Beginning of an end

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Three months have passed since I arrived safely in Australia. Admittedly, I've delayed writing this last blog entry mostly because I don't really know how to end it. I know that this really isn't an end, just a temporary break - a pause if you will - on my traveling. I'm addicted - already I've started dreaming about my next trip hopefully in a year.

Adjusting to my life in Australia has taken a lot of sorting out, but as of this week, my life has finally started to settle down a bit. I moved into a flat with some friends in Newtown. I love the area, and although it's a bit farther from campus, all the cafes, restaurants, funky shops, and the close proximity to the city, make up for it. Finding a job has been such an unexpected hassle! It took about 2 months for me to even hear back from a place, and even then, I never heard from most of the places I applied to despite the fact that they were mostly just cafes and retail shops. But luckily I'm working out details for a few job prospects right now. And of course, school. I forgot how much energy and commitment being a full time student requires but luckily in grad school at least you're studying something that interests you. About 90% of my department of Public Health is from overseas, with the majority from a non-industrialized country. There are so many doctors, dentists, nurses, and physical therapists, that it's hard not to be a little bit intimidated, but I feel so lucky to be surrounded by such a diverse group of people where we can all share and learn from our experiences.

Slowly my life is coming together, and things are good. When I first arrived here, I felt ready to stay put again, but after a few weeks, there's something about being in a place for about a month that makes me antsy. I don't know what it'll take to make me tire of moving around, seeing new things, experiencing new places. A part of me really misses traveling. While I'm ready to focus a bit more on my career, knowing that my degree will open up more opportunities hopefully internationally, somedays I just want to pack up my bags, head out of town, and not tell anyone where I'm going...

There is so much I value in traveling. It's hard now to stress about all the small things that I used to worry about. My perspective has entirely changed. When you see how much suffering there is in the world but also how much joy people have despite their circumstances, yelling at traffic or getting upset because of having to wait longer in line seems pointless. A wasting of energy. I also realized how much I, we in the Western world, consume. New clothes, excessive amounts of food, multiple products, we always have to have the latest, newest thing. There's nothing wrong in wanting or having stuff, but to the extent that we obsess and make so many sacrifices in order to "get" things, when you think of how many millions of people live on 1/4 of what we do, it puts things in a different light. In the end, doing things - experiencing - is more valuable than having things.

I know that so much of what I gained these past 8 months traveling is a result of actually traveling, but at the same time you don't have to go around the world to realize how lucky you are. This next year will be a different kind of adventure, not less or more worthy than another, and while it may be an end of one kind of journey, it's the beginning of another.

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