I don’t know
if anyone will be reading this, but I felt the need to explain my long absence,
so I decided to write this post. Let me apologize for my being absent for so
long without any sort of explanation before. I had some severe personal problems that I
prefer not to specify here, but I have them more or less figured out now.
However, I will not continue this blog, at least not for the next few months
because I am doing my semester abroad now and it’s hard to find any free time
at all. I am always at university or at some sort of Erasmus event with some
friends.
So, for
anyone who is interested in knowing more about this, well, I am in Rome now. Actually,
I applied for Erasmus (in case you’ve never heard of it, it’s a European
exchange program) in England, but at my university there were only four places available
while about 200 students applied for it. But they offered me to go somewhere
else. So, I ended up choosing Rome, since I learned some Italian at school and
I’ve always wanted to see Rome. I’ve never been there before, I’ve also never
been abroad alone or for more than two weeks, so as you can imagine coming here
was quite exciting for me.
And I have
to say, I absolutely love it. There are so many beautiful places to visit here,
there’s always something new to see. I love being abroad anyway and I love the
Italian language. I love waking up in the morning with my window open and
hearing people in the streets talk in Italian. Of course, it’s also much warmer
here than in Germany. What I love most is meeting so many people from all over
the world (mostly Europe) and making friends with them. I actually even avoid
the other German students. I mean, there are enough of them in Germany, so why
would I want to spend all my time here with Germans? The only slightly negative
thing about talking to all sorts of different people all the time is that I
feel like my English is actually getting worse here. Most of the Erasmus
students don’t know much Italian, so we usually talk in English. Unfortunately,
so far I haven’t met any native speakers and a lot of the students are not very
good at English, so you have to try to adapt a little so that they can
understand you. By the time I am back, I will probably speak English with an
Italian or a Lithuanian accent; Lithuanian because I am currently spending most
of my time with two girls from Lithuania.
By the way,
one thing that you should NOT do here is being out alone at night as a young woman.
I always meet with some friends when I go out, but Rome is so big and no one
lives near my apartment, so at first I always went home alone. Normally I don’t
have a problem with that, I also do that in Germany and I am not someone who is
easily scared anyway. But I can tell you that it was not a good idea.
I had to learn quite fast that even during the
day, it can be quite difficult. Something that I still don’t know how to do is
being unfriendly with men. I am used to trying to be friendly and normally,
when I’m not interested, I still try to let them know politely and in Germany
that works. But in that aspect, Rome is very different from where I come from.
So, I’ve been told that I am too nice.
Anyway, I am going back to university now. Actually I just wanted to explain why I haven't been around anymore. Again, I am sorry for not having continued my
posts like I said I would. But I hope you understand. If you have any questions
about Rome or anything else, don’t hesitate to ask.
I hope all of you are fine and have a great time, wherever you are.
