“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain
What if I don't get accepted into the program? What if Sterling and I can't afford to go? --Sure we have enough money, but we kind of want to have money left over in our bank account for when we return! What if we can't go anywhere and I've started this blog full of excitement for nothing?? Hmmm... but what if we CAN go??
Friday, we met with Rebecca in the OCS office and found three possible universities in Australia that would best suit Sterling and myself based on our majors (Math&Computer Science and Health Sciences, respectively). Our top choice as of now is Wollongong University (seen in the photo from http://www.ranke-heinemann.at/australien/feature.php?id=21&demo=1), next is the University of Queensland, and our third choice is James Cook University, Townsville campus. Luckily, the Gettysburg Health Sciences department accepts some of the courses offered in Australia as HS electives (such as exercise physiology), which I need 4 of for my major requirement, and of course, the whole world does math, so Sterling shouldn't have any trouble finding classes no matter which one we choose. The main downers about Australia is the cost of the Visa to get in there (on top of the other costs) and the fact that they start school in the middle of our Summer so that means less time to work, (yet more time to work over Winter break). If it turns out that it doesn't work out for us, we are considering the UK as a back-up plan. And if that doesn't work, we would just stay here, which wouldn't be that depressing because we love it here!! (But let's be real... how often do we get the chance to go to Australia??)
Oh yeah, we also learned that all of the schools we looked at have MARRIED HOUSING!!! Sheesh... why can't Gettysburg have that? ...Oh yeah, we'd be the only ones in the building!
Ahhh where to begin?? Sterling and I have decided that it would be totally awesome to study abroad during the fall of next year. We had absolutely no intentions of going abroad when we got here last year, but from hearing so many great things about it, and the fact that it doesn't cost too much more than we'd have to pay if we just stayed here, we figured "why not?" We wanted to pick a place that interested both of us. A place that would seem like a vacation, with similar food to the US (anyone who knows me well knows that I'm not so great at trying new food), and where English is the main language. So, Australia is where we want to go!
(It's not set on stone yet though! Still planning and trying to see if it is a wise decision-- especially financially speaking!)
