I am one of the lucky few SRJC students who ventured to Florence, Italy, to learn both a school and from my surroundings as well. I studied at the American Institute of Foreign Study through Santa Rosa Junior College. The SRJC Study Abroad program  is a consortium of four California junior colleges, who together provided a program for 90 students to study in Florence. The other three colleges are Diablo Valley College, College of San Mateo, and Cosumnes River College. Each college brought a professor who taught classes at an Italian University campus.

Dr. Robert Duxbury from SRJC’s English department taught English and humanities. I also took a world history class, an art class, an English class, an Italian language class and an Italian life and culture class.

I decided to study abroad because I wanted to get out of the small town I had been living in my entire life, and to also see what the world has to offer. I am incredibly close with my family and wanted to gain independence in a supportive environment.

I had a whirlwind adventure but there were also some challenges. It was so much harder to be away from my family and friends than I thought it would be. Being in Italy was the farthest and longest I had ever been away from them. But that experience gave me the opportunity to be self-sufficient on my own and cherish them as well.

I chose to study in Italy because the people are known to be welcoming and lively, and they truly were. Italian people took such good care of me. They came up to me when I got lost, offered help, greeted me and welcomed me into their country. At first Florence seemed like such a daunting city, but as time went on I was able to put down my map and wander down the streets without the fear of getting lost.

I began with a trip to Paris, France for two days, then London, England for two days before starting the semester in Italy. While living in Italy I traveled to Rome, Naples, Venice, Sorrento, Siena, Pisa, Cinque Terre, Viareggio and Verona. Each city and town had a unique experience to offer and gave me a different perspective of the country that I called home for three months. I also visited Prague, Czech Republic for a few days during spring break and then headed to the island of Corfu, Greece the week after.

I would not have been able to go on this adventure if it were not for financial aid and scholarships. A lot of students in the program were in debt. But I am so incredibly blessed to have received scholarships from the American Institute of Foreign Study and the Gilman Scholarship Foundation, so that I didn’t have to spend money I didn’t have in the first place. I am also fortunate enough to have my loved ones rally around me and support me to achieve my dream of seeing the world. I am lucky that I didn’t have to take out student loans, but there were students in the program who did and they said every penny was worth it.

Although I loved the food in Italy, I started to miss taco truck burritos and ranch dressing. One of the hardest things to deal with in Florence was getting lost time and time again. I have dyslexia and would often confuse directions and misread maps, which made getting lost even more frequent and frustrating. But it is from those experiences I learned to be patient, trust my sense of direction and find the confidence within myself to get where I needed to go.

Another difficulty for me being away from my family. I was so excited to see the world, and in doing so, I surprisingly began to miss and be grateful for my home and the people that I love. There were times when I missed my family so much that I did not truly appreciate and cherish every moment I spent in Italy. So I concentrated on the little things I loved in Florence, like living across the street from a gelateria, living next to a 99 cent store, visiting the “secret” bakeries that sell warm chocolate and custard croissants at 3 a.m., and being able to see the Duomo of Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore from my apartment building. I loved gazing at the mural of angels on my bathroom ceiling, passing Santa Croce Church on my way to school, visiting the small pizzeria that sells gourmet panini’s and pizza until 5 a.m., attending trivia nights on Mondays at a local pub, and seeing Catholic shrines and Crucifixes on random street corners. The American Institute of Foreign Study staff were kind and supportive, and I always felt welcomed by Italian people.

I ended up learning more outside of the classroom.  I learned that free food is hard to come by and so incredibly valuable, it is imperative to wear gloves when selecting produce at the supermarket, it’s important to be aware of myself and surroundings but not paranoid to the point of not being able to enjoy myself, and that time passes so much more faster than I thought it would. I learned not to depend on a map to the point where I don’t develop or trust my sense of direction, and most of all to live in the moment and not think about the next. Most importantly, I learned to just be, and cherish being in such a beautiful country.

Studying abroad is so much more meaningful than just traveling because I lived in Florence. I wasn’t a tourist there for a few days; I called it my home for three months. Each day I spent there I learned more about the country, its people, and culture. I shopped at the supermarket,  did my home work in the cafe` under my apartment and made new friends and memories that will last me a lifetime.

It’s not unusual for American citizens to have never set foot outside this country. I refused to be one of those, so I did it. I went off into something I had never known and it made a world of difference in my life. Studying abroad and traveling are not luxuries but necessities for every student. There are so many different and beautiful cultures in this world, and it is important for people to realize that we are all a part of a bigger picture: that we as humans are more similar than different.