- Experience a different culture. You are exploring a world different than any you’ve been used to and it’s exciting. The streets are paved differently, the people dress differently and the air just breathes like nothing you’ve ever known before. It is both exhilarating and terrifying, yet uplifting. To travel is to live. It is the best thing you can do for yourself.
- Meet new people. Yes, we all meet new people when we go away to college or when we get a new job. But to actually feel foreign in a place where you are so insignificant, where nobody knows who you are, is a feeling you can’t quite put into words. Imagine not knowing the language; imagine sounding like the idiot who doesn’t know how to distinguish “right” from “left.” It will give you a whole knew appreciation for your home and your family, and for the people you know who have come to the U.S. without a sole connection and have made the best out of it.
- You learn how to manage your money. When you travel, you realize how expensive or inexpensive basic necessities really are, depending on where you go. I went to London, which is one of the most expensive cities in the world, and lived on High Street Kensington, next to Hyde Park and Buckingham Palace, one of the most expensive areas in London. Let’s just say I quickly realized that my love for food could not be satiated in the city where I was staying. The food was just too expensive, and so, I lived off of peanut butter sandwiches and soup for a little while, but I’m still here, and I couldn’t be more thankful for the experience.
- Experience the amazing power of human kindness. I think sometimes we live in a world that focuses on the negative. We don’t hear a lot about all the good people do, and we never see or hear about random acts of basic human kindness. Which is sad but at the same time when you travel or study abroad, you get surprised. People show you empathy. People show you genuine sincerity for your general well-being, and they legitimately want to help you (for the most part). Kindness from strangers shouldn’t be something that surprises us, but because it does a lot of the time, you’ll be amazed at how nice a lot of other people in the world actually are.
- You learn a lot about yourself. Because you take yourself away from your comfort zone, you really get to know what makes you happy/sad, etc. You start realizing how much you really hate doing that certain thing, or how much you truly appreciate the relationship you have with your friends from home. Yes, it is terrifying but at the same time, it is almost like a cleansing process. You realize how to distinguish the good from the bad, and it is a great feeling.
