#USAadventure 2: Packing and my Carry-on

I hate packing. I hate everything about it. I love the excitement and the happiness which come along with a trip but I really and strongly dislike packing. And on top of it, I am the worst packer on the entire planet. No, probably the whole universe.

Anyway, I started the whole packing process with a pre-list of all the things I needed to pack. I just wrote down everything. Then I made my actual packing list which I divided into different sections – clothes, toiletries and cosmetics, shoes, things I need for college, medicine, and other things. If you have not thought it before, you probably will now think that I am a bit crazy. But I just like to be organized. Anyway, at this point I realized that I am going to need soooooo many things. The next step for me was to buy all the things I did not have at home or of which I needed to get new ones. I mostly needed to buy all the toiletry things such as shampoo, conditioner, bodylotion, bodywash, facewash, facecream, q-tips, etc. When I bought all those things, I realized for the first time that I actually need so many products just to clean myself with the basics and take care of skin and the rest of my body. Additionally, they take so much weight away of the 23 kg my suitcase is allowed to weight. I never realized this. Evertime I have travelled before, I always bought the travelsize packages but never the normal ones. The weekend before I left, I started packing. The reason why I hate packing so much is probably because I never know what to pack, especially clothes. I always tend to pack way too much and stuff that I do not need. However, for this trip, I had to be smarter on what to actually take with me and what to leave at home. So a packing crisis already approched me the week before I actually started packing and it only got worse. I even called some friends for advice which clothes I should pack. I even aks my mum for help. I bet you see why I hate it so much and why I am very bad at it. Well, it was a long process but when I finally finshed I was a very happy girl.

Packing my carry-on was as difficult as packing my suitcase. Due to me attending a summer program in the states, I had to take so many others things with me than I usually do. I will tell you more about all the additional things later after I finished with the items I have always in my carry-on. First, my carry-on back is my backpack. It is the most comfortable thing for me to carry around in an airport. The most usual things I always bring with me on the plane is my phone (+ charger), camera (+charger), Ipod (+ charger) (yes, I am that old-school, but I love my Ipod nano), wallet, a book, a blanket, warm socks (I always get so cold on planes), santizier, disinfection wipes (to disinfect my hands, the seat, and the table), a hairbrush, handlotion, make-up remover tissues (I like to take the little bit of make-up I am wearing off during a flight), face cream ( my skin tends to get really try and kind of grey looking during a flight, so I try to keep it moisturized), gum, lip balm, a toothbrush (the flight could be delayed and I have to stay somewhere, so I always have to toothbrush with me in order to at least brush my teeth) a clean pair of underpants (same reason as the toothbrush, at least I am able to change that), and empty water bottle (in order to refill it at drinking fountains after the security check in), something to write in, and a pen. I know, it is a lot but I need all of those things. I really do. The additional things I had to take with me this time were my tablet with its keybord, some of my school things (I was afraid that my suitcase will get lost and I am without those things), all of the neccesarry papers form y visa, my Amazon Kindle, and not only a pen but a whole pencil case. This time my backpack was very heavy :D

As it got visible, I really am the worst (but slightly organized) packer and I hope you understand why I hate it so much. For this trip it was especially hard because I had to take all the school supplies with me which took away more of the allowed free-weight than I thought.

I hope you enjoyed reading. See you later J

#USAadventure 1: The Preparations

When you read my previous blog post you already know what this is all about. For those who are new to the party, I am going to attend a summer program at an American university this summer. And I am very excited. Without further ado, I am going right into the theme of this post – the preparations. 

It all started when I got accepted into the summer school in mid-February. I had to plan my whole trip. I had not only to plan the summer school itself, but also if I want to go somewhere else. But first I had to wait until I got the official letter of acceptance and the exact dates of the summer school. I received all of this by the beginning of March. I am going as an exchange student from my German university. Therefore, I also got a scholarship for it. This made me very happy because it is a lot of money. The scholarship pays for room and board and the tuition. I have to pay for the flights, the insurances, the school supplies and the student visa myself. I started with writing my relatives in the USA if and when I can maybe visit them. After determine that schedule I booked my international flights at the end of March. Simultaneously, I had to coordinate everything with the advisors of the summer school. I had to accept the spot, pick out classes, and organize everything I needed for my visa. Around mid-April I finally was able to book my domestic flights. Hence, by mid-April at least all my flights were booked. This was a huge step. Now, I had to get everything in order for the visa. I had to fill out a couple of forms and sent them to the advisors. It took them a while to get the papers back to me. When I received them I finally was able to apply for the J1-Visa. Guys, let me tell you something, the United States of America make it really complicated to apply for a visa. There are no clear instructions where you have to do what. Fortunately for me, I have some friends (thank you again for all the help and not being annoyed of my 10000000 questions) who let me into a direction and I knew kind of what I need to do and where. I had to fill out a huge questionnaire with millions of question about myself, my parents, my school, and many more. The United States knows everything about me now. Then I had to a fee just to prove that I am a student. Yes, you read right. I had to pay a fee to prove I am a student. And it was not a small amount. Then I had to pay the actual visa fee, which was also not a small amount. It took me a whole day to figure that all out -.- 2 days later I got the acceptance to schedule an appointment at an American Consulate. My younger brother had to go with me, because I was not allowed to take anything with me inside the consulate besides all the necessary forms and my passport. The appointment was the easy part of this whole visa journey. It only took 15 min. Two days later, I received my passport with a huge visa sticker inside of it. The next steps are now packing and getting all of my school supplies ready. But I will tell you more about that in a new post.

However, as it got visible it takes a lot of work and time to prepare for this huge adventure. Beside all of these preparations, I also had to continue working part-time and writing my Master’s thesis full-time. I also had to start prepare for classes for the summer school. All of this was tons of work and it still is. But I have a strong feeling that all will be worth it at the end.

I hope you enjoyed reading and I will see you later. Have a wonderful day J

Holly goes out into the World

When you follow me on Twitter (@HollysLifetime) you probably read some tweets which were kind of a countdown for a new adventure of mine. In a couple of days I am leaving for the USA to attend a summer program at an American University. Some of you probably will not call this an adventure, but for me it is one. For the first time, I am travelling completely on my own which is new for me. Of course, I have been traveling without my parents. I am an adult. But I have never travelled this far on my own – alone. I always travelled with friends. Additionally, I have never attended anything where I do not know anyone this far away from home. As you can see, this is new to me. I am a little bit nervous about all of it. But it is a good nervous. I am more excited. I am excited about who I am going to meet, how classes will be, how the campus will look like, how the dorms will be, and so many more things. Let’s see how it is going to be.

I decided that I want to share my experience with all of you on my blog. I want to write some kind of an online diary, but I am not sure yet on the posting schedule – if I post one shorter entry every day or a larger one every other day. I think I want to depend it on what is going on and what I will experience. If I spent a day with only studying, I probably will not post that day. It will be quite boring. But overall, I want to share my experiences with you. I will also share my preparations for the whole journey. The first blog post will be about all the preparations I had to deal with over the past couple of months, which were also the reasons why I have not been posting as much as I wanted too. Okay, fine. I literally have not been posting at all. But all those time-consuming preparations did not leave much time for anything else. So, unfortunately I had to prioritize. And as much as I love blogging, I had more important things I had to care of which are important for my academic career and my future work career. I apologize for not posting. And I hope you will forgive me. 

I will talk to you later in my first blog post about my USA adventure. See you soon J