5 months later

My fingertips are raw and there is chalk caked in the cracks around my fingernails. My adrenaline rush has made the skin on my arms stretch so tight it feels it'll tear open, but I shove the unpleasant image aside and continue climbing my way up on the ‘yellow brick road’, which is what they call this particular route on the rock wall here.

Just over two months ago I could barely make it up the easiest route, and now I’m able to do this particularly difficult one (for a noob like me) twice in a row, though not without successfully transforming into a floppy noodle. I can’t even undo the clip that attaches me to the rope from how weak I feel after the second climb.

Bouldering= climbing left to right,
no harness needed

This has become a part of my daily life out here in St. Cloud. I teach, I study, I climb. Repeat.

Let me back up, in case you’re behind: I’m a first-semester graduate student at St. Cloud State University working towards my Master’s in TESL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages).

Five months ago, I was dumped unceremoniously by Delta back into Michigan after an almost-year abroad, like Europe had simply been babysitting me and now I was back.

I landed with my head spinning and have remained in a similar state ever since. I had barely 3 weeks back home to get through reverse-culture-shock and do some hummingbird-watching and then drove my way through Chicago and cheese curds to arrive in St. Cloud, Minnesota to start my training as a graduate assistant, also known as that one time they tried to summarize the essence of teaching the English language to a diverse group of students in a couple weeks.

Oh run-on sentences, how I’ve missed you.

Five months later. Here are some basic facts:

• ·      Yesterday was my last day of teaching
• ·      Today is my last day of classes
• ·      Next week is exams
• ·      I’m a Graduate Assistant (like a TA) which means:
• ·      I was an instructor in the IEC (Intensive English Center)

o   The IEC is broken up into levels, pre-level 1 to 4. Level 4 is the level they (exchange students) need to pass in order to take college classes.

o   I taught two classes: level 4 Listening/Speaking & level 4 Reading

• ·      I live in a house with several other females 15 minutes (walking) from campus
• ·      Here is a picture of the house, taken months ago:

I like it here. I liked teaching. I more or less liked my classes. I like the people. I like the state. I like the teeny accent, which I have apparently picked up a little of. Some of the vowel sounds just feel better, ya know? Melk and bayg just rolls off the tongue a little more easily.

Minnesota is like Michigan but with straighter highways and pronouncing “aunt” the British way. It’s generally sunnier, and a bit colder in winter, but the famous snow has yet to fall. Well, we got this preview a couple weeks back but it’s evaporated back up to where it came from until it feels like staying longer:

Looking out the front of my house

about 2 hours later

Next morning

St. Cloud is… well, a town. On a superficial level, St. Cloud is like the 9^th bland person you meet at a party with whom you listlessly recite and repeat the basics, like some boring party robot (“I’m ____ from ____ and I study ____ and hope to ____ in the future… how about you?”). You don’t really get any particularly good or bad impression of this person, but neither do you remember a word the person just said 5 minutes after talking to them. This is St. Cloud.

But then you randomly run into them in the bookstore and see them holding your favorite novel of all time and spend the rest of the evening having an incredible conversation with them. You click and proceed to get to know each other over a few weeks and discover all their wonderful little quirks and don’t even associate the first meeting with them to the person you know now. This is St. Cloud.

One of these great, hidden quirks of St. Cloud is Quarry Park, where I spent my first couple months wandering in my free time:

As for SCSU’s campus itself, it’s pretty standard. It’s practically miniscule compared to Michigan State, and I like that everything from my office to my classes to where I teach is all within a few minutes of each other.

Just before it got too cold, I spent a wonderful weekend hiking and climbing along the Superior Hiking Trail, a few hours north of here, higher than the mitten of Michigan! 

Arriving at night and hiking a couple miles to the site

Waking up to this!

coffee and oatmeal

See the train?

hello.

climbing! erm... descending first

my very first time, it took me a bit to get used to it

quite the rush

sun going down

sunset 

It was my friend Kevin (who I met through the sort of ‘Outdoors club’ here) who introduced me to climbing, and I’ve been hooked ever since. I know I’ve dabbled around in all sorts of sports and activities in my 23 years, everything from ballet to rugby, but climbing was not one I saw coming. For me, walls were not interesting and going up them held approximately just as must interest.

All I know is that I’ve got some sort of climbing bug now. I love the challenge of every different route, of learning ways to use my body to reach the top. I love that I’m actually using my upper body even if I have been constantly sore for 2 months. I love the little climbing community who congregates at the wall every night from 6-9 and helps each other out, telling crazy climbing stories and giving advice and encouragement to the climber as they belay them.

I love that it helped me survive this first semester. Knowing the wall’s hours pushed me to work harder throughout the day in order to finish in time so that I could climb and leave any bad energy at the top of a challenging route. I love that it’s one of the best workouts I’ve ever gotten and that I’ve actually got a bit of upper body strength now.

