Welcome

 Reed McElyea

WE HAVE SNOW!  Austria has been so warm lately ski resorts are not making fake snow because the mountains are still green.  My god I was losing all faith in what I knew to be true, but now I feel my prayers  for snow have been answered!  In terms of weather it has been a strange year.  The summer was incredibly grey and wet, we saw very little sunny days.  As the year progressed towards winter, sure it got a little colder, but the last month was sunny.  I mean we had these clear rich blue skies.  I must say Austria is one of the cleanest countries I have been to, and I really do mean all around cleanliness. You are truly able to drink from every tap the water is that good, there are strict recycling laws, and I am telling you in terms of air quality there is very little difference from Bozeman to Vienna.  Okay there are some gross smelling places of course it is a city, but I think you can get the gist of what I am trying to say.  
 
When I was back in Bozeman, still in orientation Daryl would say to the parents "Do not be surprised if your kid says they do not want to come home.  Do not be surprised if your kid sinks in to exchange so deep that it will be harder for them to come back to Montana then it ever was for them to leave Montana".  For the first couple of months I thought I was different. I thought Austria is great but I will be ready to leave when the times comes.  Damn it was I wrong.  I have fallen, and my goodness it feels good.  You know what I think the cool thing about exchange is?  That every single one is different.  You must dive in blind and re shape every moment so that it fulfills its true glory.  That is not easy to do, in fact it can be frightening,  it is the reason Montana was only able to send five students abroad last year.  Change is absolutely scary, and I honestly believe the reason more students do not go on exchange is the fact that the friends you left with may not be your friends when you come back.  I am a different person already, and I have made true friends.  I meet a new a person every single day, and every single day the web of friends that I have gets bigger and bigger.  I do miss my friends back home, but why dwell for something that is not going anywhere?  
 
Every month I get an Email stating that I need to post a description about how the last month has been.  For me the moments that I truly emanate on are not the moments when I was walking through the streets of hungry.  Or standing before the magnificent church of our lady in dresden Germany.  Not to say these moments have not been special, but I am already at the half way mark and when I look back I look at the small moments.  Cause really all I am is a teenager, in highschool, in Europe.  I remember screwing around in class with a friend and getting yelled at.  I remember the first Austrian I saw in my school to pitch my tent (if you catch my drift).  I remember there was minute were I sat and it hit me.  I no longer felt like an outsider or a tourist but I truly felt like there is no other place on this Earth that I should be sitting.  That is a really cool feeling.  It is no surprise to me why so many exchange students come back and decide they want to leave again go explore something new.  This world is so much bigger then the world I knew back in Bozeman.  I will say it, I do not want to come back.  However I do not think I would want to stay were I am.  I want to move find a new place and find a new adventure.  I really do hope the exchange program expands to greater heights, because I said it before no one has the same exchange, but every body will come back the person they were truly meant to be.  Not the person you thought you were before you left.  
 
My December post,  Reed McElyea 

 

 

 Here is Courtney Miranda, and her blog is at http://aleatoryescapades.blogspot.com/

 

She is spending her year around Sao Paulo, Brazil