Traveling through Christmas

These last two weeks of my Erasmus have been incredible. I’m currently on my flight heading back to the states for the first time in over six months. It still doesn’t feel real that I’m heading back, it’s bittersweet. I definitely didn’t want to go back and leave my life in Europe and all the incredible memories that I’ve made. However, I know that it will be great to see my family and friends again for the first time in a long time.

However, in these last two weeks as I said I was going to in the last blog, I have traveled to France and through the North of Spain. Then this past week, I was able to return to Murcia for my last week and give it my good bye, something I’ve gotten better at doing in the last year and a half as I have made so many friends from so many different places around the world.

Anyways, I went headed to France on the morning of Christmas eve bright and early for Paris. It was a little rough as I had to pass the night in the airport as the flight was so early. I was very excited to get to go to Paris as I had heard from so many people that it’s such a cool place to visit and see. However, I was slightly nervous as I was going to be passing Christmas and the next 3 days with my girlfriend’s family. Not only because that’s a nerve-racking situation in itself but because my French is about non-existent. However, it turned out to be some of the best days of my whole trip.

It was really funny really as there were usually about 3 languages going on when we all tried to communicate. Obviously everyone there spoke French but in order to comidate me, the majority of the time they would try to speak English as the majority of them spoke at least a little English. However, a few did not but did know a little English. Also, my girlfriend almost always speaks to me in Spanish, therefore it was pretty odd but really cool at the same time.

But it was really cool to experience Christmas overseas, not to mention in Paris. Although, it was very weird not being with my family and doing our normal customs and rituals for Christmas. It seemed that here that the 24^th was actually more of a bigger deal than the 25^th. On christmas’ eve we opened presents and we ate a ton of good food throughout the day. Then on the 25^th we went to paris and saw the Eiffel tower and some of the other sites and monuments around that area. I was really impressed with how beautiful Paris is and how old the city actually is. Then on the 26^th I went back to Paris during the day to see some more sites like the Notre Dame and we stayed the night in the city as I had to fly out early the next day.