Tag: abroad

Laura: So Much to Miss in Boston

Next semester, I will be traveling abroad to Sydney, Australia for Boston University’s internship program! I will be flying for approximately 21 hours to the land of beaches, kangaroos, and vegemite and saying goodbye to some American, and specifically Boston, staples. In memoriam of being away from those things for four months, I have composed a list of the things I will miss most while I am down under: 

  1. Trader Joe’s
    This is number one for a reason. I will miss the convenience of shopping at the Coolidge Corner store every week and the cauliflower rice!
  2. Marathon Monday
  3. T. Anthony’s Pizzeria 
  4. Picco pizza (I really like pizza, can you tell?)
  5. Studying on the 3rd or 6th floor of Mugar
  6. Going to the Boston Public Library to pick up books to read 
  7. The view from the 26th floor of Stuvi2
  8. American-specific content on Netflix (aka The Office)
  9. Lemonade
    Apparently ordering lemonade isn’t really a thing in Australia, the closest thing is Sprite.
  10. Flywheel classes in the Prudential
  11. Ketchup
    If there is one thing to know about me, I put ketchup on everything. Apparently, if I want ketchup in Australia I will have to ask for “tomato sauce,” but then what am I supposed to do if I actually want tomato sauce!? 
  12. Matcha lattes from the Pavement coffeehouse on Commonwealth Ave 
  13. Walking from my dorm in West campus to class in East campus each day 
  14.  FitRec
  15. Running the COM open house in April with my fellow COM Ambassadors
  16. The leaves changing on Bay State Road

Short list of things I will not miss: Snow and hearing everyone talk about Tom Brady. 

I will miss my friends, family, and Boston University as a whole more than anything (even more than Trader Joe’s). Boston University has prepared me to take a leap of faith and travel across the world and I know that I am prepared for this journey of a lifetime. I will be back soon Boston, don’t you forget about me! 

Megan: Life Lessons from BU

After 7 semesters and 3 summers, my time at Boston University is drawing to a close. I will carry the memories and lessons I’ve learned long after I graduate in January, but it feels very bittersweet for my time as a student to be ending after such a wonderful experience! I’ve decided to go through and reflect on what I learned during the time I was a BU student.

Fall 2015
I was so nervous before I moved in about making friends and getting to know a city I had only visited for short periods of time. But, I was able to form a community by doing FYSOP my first week of college, befriending all of the people on my floor in Warren Towers (5C!), and joining lots and lots of clubs. It seemed silly to be afraid after meeting so many people I could relate to.

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Spring 2016
This was the semester that I found my home at BU: COM Undergraduate Affairs. I really looked forward to being, and to stopping by whenever I was in COM. It was where I really found people with similar interests and passions. I also learned how much fun PDP’s are while I took a golf and swim class!

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Summer 2016
I spent my first summer after college back home in Maryland, and it was the second-best summer of my entire life! It was so important for me after a school year of change to be able to come home and be with the friends I had grown up with, to nanny for the kids I love, and to sleep in my own room.

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Fall 2016
This was undoubtedly the best semester of my college career. I became best friends with the greatest friend I’ve ever had, CA Claire, and realized what it meant to find a near-perfect friendship. I also worked harder than I ever had on Bay State, the BUTV10 show, and felt more confident than I ever had in my classes and what I was doing.

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Spring 2017
I went from my best semester in college to my worst. Though I was doing lots of fun things, like being an assistant stage manager for BU On Broadway’s Legally Blonde, and directing on Bay State, I was doing totally too much and my mental health suffered. But, I learned how to prioritize the activities and friendships that matter, and to stick close with the friends that would be there for me through the tough times.

Summer 2017
Staying in Boston for the summer was an outstanding experience. The weather was great, I was working for Orientation, and I did my first internship. Claire and I did our fair share of cooking, and visited as many beaches as we could. We also took time to visit family in NYC and Maryland, which was super important after not being home for so long.

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Fall 2017
This was the semester that I had an hour long lunch break at my internship in the heart of Boston, meaning I was constantly exploring and visiting my favorite place, the Boston Harbor. I also got to read feature film scripts for the first time, and made some really wonderful new friends as I took on bigger leadership roles.

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Spring 2018
My last semester in Boston was amazing because I interned at WGBH in their Children’s Programming department, and finally felt like I had found where in the entertainment industry I belonged. It was the best feeling in the world getting to go there, while also experiencing my favorite things in Boston for the last time. I miss Regina’s Pizzeria in the North End every day.

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Summer 2018
The BEST summer of my life! I got to go abroad to London and explore England, Ireland, France, Belgium, and Amsterdam, and learned what it meant to really fall in love with a city. I had never felt so clearly that I belonged somewhere, and I miss it every single day. I also got to teach a bunch of Europeans how to make s’mores, and changed their lives forever!

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Fall 2018
My final semester of college has been devoted to “studying abroad” in Los Angeles, and preparing for a post-college world. I have had the opportunity to intern at what I think is probably the best place in the world, DreamWorks, and feel ready to enter the workforce and begin to make the magic I always dreamed I would.

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There are so many opportunities I haven’t gotten to mention in my final blog post, but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how much being a COM Ambassador has meant to me. I have been able to make wonderful friends, meet amazing prospective students and their families, and share my love of BU to thousands of people. That’s craziness, and I am so so thankful for COM. I’ll miss college very much, but I know it has helped me get right where I need to be.

Tyler: I Swear It Wasn’t Like This Before

When I got off the plane from London at Logan Airport two months ago, I gleefully welcomed the frigid weather. It was unbearable and exposure to the wind caused concerning pain to my face and hands, but it confirmed that I was home.

 

Don’t get me wrong — spending the fall semester studying abroad in England was the greatest thing I’ve ever done. And that was exactly the problem. I didn’t want to leave at all, but I’d accomplished my academic and research goals and completely run out of money. So, I had come to accept that it was time to get back to campus where I can focus more directly on working toward a career without being distracted by travel, a different social dynamic, and the whimsy of simply being elsewhere.

 

I take it back. I’d become accustomed to such a routine lifestyle of extremes in London. My time was spent in lengthy periods of either sitting quietly and nervously in a massive historical library or taking taxis, buses, trains, and planes to the new coolest place I’d ever been in my life. Classes ran once or twice a week. The weather was a comfortable, albeit often rainy, 50 degrees every single day. Plane tickets cost $40. I could drink legally!

 

Nothing feels right in Boston — the city in which I’ve lived practically all my life. I’m no longer on a cultural crash course disguised as a vacation. It’s not easy realizing that what I learn and accomplish in the next year very much decides how I spend the rest of my life. It’s not easy reverting to prudent financial habits. Fortunately, friends and family remain constant regardless of where I spend my time, and returning to those at home has certainly helped me realize what, or who, truly drives me to achieve my goals.