A little long distance lovin'

I was incredibly homesick my first week in Cape Town. I didn’t want to participate in orientation activities, I didn’t want to explore the city, I didn’t want to do anything but turn around and go home to the States. This is so unlike me. My favorite thing to do is to explore a new city, and I'm usually outgoing and excited to meet new people. We're talking some serious homesickness issues here, people. I wondered what I was thinking leaving everyone I know and love behind and moving across the world to a city I'd been to only once. I didn't know a single person on my study abroad program or in Cape Town. Not only have I never been so completely on my own, but I've always lived in cushy, safe, quiet suburbs, and I also had to adapt to living in a big, bustling city. It was the biggest risk I'd ever taken, and at the time I thought I'd made a huge mistake. 

Throughout all this, my incredible boyfriend, Russell, called me every single day, on his own dime, to make sure that I was okay.  At the time, he was a full-time counselor at a sleep away camp for middle school boys from inner-city New York City. His schedule was packed and he had his hands full, but he always found time to call me and make me feel like I wasn't so far away. Best boyfriend ever award? I think so. 

Russell with all the things I packed for South Africa on July 5th, the last time I saw him.

Russell is currently spending his first week in Alcala de Henares, Spain, a little town about 30 minutes outside of Madrid. He’ll be there for this semester, and I’ll be headed there to visit him as soon as exams are over here. While there is no way that he will be as homesick as I was, I feel bad that when he's adapting to all the changes that come with living in a foreign country, I'll be totally disconnected from the world on the side of a mountain in Tanzania. 

I can't think of any other way besides an automatically posted blog post to send him a message. So, this post, which will (hopefully) post automatically halfway through the week, is meant to be a reminder that even though I can't call him to talk, I'll be thinking about him. 

So, Russell, I know that you're absolutely loving your first full week in Spain. You will be absolutely nothing like me in my first week in Cape Town. I'm getting so, so, so excited to visit you and meet all of your friends there and your host family, which you will have met by now. Keep sending me messages on the reg, because otherwise you'll forget all the things you did this past week. I want to hear about everything. For some reason, this week I'm homesick for your home and your family, probably because I've been hearing about all your goodbyes. Its September 1st when I'm writing this, so its exactly four months until we both will be chillin on the couch in your living room, with your mom and grandparents and Ronnie, recovering from New Years eve in New York City. I can't wait to be reunited with them all again. Just like the past 2 months, these next ones are going to fly by. 

And hey, Russ? Remember that time in Sheehan 155 when I told you I was going to climb Kilimanjaro while I was abroad? You looked at me like I was crazy and said, "OK, Michaela." Just another one of my crazy ideas, right? Well, at this point, I'm 80% of the way there.

  I'll take a picture for you at the top.