Fifteen days.
That’s how long I will be in America. I’m writing this at 10 o’clock which is five hours before my flight will depart on the 25th. It blows my mind
that in fifteen days I will leave this country for a year. I will leave my
family, my friends, my school, and my town for a year. I’m not going to lie, it
is a little intimidating. I don’t even think I am able to comprehend how
different the next year will be. I know that it will be the hardest thing I
have ever done and I will miss home terribly but I also know without a shadow
of a doubt that it will be the greatest thing I have ever experienced and will
experience for a long time.
I have
written a packing list and am making my final preparations to leave. Next
weekend my family is getting together for one last goodbye. Not a small feat
when you consider the amount of people; my extended family from Richmond, IN,
My brothers and my mother and father. I started taking an online course of
American History today. I will take the first semester before I leave and the
second semester before I return. Over the summer I took English 11 online.
These were just two steps of the long preparation process.
It was early
August 2013 when I decided to apply for Rotary Youth Exchange. I was contacted
by Lacretia Ulrey who is the woman in Columbus Sunrise Rotary Club who takes
care of Youth Exchange. She told me about the program and walked me through the
application process. I met with an outbound exchange student going to Italy
shortly before her departure. She gave me an inside look at the process and
help console me through it.
In early
October I submitted the long application to Rotary for review, this led me to a
leadership camp at Bradford Woods. At the leadership camp I was interviewed by prominent
figures of the district and I met some cool people and a couple exchange
students. This began the waiting process, I was notified in December that I had
been accepted into the program but it wasn’t until late January that I knew I
was going to France.
More
recently, in early July I went to Chicago to apply for my visa. This was really
just a formality but it gave me the opportunity to meet about six or seven
other exchange students going to France. From the consulate appointment we
drove up to Grand Rapids, MI for the Central States Rotary conference. There
were about 1,100 people there including parents so about 500-600 exchange
students. It was a mix of outbounds, inbounds, and rebounds. I got to meet a
lot of exchange students going to France, from France, or recently back from
France. I asked a lot of questions and got pumped for the exchange. My Rotary
Youth Exchange (RYE) jacket is also about ten times heavier now.
Now is just a
waiting game. I have a countdown on my phone which I check every single day. In
the next couple of days I have to choose my seat on the plane, email the rotary
club in France about my arrival, say goodbye to my friends, and last but not
least pack my bags. It’s going to be a crazy year.
