I’m currently on the flight heading to Quito, guessing we have about an hour, maybe a little less left of the flight. Just finished watching Fools Gold- half without sound because I was too lazy to plug in the headphones. 
There are probably about 9 or 10 of us on this flight actually (I discovered today there are actually 17 in the whole program from Willamette). I am sitting next to a girl from my school actually, Cassie, and we’ve been chatting. Pete is also just a row behind me. We all sat together in the Huston airport before boarding this flight and talked about (in English) how completely terrified/nervous, scared shitless we are. (Indeed, direct quote.) One girl did seem to have a little more info than the rest of us and knew that tomorrow morning we have an orientation at ACLAS and our host family will go with us on the bus routes to the school so we know how to go about doing that. Beyond that though, we still don’t know anything.
Sitting on the flight from El Paso to Huston I had quite a few emotions fleeting through me. It was quite ridiculous actually how I could feel really nervous one second and then really excited the next. But I have definitely started becoming more and more excited as the trip has progressed. Now I’m back to the completely nervous stage, I think because I will actually be in Quito, Ecuador and meeting my host family in a matter of less than a couple hours. That’s a big deal!!!
Sadly enough, I’ve had cell phone withdraws already. Only minor ones though, where I hear a phone beep, or want to check the time, or just check my phone in general, or randomly text someone. It really is like a lifeline in a way… I felt so disconnected. :p I didn’t even have another watch or form of alarm. But Pete had a little alarm clock he is letting borrow at least till I get one (he still has his phone that he said he could use).
I read my lonely planet guide on the flight from El Paso to Huston so I felt a little more prepared for at least the area and such. I got a few ideas of places to go and where they are in relation to each other. Turns out there’s a lot of places for hiking, which some of you will be very pleased to hear 
Even better, I think I will be trying to utilize them quite a bit- at least during the actual school year. I will have my classes keeping me busy Tuesdays & Thursdays but I will only have one on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays… I’m starting to worry I will not be kept busy… So I will do my best to seek out things to keep me positively occupied. This first month I know will be very packed full of…everything (even if I don’t know what all that is yet).
It still hasn’t quite set in that I will be spending the next 5 months of my life in a country speaking mostly Spanish. It is weird that I left my parents today not to go back to Oregon but to an entirely different country. It is weird to think that the friends I’ve been seeing all summer I actually won’t see tomorrow, or any time soon. It’s weird to think that I won’t be seeing the ones from college either. In whole, it feels different because I know I am going away from home and to school but it is not in the same respect that I have become accustom to the past two years. My equilibrium is thrown off, if you will
It’s weird how no matter how many times you leave a place or people or what excitement and adventure and experiences you are leaving it for, you still inevitably feel a little sad. Even though I am going to be having an experience of a lifetime that most don’t ever get in a lifetime, I still had a few tears escape me at the airport. (Don’t tell anyone.) Part of it is probably because it’s a bit scary- up and leaving your comfort zone always is. Up until about yesterday I had spent the summer not putting too much thought into the fact that I was going to be leaving the country for 5 months. In a way, it was just easier to not think about it and go about my summer as if there was nothing drastic in my near future. Some would argue that this may not have been the best approach but honestly, I can’t say if I think it was or was not. I am currently listening to my summer music mix from this year (yes Mama, the one with the song Tonight on it that you so love you can listen to it now whenever you miss me.) It’s my way of easing my way into the whole thing…? Maybe. But it is true that now I am certainly thinking about it all. Thoughts and emotions are a mess and all over the place!
It will all take a little getting used to. And that will all begin in the next few hours. But I can very confidently say that I am ready for this trip/expedition and in no way feeling like I needed maybe a couple more days. No better time than the present! 
Basically I just have to go into it knowing that things will not go as planned but they will turn out fine, that I will forget and then learn all the Spanish I already know and more, and that it will be a fantastic and unique experience when I look back on it 5 months from now. Basically all I can do now is to take it a day at a time and just kind of go with it and have faith that it’ll all work out.
Hoping to write often and meaningful things…and again soon. I’m sure I will have so much more to actually tell and want to talk about than I could ever write, and I wish every single person in my life could share this experience, but we’ll make do with what we can and I’ll try to help share it all with writings and a “plethora” (hehe) of pictures.
7/17/08
