This may sound ridiculous, but I never thought that the end of this semester would actually come. It always seemed such a long way off, and I instinctually always put it in the very back of my mind when it was brought up. That’s why, during our last week, the reality that we were about to leave was a major slap in the face.
Our last week in Salamanca was, for the most part, consumed with studying for finals. Since we went to Portugal the weekend before, we left all of our studying for the week of. Finals went well, but finishing our classes was actually very bittersweet. Since all of our classes are so small, we became really close with our professors, and it’s not like we are ever going to see any of them again.
The only professor I was happy to say goodbye to was my art professor, who accidentally forgot to show up to an extra review session that he made us come to during finals week, showed up an hour and a half late, and proceeded to lecture for another hour and a half, completely wasting three hours of our time when we had other finals to be studying for. He then sent us a 166 page study guide for the final, 11 pm the night before the final, with “important things we must know.” He was extremely infuriating and I do not miss him.
Sorry, rant over.
During the Wednesday the week before, we had our last Intercambio. Intercambio was a thing we did every Wednesday night from 8-9 at a local café, where we talked with Spanish University students studying English. They would speak English to us, and we would speak back to them in Spanish. It was an extreme mental workout, but Jemma and I actually got really close with one of the students, who we paired with every single week. Saying goodbye to him was really hard. That is the part about traveling that absolutely sucks. You meet so many incredible people, but you know that you’ll probably never see any of them again.
On the Thursday of finals week, we had a big dinner out with our program director and all of our professors, at a super fancy restaurant. They got us nice and wine drunk, and we all ended up crying harder than we should’ve when it came time to say goodbye to our professors.
We all went out that night until 6am as a final hurrah, and it was one of the best nights of the semester.
Our last full day, Jemma and I walked down to the Cathedral, and were surprised to see a Christmas market set up. It was the cutest thing ever. We got some fresh churros con chocolate and sat outside the cathedral, reminiscing about the trip.
As we were walking home we stopped in the Plaza, and we got there right when they turned all of the lights on. It was so beautiful that we immediately burst into tears.
All of us went out for milkshakes that night, and said goodbye to the Plaza. Two of the guys on our program, Freddy and Diego, had early morning flights the next day, so they were taking a bus out of Salamanca a night early. We went home to say goodbye to them, and after they left it started feeling super real. Our group wasn’t the same with two of us missing.
The next morning, we woke up at 5am and had one last breakfast of Special K cereal, mini donuts and a banana.
Pilar (my host mom) then helped us drag all of our luggage to the spot where the bus was going to pick us up. Saying goodbye to Pilar was HORRIBLE. I was a teary mess. The bus came and picked us up, and she waved goodbye until we were out of sight. That was one of the most heartbreaking goodbyes in the world.
The bus ride to the airport was very solemn, and when we got there, our program director Jesús said goodbye to us. Again, many more tears. All 8 of us were still sniffling and crying as we made our way (with our obscene amount of luggage) to the terminal. Because the Barajas airport sucks, we had to take a 15-minute bus ride to Terminal 4, which for some reason is way out in the boondocks. This is normally fine, but it was quite the feat to undertake with all of our suitcases. I personally had two suitcases, one normal size and one absolutely M A S S I V E one, along with a duffel bag and backpack that I was carrying on. The big suitcase was about 65 pounds, which made everything else I was carrying seem light, even though each individual piece was way heavier than I can normally handle.
Long story short, it took us close to an hour and a half to make it to our gate, just because of how slowly we were moving with our luggage. One by one, everyone in our group left for their respective flights until it was down to just me and Jemma. We were on the same flight to London, because I spent one week with her family in England after the program. I’m super thankful that I did that, because it was the perfect transition between the program and coming home.
As I write this, I am sitting on a plane home to Newark. I said goodbye to Jemma and her cousin Antonia, who we were staying with in London, this morning. Right now I just feel kind of numb. I’m very excited to see my family and all my friends, because three and a half months is a super long time to be away from people you care about. But returning from such a huge adventure is way more difficult than I expected it would be. This whole semester has felt like a dream, and I already feel like I’m looking back on it through a window. My everyday reality is turning into memories. I’m just afraid that I’m going to forget all of the feelings and experiences that made this trip what it was. I’m afraid of going home and resuming my day-to-day routine, and then graduating college, getting a good 9-5 job, getting married, and settling down. I don’t want that. I don’t want to get stuck. I want to remember how alive I have felt all semester, and how in my element I am when I’m traveling. I feel like I’ve been living my whole life with clouded vision, and now I can finally see clearly. That sounds incredibly cliché, and before this trip, I would’ve rolled my eyes if someone said that. But it really is incredibly accurate. I don’t want to lose that feeling and clarity that I’ve gained this semester.
Hasta luego, España ❤
Idly Wild 