Teaching this semester has been by far one of the most challenging experiences of my life, and never have I ever loved a job so much. Never have I been so pushed, so inspired, so frustrated and overwhelmed, so happy and sad. It was the most rewarding semester of my life.


I was even able to combine my two new loves:

Some of my students and I at the rock wall
(okay so I bribed them with extra credit)

And finally, the last two classes, where several of my students sadly didn't show up, so all aren't represented here:

Level 4 Reading Fall 2011 

Level 4 Listening/Speaking Fall 2011

I'm currently writing this from the lounge area down by the rock wall. I was bouldering and remembered I wanted to finish this.

Anyway, I miss you all, from my family back in Michigan to Anne-Marie in Senegal (who can’t even read this), to Mike in Scotland and Alberto in Spain, to Elisa in France and Mohgee in South Korea, to Zach in Virginia and Caro and Jan in Germany...to everyone so far away. Hope to hear from you soon,

Love,

Katie

A Warm Welcome Home

(Tuesday, July 19^th 6:45pm)

Delayed flight

Lost luggage

Violated

A hearty welcome home indeed. What's up America! Good to be home.

As though it were the final exam to this past year's experience, coming back hasn't been easy and I haven't passed yet – I'm currently in Miami waiting for my connecting flight to Detoit with only 30 minutes to spare despite a 5 ½ hour layover. Let me elaborate.

I was first greeted with the news in Madrid that my flight was overbooked, but luckily I arrived in time not to get pushed – though they gave incentive to volunteer.

Next I find the flight is delayed an hour and a half, which actually turns into 2 and a half, but no big deal because I have such a long layover in Miami, right?

During the first flight the man in front of me leans back his seat all the way and the grouchy French man behind me taps on me seat telling me to put mine up because “his legs are too long.” And right on cue, crying baby commences. Only 8 hours 40 minutes left...

Then I find myself waiting over an hour and a half for the luggage – it seems the whole airport is gathered around the baggage claim wheel-thing getting grouchier and grouchier by the minute because the bags are normally there waiting for you once you get through customs and many people have a connecting flight within the hour.

I try to ignore everyone around me whose irritability is getting contagious which I hate but I don't succumb to crabbiness despite their best efforts, and even when they announce that our luggage is actually at dock 1 and not 2 and the whole world shifts over their, I'm still telling myself all will be alright, there's still time.

Still 20 minutes later I still don't see my luggage and another announcement comes on saying that the luggage is actually coming out of both docks, but because of all the other arriving flights they're mixed and now there's even more people and some airport employees are starting to pull luggage off the belt bringing the total places you have to check for your luggage to 5 or 6 places.

Finally, with still just enough time not to worry (too much) I find my sad little red bag with its broken handle and make my way through customs and then through a confused maze of people and signs that eventually lead me to someone taking the bag I just found and adding it to a huge pile of bags that will probably end up at the north pole but I don't care at this point and so I continue to security.

One long line later I'm the random person chosen to go through the new high-tech body scanners but ask for an opt out and find myself thoroughly examined by a bored female staff member who wasn't kidding when she said she'd get up close and personal in your business. Sigh.

Feeling slightly violated I make my way to my gate and find that I will be flying to Detroit with 60 hyper and annoying high school students from Paraguay and what seems to be another loud student or volunteer group from Haiti.

And yet, despite all that, I never got all that grouchy or impatient or even worried. I think I've gotten quite good at traveling by this point. Well, that or the fact I've felt slightly numb since leaving a billion hours ago.

I just thought it'd make for a good story.

If nothing else goes wrong, should be home in just under 4 hours.

Actually, I'm home now if you're reading this.

Love,

Katie

Update:

Arriving home

Home after 2 long flights 

With Dad

With Donna

The end of a journey

Time plays such funny tricks on you.

For so many moments of my life abroad these past 10 months, going home was always more of an idea than reality, something that was supposedly going to happen but always so far in the future that it never quite seemed real.

Quite suddenly, I am returning home to Michigan tomorrow.

I exceeded every expectation that I had for this journey – especially when it came to wanting to slow down. Not only did I get my wish, but in less-than-happy moments it felt like it would never come to an end, in fact (i.e. a rough week of classes/students). This is the not so desirable forever-feeling.

Then there were the many weekends in the woods, climbing this hill or following that river, feeling like you could never possibly be anywhere else doing anything else, that you would forever add muddy miles to your trusty old hiking boots while discovering new smells and sounds, all the while just walking under a clear blue sky or on fresh white snow or under some friendly rain.

Or perhaps it was the many moments traveling alone on a train or ferry, staring out the window at mountains or deserts or oceans, your thoughts so entangled that sometimes it feels like you're thinking about everything at once while other times it feels like you're thinking of nothing at all, but you're so at peace no matter what kind of thinking it is that it doesn't really matter. The beautiful thing is that you never think of the end. You can never imagine being any other way.

