It was, in my mind at least, not long at all before the end of semester had arrived, before I knew it I was studying for exams and even saying goodbye to people I felt I had known for a lifetime let alone just a few weeks. To say that it was ‘over in the blink of an eye’ though doesn’t quite capture the reality of my experience, because for each and every day, for every moment of those days my eyes were open wide, almost afraid to blink out of fear for what I may miss, and it was with this overbearing enthusiasm that I lived these days and experienced everything that passed before me.
As the end did approach it was unavoidably a time to reflect and as I turned back to look across the preceding weeks I was overwhelmed by a thick blanket of nostalgia. There’s something about reflection over a significant and meaningful time in your life, the trials, the hard times seem to dissolve in a wave of pure joy and happiness that seems to wash over the hours, days and weeks, leaving no moment untouched. The reality is obviously a different story, but a day suffering food poisoning in Mexico City is overshadowed by the mere magnificence of a visit to the Palacio de Bellas Artes, the struggles to communicate, the awkward silences, the anxiety and insecurity of being so far from home all but a faded dot on a timeline that stretched across the page and arrived at the present to reveal a self-assured and content me, all the richer for the ups and downs that I had experienced.
So it was, my attempts to reflect accurately on my time away were thwarted, the challenges, the moments of desperation uncontrollably removed from the pages of history, simply overwhelmed by all those memories that brought a smile to my face whenever they would pop into my head. My time at University was the very best example of my own minds trickery. The challenges I faced were real, 8:00am compulsory classes four days a week and living over an hour from the campus by public transport would be a challenge for any Melbourne based University student who is more accustomed to the late morning or early afternoon lecture times and the relative comforts of our public transport system. Being placed in classes with students from all around the world, some who had been learning Spanish for upwards of 12 and 13 years, these were the realities of my time at school, but looking back what I remember most distinctly are small wins that I had along the way, that gradually gave me momentum and confidence to succeed. Giving my first presentation to a class exclusively in Spanish on a topic as serious as the issue of homosexuality in a catholic state such as Mexico was something I will never forget. The relationships that I forged with my teachers; my speaking partner with whom I met twice a week to practice her English and my Spanish. These were the triumphs that I had in the classroom, on the other side of the world in another language and in another educational culture.
The biggest success that I ever had was finally possessing that feeling of belonging, that which creeps up on you slowly but surely and one day takes you over completely, where you are no longer an alien merely surviving in your environment but rather you are you and you are living in your home. You can never say for sure when this moment has come, but one day, all of a sudden, when you are walking down the street saying ‘Hola’ to a friendly neighbour, or talking casually with a worker at your local supermarket you will know that it has arrived. This is the great tragedy of the exchange experience, as you finally overcome your initial trepidation and insecurities and have come to master your new home, it's time to leave. But this will always be the case, the longer one spends anywhere the more at home and secure they will feel and when the time comes to leave it is inevitable that that very moment will be the pinochle of their own sense of belonging.
For me the hardest part of all of this was saying goodbye to all the people I had met along the way. Goodbyes are never easy, but behind the kind words, the hugs and tears there was always the common understanding that this may be the very last time we see each other and at the very least, this is the very last time we will all be together in the same place at the same time. That part of each of our lives exists together, dependent on one another and independent of our other lives and it is this that connects us in this life despite the fact that it has closed never to be reopened.
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