MOVING ABROAD TO SPAIN: 22 DAYS
Excuse me, but what? 22 days?! Do I count the day I am leaving? Am I even counting this right?!
First of all, 22 days is pretty damn close.
Second of all, if my big move is that soon… Why haven’t I started packing and when do the nerves kick in?
For the past 3.5 months, I’ve semi known I was headed to Spain. When I say semi, I mean… I received my acceptance into the program two days before graduating and then never heard back from Spain until end of June/early July about receiving my carta.
I didn’t even receive my official carta and school placements until the end of July/early August! Getting information so late from the program made me wary about if I was even going to go there (see: trust issues). But, now that I’ve turned in my paperwork to receive my visa and have bought the one way plane ticket… It should be sinking in, shouldn’t it?
Denial: Moving to Spain
During the beginning of the summer I was in denial. I will admit it… I was in denial and shock that I was accepted, and that I would actually be moving to a completely different country.
As I’m even sitting here and writing this blog post, I’m STILL in denial! How can I be in denial 22 days before my big departure!! Someone, please send help… I may have lost it. With my remaining time before Spain, I have been trying to divide my time with family and with friends.
There seems to be a similar conversation always floating around while I am with everyone, and it usually goes like this:
Person: “Are you excited?!”
Me: my lackluster answer of “Yes! I am really excited and nervous. It’s going to be so different over there!”
Person: *usually something about how I’m going to have so much fun and it’s going to be an adventure, OR the people who aren’t so supportive and sound excited for me but also have a look on their face like, “why didn’t you get a full-time job?”*
Sometimes, I have conversations with friends, family, clients at my parents’ work, etc who are extremely supportive and genuinely excited for me and my upcoming year. Their excitement, actually, fuels my own! It makes me feel less nervous about failure and more excited about being a transplant in a foreign country.
But, with the encouragers and supportive folk, there are definitely others who make me question my decision to travel abroad for a year and work as a language assistant… instead of finding a full-time job with benefits and a salary.
I’ve been thinking about this for quite some time; if this was the right decision for me. To be honest, every time I mull over the thought about moving to Spain… I cannot even fathom thinking about how I could be doing something else. I have never seen myself in the “corporate” world, and my drive to constantly do something different and create an unconventional lifestyle has always lead me down a very different and interesting path.
So, to say the least, I think this is exactly what I should be doing! I am young and don’t have any ties or hardcore responsibilities I need to tend to. If not now, then when?!
Excitement: Moving to Spain
After all the small talk about my excitement (or lack there of, let me explain) – the reality that I am leaving still has not hit me yet.
Remember a few paragraphs up when I said I was in denial?
Yeah… the denial is very very real. It’s not that I am not excited, because I think I am… It’s more of, I’m not sure how I should be feeling. It’s bittersweet because I’m leaving my family and friends and all the familiar, but I’m also ready for the adventure that I am about to embark on.
The auxiliaries for the 2014-2015 year have a Facebook group for all of us to meet and talk to one another, and a fellow auxiliar commented saying that she might be too scared to let it sink in. Maybe that’s what’s happening here… I’m too scared to let the reality of this giant move sink in because I don’t know what to expect!
To be honest, I have no idea what I’m doing at the moment. I’m going through the motions with packing (or not packing), the paperwork, the saying goodbyes… but I don’t think this will hit me until my feet touch Spanish soil and I’m sipping sangria or a cafe au lait at a sidewalk cafe.
Oh man, wish me luck everyone! These next 22 days are going to fly by and that means I need to get started on this packing ordeal and consolidating my belongings!
Other auxiliaries/expats, is it normal to feel like this?! To be honest, it only feels like I’m moving home and this is what’s right.
Follow my journey as I…
Renewed for a 2nd Year with the Auxiliar Program
Met my Spanish Boyfriend
Learn What It’s Like to be an Asian-American in Spain
and… How I Started my Own Business and Permanently Reside in Spain
I completely understand how you feel! I leave for Spain in 20 days and am in the same sort of denial stage. I don’t think it will hit me until I touch down in Spain, hear the language, and probably have some tapas. There’s still so much to do before I’m ready to actually leave! Best of luck preparing, and I’ll see you over there!