Letter of gratitude

I think I can say that going on Erasmus is been one of the best things I've ever done in my life. Simply because of the people I met there and the trust I gained with myself, I can certainly say I would repeat every part of it if I had the chance. The thing is that going on Erasmus is not only an experience in terms of partying and traveling as we are all concerned but also a personal one, that makes you grow until unimaginable extents of yourself you didn't even know they were there. This is what happened in my personal case.

I went to Cardiff, Wales and spent 9 months living there. I remember myself wondering what would happen before the time came, what would I do, which people would  I encounter there. Am I going to work? It'll be a good opportunity to make some money easily... Is it really going to be like they say? I hope I'm partying until I die...I left home on September the 14th. I wasn't even nervous.

And that is so strange to me because I'm a very nervous person in general terms. Anyway, I remember I was wearing all my heavy clothes and the biggest boots because they didn't fit in my suitcase. A funny thing about my trip was that every item I brought with me was waterproof. I got so obsessed with the idea of the cold, rainy weather in the UK that I decided myself to get there as ready as I could to face it. It was 25 degrees when I arrived there.

Days passed during the first semester, and I felt something was missing. I needed my family support and my best friends company. I was feeling a bit lonely at the beginning as I was just getting to know the people I was living with, and we didn't have much confidence. Therefore, there was always a huge feeling of emptiness on my inside, I was missing someone I could trust in, somebody I could talk about how I was feeling. So I looked for that person.

I don't usually talk much about myself, but I use to do it if I feel the necessity to be heard. I was feeling that necessity now, so I had to pull myself to talk to other people and to find that confidence I needed to feel better. This way, I started to get along with my flatmates and the people living just in front of our flat. We were all from different countries -France, Italy, Germany... and we were all in the same situation. The only difference between each other was the way each of us dealt with their "Erasmus feelings". In the end, we became super good friends.

Then Christmas came, and we had to leave. Oh no, I don't want to leave -was my only thought of the day. I went back home for two weeks, and everything looked different to me. I felt like I didn't fit anywhere, that people didn't understand me, or that they weren't taking my words seriously. I even started to think they were asking me about how things were going because they had to do it- so many time since we don't see each other... just tell me how it was.

I spent the whole Christmas thinking like that until I had to come back to Cardiff. The happiest day of the year. We got to meet up some cool people we had met just at the end of the last year, and we became  -from my personal experience- a big family. Thus, I can say the following months of January and February were kind of the best ones with the ones of November and December. But then they all left, and those who remained started feeling that emptiness I was talking about before coming again-each of us in different ranges, of course. We were now just "those who remained there". We really tried to make new friends, but the possibility of keeping the same conversation -what's your name and age, where are you from- again and again was unthinkable anymore.

Anyway, we meet random people during the second semester, who have actually become some of my best friends as well. We found other ways to have fun like going on hiking tours or traveling around Wales when we could. We practiced sports together -yoga, meditation... and we changed nights out for dinner time with friends and some wine, maybe a film. But in my very case, the emptiness was still there, so I decided to look for things that I would enjoy doing, spending time with myself. That is how I discovered that I  like coloring, going shopping on my own, going to cafes for some tea and reading... I even discovered that I liked Rock and Roll, which I had never enjoyed dancing before.

And these are the personal aspects of my personality I was telling you about at the beginning of this paper. The fact is that I found myself in that place because I had the right time, people and circumstances to do it. I discovered things I hate and that I like, and I discovered things that I thought I liked and I actually don't, and things I thought I didn't like, that I actually do. But the most important thing that I faced up was my hermetic nature. I found out that we have to trust other people, and that we have to learn to talk about our problems in order to solve them. We live wondering about how to do things right, but we don't ask for help. We make mountains out of a molehill and the worst thing is that these mountains occupy our minds for days and days and days.

I also learned that we have to react to those feelings that block ourselves and make the path more difficult. I had never stop and talked to myself as I did when I was in Cardiff. And the thing is that it happens that sometimes it is not your mind who is talking, but your body. And we have to learn to listen to it and correspond it with the right acts. Because still happen to me sometimes that my body is -for instance- asking me for some sport or some time out, but that my mind says no straightaway, saying that I have better things to do or that I'm simply tired. I am not tired, I don't have better things to do, I just have to find the right moment to do each of the things I like doing. And it should be like this for all of us.

I think you might imagine what happened when I had to come back home. I didn't suffer, I didn't cry much. Actually, I missed home in a way. And this time, I didn't feel like I did at Christmas. I was actually that mature person I had always considered myself to be, with the only difference that I now knew a better way to react towards negative thoughts and over thinking. And this is the reason why I would strongly recommend anyone who is thinking about going on Erasmus to leave. Leave and don't be afraid of what comes next, just be aware that you will learn and that you will find a better inner self that will certainly make you feel proud of yourself from then on.

Hope you enjoyed reading this little work of mine, you are actually reading part of myself.

Love, Reb