NateON - Leaving Korea - The feelings

February 14, 2012

Now that I’ve finished 90% of the last Cass I’ll have for a long time, I thought I’d dive into my psyche a bit.

This whole leaving thing is strange. I’ve been abroad since October of 2009. Egypt for 5 months, then Korea for 2 years. So I’m used to the change. Leaving for Egypt was terrifying, and my arrival didn’t go as smooth as one would hope. When I finally settled, I still felt like a mess. I remember packing for that trip, and actually going on it. I feel like I was such a novice at the physical act of traveling.

On the way to Egypt we spent a couple days in Rome. I remember having basically a breakdown in the hostel when we got there. My entire life was in two suitcases, which I had just dragged about a mile in downtown Rome, after a ridiculous 1 hour ride on the Leonardo DaVinci Express from the airport (no AC on that train, FYI). It didn’t feel like I had made a mistake, but it felt like the most terrifying thing I had ever done in my life, and with good reason. I had just quit an awesome, union, stable job with the government. I was on the other side of the world, miles away from family and friends. I was lucky my girlfriend was there with me to be something of sturdy thing for me to lean on.

And now here I am, 30 or so months later. I’ve been to 8 different countries. I’ve learned another language (well, Korean food anyways). I’ve been accepted to the #1 school for international business in the world. I’m repatriating to America feeling smarter and more confident in myself than at any point in my life. (And I was quite confident in HS. Think “Sexy and I Know It” but 6’7” and super-awkwardly-skinny).

It’s what travel does, I suppose. It breaks you down, makes you question who you are through the risks you take. It puts you places you’ve only read about, and makes you think about how incredible humanity can be. I’ve seen the Colosseum, the Pyramids and the Great Wall of China.

Travel pushes you through people as well. I’ve talked about the snowball effect of traveling, and how it leads to more travel to better understand the people you’ve met, and how that just multiplies. But it’s more than that. I had an amazing college experience, but the friends I’ve made since traveling—foreign and otherwise—have challenged me in ways that no one else ever has.

Can anyone put a price tag on what these experiences are? They’re clearly more valuable than the MBA I’ll earn, because without them I’d not even be getting an MBA. They’ve replaced an interest in the world with a hunger for it. A desire to consume it over time, like one of those giant jawbreakers every 12-year-old has at some point in time. I’ve learned so much, and have so much more to learn.

I’m sure I’ll get back to Clyde, OH (Click that link, for serious) and have some sort of break down. Change isn’t the easiest thing, and life has been damn good to me the past two years in Korea. But I’ll have it, this time, not fearing what is ahead of me, but with an excitement that most would kill to have. Well, some fear, but not in the same way. But I ask, is fear not a good thing? Have we not always been told that without great risk there is not great reward? I hope I have more fear, and to jump further. I have defined my direction, now I will define my movement.

12:11am | URL: http://tmblr.co/Zx1FXyGMDEbu

(Notes: 18)