{"id":909,"date":"2013-06-30T16:51:32","date_gmt":"2013-06-30T20:51:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/?p=909"},"modified":"2015-01-08T14:54:26","modified_gmt":"2015-01-08T19:54:26","slug":"i-think-i-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/2013\/06\/30\/i-think-i-can\/","title":{"rendered":"I Think I Can -Allison Miller"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"allison_howth\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s my birthday, May 19th and I\u2019m on the way to the airport to catch my flight from Philly to Dublin. My mom and dad are in the front seats driving me there. I see my mom look at me through the rearview mirror and I quickly look away because I feel like I might cry. All I\u2019ve been talking about for the past 3 months is how excited I am to finally leave the country and be out on my own. I can\u2019t let them know that now I\u2019m scared and I don\u2019t know if I made the right decision. I\u2019ve never been away from my parents for longer than 3 weeks. How can I manage for 6 weeks in a completely different country?<\/p>\n

For as long as I can remember I\u2019ve been telling my family that I want to travel. I always say there is no way I can live in Pennsylvania my whole life, I need to get out. It\u2019s not that I don\u2019t like it, I just want to see what else there is. So after all the preparations were made for my trip to Dublin I immediately began making arrangements for my future endeavors. In the spring semester of 2014 planning on working for the Disney College Program in Florida and then I want to complete another study away program in Los Angeles the following fall. Each of these programs are 3 months long but during my whole jumbled preparation process I never really thought much about being away. I just have this urge to experience everything I possibly can while I\u2019m still young and not tied down by a job or a family of my own and that drive prevented me from thinking about the downsides of traveling.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until the day of my flight out of Philadelphia that I realized how hard it would actually be to leave all my loved ones behind. I was so caught up in the excitement that I didn\u2019t take the time to sit back and think about what leaving would actually mean for me. I\u2019d be missing most of my birthday, Father\u2019s Day, family reunions and parties. Not to mention the fact that I would also have to leave my pets behind. Since I put all of these thoughts to the back of my mind for so long, on the day I was leaving the realization hit me like a brick.<\/p>\n

After choking back my tears and saying goodbye, my life became a blur. Everything began happening so fast. Before I knew it I was in Dublin with 17 strangers. It could\u2019ve been a new season of MTV\u2019s the Real World. I don\u2019t know how many times the opening monologue ran through my head, \u201cThis is the true story\u2026 of 17 strangers picked to live in Dublin for 6 weeks\u2026find out what happens\u2026 when people stop being polite\u2026 and start getting real. The Real World Dublin\u201d. None of us knew anything about each other or the city we were thrown into. Suddenly we were expected to live here and interact with one another.<\/p>\n

The first week was very difficult. I was extremely jetlagged and having never flown before I had no idea what that was like. Getting up for early classes while trying to recover from jetlag, make new friends and explore the city, was nearly impossible. During this time those thoughts kept coming back into my head; \u201cI wasn\u2019t ready for this\u201d, \u201cI\u2019m not going to be able to travel like I always said\u201d, \u201cI miss my family\u201d, \u201cI\u2019ll be in the same place forever\u201d. After a couple weeks of this internal struggle I finally snapped out of it.<\/p>\n

Howth is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. It is only a 30 minute bus ride outside of Dublin but it is like a different world. Standing on top of Howth\u2019s Head you can see\u00a0for miles, from the tall buildings of Dublin to the beaches of Malahide. We traveled as a class to Howth to hike the beachside cliffs from the top of Howth\u2019s Head into town. We began walking the trails and climbing around on the cliffs when I noticed our teacher, Darren, walk down a less trodden path and disappear. After a few moments I decided to follow him. When I found him, he was sitting in a clearing on the side of the cliff that had one of the most breathtaking views I had ever seen. I just sat down there while the rest of the class wandered in and I clearly remember thinking, \u201cThis trip is the best decision I have ever made.\u201d That epiphany caused the rest of the program to fly by. Once again everything was a blur but this time it was exciting. I explored the city, I explored outside of the city and all the corners of Ireland. I went everywhere I possibly could and took every opportunity given to me.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s ironic that after all of my worrying it\u2019s now my sixth week in Dublin and I\u2019m not ready to leave. This just wasn\u2019t enough time to do everything I wanted to do and see everything I wanted to see. I wish I wouldn\u2019t have let myself get so stressed out and waste time worrying about coming here instead of enjoying my last day with my family and friends. But at least now I know that when I leave again it won\u2019t be so hard. I can make the best of it. The most important thing that I got out of this trip was proving to myself that I can do it. I can go out on my own and experience a new place without constantly feeling homesick. I love my family and I love my friends but at some point everyone has to leave the nest and for me, Ireland was that time.<\/p>\n

-Allison Miller<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s my birthday, May 19th and I\u2019m on the way to the airport to catch my flight from Philly to Dublin. My mom and dad are in the front seats driving me there. I see my mom look at me … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":489,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-final-thoughts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/489"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/dublincultureblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}