we were going to ask random people if we could use their hotspot/look up directions on their phone, and we did, and made it back an hour later. SO STRESSFUL. Anyway, in hindsight, it’s really funny because we thought every car behind us was the insurance company trying to rear-end us. Lord.”
Topic of the week:
This section allowed me to communicate my thoughts about what was happening outside of my life in Sydney. A lot of the topics ended up being about politics. Donald Trump was inaugurated during my abroad semester, and I witnessed the actions of his administration from 7,000 miles away. This is where I discussed becoming a journalist, specifically for politics, as I would read the New York Times’ politics section almost daily. Other topics included alcohol culture and sobriety and how I had managed it in a world where drinking is normalized and expected. I decided I would continue my sobriety back in America. I also talked about lighter things: nude beaches, Hinge dates, music and ghosts.
Pictures:
Everyone wants to see pictures of the beaches, the Opera House, Sydney Harbor, and quintessential Sydney landscapes. And I sure did send them! But I also included silly pictures. My roommate sleeping, our attempt at recreating the faces from Smile 2, snorkel selfies, etc.
Looking back on these newsletters, I smile. I smile at the girl who was so nervous to spread her wings in another country. I smile reading how she made friends, traveled, developed hobbies and relaxed into Australian life. I am immensely grateful for my semester abroad. The newsletter grew to 60 recipients by the end, and so many people responded with advice, encouragement, funny stories of their own, and general praise. I had done it: showed the realities of life abroad, all the highs, lows, funny stories, food for thought and my saved pictures over the last five months.
And now, I’ll sign off like I did with every newsletter.
‘ɹǝpun uʍop ɯoɹℲ
Aspen Moore
Contact CU Independent Writer Aspen Moore at aspen.moore@colorado.edu
