Student Bloggers

“Please have snow, and mistletoe, and presents under the tree”—Frank Sinatra crooned it best. It’s my favorite Christmas song, and one that’s been especially poignant this year. In eight hours time, I board a plane that takes me back to America, back to a home that’s got parents and puppies (and hopefully some presents). But this year more than ever, going home feels odd, mostly because I feel as though I’m leaving a new home and going back to an old one. Now, there’s nothing wrong with an old home (my roommate can attest to the fact that I miss it terribly—she found me crying over a picture of my dog last week), but there’s a lot to be said for my new home too.

Rome isn’t exactly an easy place to leave, either—its magical at Christmas. Say what you will in favor of December in New York City or London, but Rome does Christmas well. From mid-November onwards there’s been Christmas decorations in all the shops and lining the streets. Even my little neighborhood of Garbatella has gone full out! My corner pastry shop has twinkle lights strung up around light poles, and as you walk down the street to the market, the tall apartment buildings twinkle with private balcony displays of pint-sized trees and strands of lights. And of course, trees as tall as the monuments themselves adorn the Colosseum, St Peter’s, and Piazza Venezia. There’s something really special about seeing the corners of an ancient city shake themselves awake for the Christmas season, and more than ever I feel lucky to be in Rome. 

Knowing I’ll soon have to let go of the magic is partly why its been so hard to conceptualize leaving, even for so short a time. With the end of fall semester here, my time in Rome is half over and already I feel profoundly changed. Not in the traditional sense—I knew who I was before I came here, and neither independence nor confidence in self have ever been issues for me. Instead, I feel changed in the sense that I’m no longer waiting for something—for adventure, for experiences, for my life to take a turn for the novel-worthy dramatic. Study abroad has absolutely been an adventure, but its the type of adventure I made for myself—a cocktail made partially of an exotic much-dreamed-about location and partially the enthusiasm and excitement I brought to the experience. Though I’ve only been in Rome for three months, the city I spent my childhood dreaming about has already taught me an important lesson: that studying abroad, like life, is a series of enthusiastic experiences, and that every day has the potential for adventure. 

And, sure, maybe its easy for me to say that—I live in Rome, I’m studying abroad, of course every day has the potential for adventure! But looking back on my first semester, here at the halfway point, some of my fondest memories have been the everyday ones. Like going to a Roman grocery store for the first time and having my Italian friend laugh herself silly while I try to order meat from the counter. Like my host family’s puppy recognizing me for the first time—she greeted me at the door like I was a member of the family. Or like getting quick Italian lessons from Fabrizio every time I order pizza after class—he owns my favorite pizza place, and he’s the only reason I know how to conjugate Italian verbs.

When I finally get home for Christmas and tell my family about Rome, I’m sure that the first things I’ll touch on will be the big ones—the Pantheon, the Colosseum, whether or not the Trevi Fountain is actually that big in person—but the biggest thing I’ve taken away from studying abroad thus far is that if I approach every experience as through it has the potential to be a hilarious adventure, then it actually does have that potential! More than anything, this past semester has taught me about the power of positivity—it's a lesson I’ll bring home to my family this Christmas season, and carry with me for the rest of my life.