Hey Everyone,
Life has finally slowed down enough for me to sit down and write a final post to this chapter of my life's adventures.
If we're being honest, there are no words to describe the feeling that comes from moving across the world, establishing yourself in an international community and then leaving it all behind. I miss it already. I look up Europe flights every couple of days in hopes that a seat sale will tempt me back across the Atlantic. The people I met have absolutely inspired me to be more aware of the broader world out there. The lifelong friendships will be cherished more than I could have ever imagined.
Because I'm at a loss for words, I felt it would be most appropriate to look back at the very first post I did in preparation for my Belgium exchange. I outlined four goals for myself. Copy and pasted from the source, they read:
1) Learn how to survive on my own in a foreign country
2) Become fluent in French
3) Travel as often and as broadly as possible
4) Seduce a handsome Belgian Prince and create a Canada/Belgium mega-nation
I feel like the best way to summarize my trip would be to assess how much progress I made towards those goals.
1) Without doubt I learned to survive on my own in a foreign country. To be fair, I had a lot of help. I had no idea how much of a family all the Erasmus students would become to me and how much we would all come to rely on each others' experience, friendship, and support. The increase in my self-efficacy and self-confidence has increased immensely.
2) Although I didn't reach the level of fluency I had hoped to attain, I still made a fair amount of progress. My background in French was school courses from grades 4-10 followed by four years of absolutely no French at all. To jump back into it, I was both impressed and discouraged. Firstly, I was impressed because I remembered a heck of a lot more than I expected. Discouraged because I realized I had never really learned all the much. So much of those early years is repetition and verb conjugation work sheets that I realized I had barely any oral comprehension. Furthermore, the Belgian accent was unlike anything I had heard before. To be fair, they couldn't understand my French accent either. If nothing else, I am now more determined than ever to continue my French studies and reach a true fluency. I came back to Canada and immediately enrolled in a French course. Additionally, I am planning to write my DELF exams and do an exchange to Quebec this summer.
3) Overall I was pleased with the amount of travel I squeezed in. Given that I was taking four classes, I was somewhat restricted to what I could visit in day trips or weekend trips. I was pleased with how much of Belgium I got to see as I had wanted to get a good feel for my host country, its people and a variety of events. All said and done, I visited Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Italy, Malta, England, and Sweden. Adding this to my prior travel experience in Canada, USA, Mexico, Czech Republic, and Austria, I'm starting to feel like I'm finally starting to actually get out of the shell that is Southern Alberta.
4) There may indeed be a Canada-Europe mega-nation someday. But it won't be with Belgium.
So thank you to all of you who followed along with my adventures. Your comments and presence in my visitor statistics was immensely appreciated.
As I continue on with my post-secondary education and entertain thoughts of pursuing a master's degree in Europe, I feel I may live to blog again. Presently, I feel a sincere gratitude and love to everyone who I met, who helped me along the way, who supported me, and who made the four months of exchange the best of my life.
Love and Light,
Jacqueline
