Things Going Abroad Has Taught Me

• Flying internationally with 20ish other students with equally heavy luggage and equal clueless-ness has very few perks.
• One of those perks is that friends are made quickly under that kind of pressure.
• Shared interest helps too.
• Friends don't necessarily need to speak the same language, smiles and pointing to food is really enough to connect about.
• The Zurich airport is stunning.
• The Madrid one, not so much.
• AFS orientations are fairly the same even internationally.
• Spiral staircases are really hard to lug luggage up.
• Unpacking your clothes, toiletries, etc. makes a place feel like home pretty fast.
• Not too fast, of course.
• European plugs are a pain, or I guess just the conversion.
• Starting school in another language/country/culture is very stressful.
• People are never as bad as you think.
• Being bored for hours upon hours upon hours of classes provides a lot of time for doodling-skills improvement.
• Not enough, however, to produce any actually good artwork.
• Harry Potter rocks.
• Smells can be really reminiscent of home, and can cause a huge amount of heartache if, say, your having a bad day.
• Letters that your parents may have written WILL bring you to tears every single time you read them.
• Hot chocolate is oh-so-much better in Spain.
• The holidays in other countries, however different, are often still pretty rad.
• I can use basically any word I want (see above "rad") while speaking english, and people think I am sooooo cool.
• I do not want to learn English as a second language, its really hard.
• What having siblings is like, the good, and the really-really-oh-so-very-much-not-so-good.
• How to sit my butt in a chair, work for three hours, and get exactly no words written.
• Just because "Spain" is associated with "warmth" does not mean that it doesn't get butt-freezing cold here in the winter. It does.
• A good scarf is essential for keeping warm.
• A good scarf is also great for fashion.
• Pizza is universal.
• I like running.
• There is such thing as too much nutella.
• There is also such thing as too many 1000 year old castles, although I have not yet hit my limit.
• Sometimes, the differences between people go beyond "cultural differences", you might actually not get along with them. 
• And that's OK.
• Just don't be a jerk.
• Because then the exchange student you were a jerk to might write about you in her blog, and no one wants that. 
• Making lists is a very fun pastime for a friday night when you are dead tired and just want to eat dinner and go to bed.
• If you just want to eat dinner and go to bed, get your butt out of the chair where you are sitting writing a blog, go make dinner, and then go to bed.
• It is very important to wish your blog-readers good night before leaving them hanging with a non-captioned list.
• It is OK to break the rules occasionally.