Is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

A group of women standing behind me recited these words as they prayed the rosary. At 6:45 a.m., they were just a few of the hundreds of thousands gathered to celebrate the canonization of Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

These words caught my attention as I stood outside St. Peter’s Square. Each time they came back to that part, I recited it silently to myself:

As it was in the beginning

is now and ever shall be 

world without end.

Or, to put it simply, eternity. I find this an appropriate word to sum up the beginning of my study abroad experience in Rome, the Eternal City.

This place is truly magical. Each winding street has a surprise around the corner—a lively piazza, a flowing fountain, the Pantheon (you should have seen my face when THAT appeared out of nowhere), or a welcoming gelateria. The city is a maze, but that’s okay. Time and place don’t matter when you’re wandering around lost in the moment.

Then, there is the Colosseum. Despite being centuries old and surrounded by apartments and a metro station, this structure isn’t going anywhere. Even the Roman Forum, most of which is gone, is still eternalized in the soil.

And then I was given the opportunity to experience an everlasting moment. As I watched Pope Francis officially canonize Mother Teresa, I experienced the beginning of her eternal sainthood. It was beautiful and moving. For a moment, the Vatican was frozen in time.

Before the canonization began, we prayed the rosary as a congregation. This time, I listened to the prayer in Italian.

Come era nel principio, ora e sempre nei secoli dei secoli.

As I reflect back on my first days in Rome, I pray the rest of this experience is just as eternal.

It is hard to believe that it is already September and we are already done with our first week of classes. As each day passes, it becomes more and more like home here, as the sights and gates and sounds become more and more a part of who I am. My ability to speak and listen has gotten exponentially better in the short time I’ve been here, and will only continue to grow as I decided to take Chinese class that is 10 hours a week.

Yesterday, some of us decided to take a field trip to the Great Wall of China aka one of the 7 wonders of the world. I’d been there once before when I was younger, but obviously did not remember most of it. Some of us chose to walk to the wall which required walking up a pretty steep mountain via stairs (stairmaster: real life). Ironically, once we reached the top, we were presented with even more stairs as the wall it self travels the path of all the mountains in the area. What is really interesting to me is that the stairs on each wall to get to each tower are not the same size, which was to prevent intruders from being able to attack as easily when they arrived on the wall. The guards of each tower would memorize the pattern of the stairs so they could quickly notify other towers if an intruder were to actually get atop the wall.

After enjoying a wonderful picnic lunch of subway atop the wall, it was time to return to the base. A lot of my friends decided to take a sled comparable to an alpine slide down the mountain, but 2 other people and I decided to stair master it down the mountain to enjoy the sights and sounds. Safe to say, my legs hurt very bad today as I’m writing this. It’s hard to imagine that this wall that is so old is still standing today for tourists like us to walk on and enjoy.

Then, at night, we decided to rally and go to a pub crawl. The amount of international students here is actually amazing, and it’s weird to think that I’m finally a cool international kid. The pub crawl was for the Beijing Ardvarks, which is a rugby team, and went around one of the expat areas of China. We got to go to a rooftop bar for one of them! Despite the fact that I got us lost. In one of those moments where you realize how hard Chinese is to learn, I had the taxi drop us off somewhere, and then we walked the wrong way. Then we decided to get into one of the pedicabs (or cabs on bikes) and he definitely over charged us. To dodge traffic, he drove on the sidewalk, and then dropped us off about 3 blocks in the wrong direction. After walking for 15 more minutes, we finally made it to the first bar. Interesting experience for one of my first nights out in China, and I may or not have been convinced to join the rugby team, but hey, when in China.

I’ll save the day in the life blog for another post, as I’m still trying to figure out exactly what classes I want to take and I’m still trying to find my day to day routine. Trust me though, the difference of life here in all aspects from food, to mannerisms, to working out are some that are worth mentioning.

— Finally got my American number working, so I actually can text now. Technology baffles me, and I feel like I’m growing so old. Anyways, I love to hear from people so stay in touch! If anyone is actually reading this 🙂

Until next time.

Have you ever cried into a muffin? Because I have.

It’s not that studying abroad isn’t great. It’s great. Returning home is going to happen too fast, too soon, and I can feel it sneaking up on me.

Yet, I cried into a muffin today.

First thing is first, let’s describe this muffin. It is a totally Chilean muffin. Some kind of vanilla-flavored batter, coated in some kind of nut (get used to that, the word for “nut” here is pretty vague), and filled with manjar (read: dulce del leche a.k.a. CARAMEL (but better)).

Anyway, obviously, the routines you know and love at home are impossible abroad and for the majority of the time this is for the better. But today was a whirlwind of things which I missed and therefore I cried into a muffin.

Let me tell you, a muffin is not the best thing to cry into. There are crumbs everywhere, Evidence of my sadness is literally sprawled across my room.

That said, maybe this is a good time to focus on the brighter points of study abroad.

There are a ton of extranjeras! Seriously! And we all hang out together often! (Perhaps too often, because I should practice my Spanish more). And the extranjeras/os come from all sorts of places so not only is there this built-in experience of meeting people from a place you have never been before, but there is the experience of meeting many people from many places you haven’t been before!

Plus, the only reason I cried into a muffin is because my host dad knows I love muffins. Whenever I have a bad day, he shows up at my door with a muffin. How he knew I loved muffins is beyond me but the bottom line is that sadness-in-Chile=MUFFINS.

Anyway, I am sure there will be more muffins to cry my heart into– but that is part of the process and I am just really grateful that I have friends to brag about the flavor of muffin to, and a family to bring the objects-of-bragging directly to my mouth.