These are the good kind of forever-feelings.

Such moments stretch to infinity and can leave you feeling rather blindsided when they do come to an end, making you feel almost betrayed by them – weren't they supposed to keep you wrapped forever in wonder and joy and a sense of freedom? You forget that journeys end and you try to blame it on them, but they are just journeys after all – they don't make promises any more than toasters do.

I leave tomorrow. How strange it feels to see and think the words. It's certainly not that I haven't thought about coming home – au contraire. I have missed my home, friends and family beyond words, but I've also been happy and living a life here, and no matter how much I thought about it and you all, it never seemed to click. It has just been so long and I've gotten so used to my way of life over here that it's hard to believe it will be over soon.

I feel an intense heaviness on my chest and the weight of the past year on my shoulders, afraid to be forgotten and left behind. Such are experiences, I have learned, feeling almost like a friend you have made instead of a place you have visited, pulling one hand behind you to stay while the other is being pulled forward toward the future. They feel betrayed you are leaving – you had gotten so close and seemed so happy – and you try to explain to them that they will be coming with you in a way, but they don't understand. And so the tug-of-war.

That said, perhaps you might be confused to know that I am very, very happy indeed to be coming home, that I am looking forward to trying on my old life like the pair of skinny jeans so many people keep in their closest, ready to see after such an extended period of time if they will fit them once again.

I am nervous and a little afraid of transitioning from the life I have here back to the life of a student, and at a graduate level this time to boot, and with just 3 weeks to be back home before moving to Minnesota. I'm slightly overwhelmed just thinking about it, but I want people to understand, too, how excited I am to be moving on. I have had my year of “breathing” as I've so often put it, and more than once over these past few months I have felt the pull to come back home. Yet I've lived so much over here, too, that it's a complicated mix of feelings.

Yes, I am ready to come home, but by saying that I want it to be understood that it does not mean I want to leave. Never before have I been so torn about anything.  

I'm not sure how to end this, nothing seems adequate. I feel beyond capable of explaining what's going through my mind, how I feel right now. I wonder if a body, a mind, was ever meant to experience so many conflicting emotions at once. 

The end of another journey, but not the end. I suppose that will have to suffice.

Love and miss you all and see you soon,

Katie

Pueblo Ingles / English Village

June 1st

You know what's great?

Free transportation, food and 4-star hotel lodgings in the mountains in southern Spain...

...in exchange for talking to people for 8 days.

I heard of this program, Pueblo Ingles (English Village) from a student I've been tutoring in Madrid - basically, it's an English immersion program for Spaniards to improve their English by spending 5-8 days (depending on the program) in a village somewhere in Spain speaking over 100 hours with native speakers.

I was accepted into the 8-day program in Coto del Valle, 5 hours south of Madrid by bus. It is a resort smack dab in the heart of the Cazorla National park in the Jaen region.

I've got nothin' but time and English as my native tongue so I'm goin!

Love,
Katie

Segovia, Spain

Sometime mid-June 2011...


I LOVE CASTLES.

Like this one:

The Alcázar of Segovia 

Look at all that nothing in the background!

I'm a die-hard Tudor junkie, but that's not to say I don't enjoy some good medieval Spanish palaces and history, too.


I just love 'em. So grand and mysterious and full of stories, so different from today and so beautiful.


This one is The Alcázar of Segovia (Arabic for fortress or palace) and it's smack in the middle of a big dry... area? Well, the whole city of Segovia is a like a fairytale city in the middle of a sandbox, truthfully. 


I am smitten with this city. 


Got off to a good start with a ham sandwich, where I got to see a grouchy old barman cut it right from the leg itself:

mmmm

In fact, as bizarre as it was at first to see legs of ham hanging around everywhere (and I mean everywhere - the supermarket, bars, restaurants... I even went to a ham museum!) it's pretty much the most delicious ham I've ever had, every time. You just gotta get used to the hooves watching you eat. 


Segooooovia! Such a pretty city. It's got these great roman Aqueducts, too:

The Roman Aqueduct of Segovia

Aqueduct what!

Looks like it'd just topple right over if you sneezed on it the wrong way.


Wikipedia tells me it might have been started in the first century, is 818 meters long and made from 25,000 granite blocks - and without any cement, nothin'! Achoo. 


I feel like I could write a song about this city. 

Segovia

and again, Segovia

I wish I had more interesting stories to share about what went on, but really, sometimes you just show up somewhere, look at a lot of stuff, and leave. 

Lookin a little chubby at
the top of the tower of the castle

View from the castle

And just because I love them so much, back to the castle - only the inside now:

You might live in a castle, but this is what's
outside of it. Sand. box.

Gorgeous ceilings.

I love royalty!!

See the wee kings and queens staring at you?

I really have nothing to say. So I shall leave you with this last photo:

Blargh! Off with yer head...s.

Love you!
Katie