Journey to Australia

It has been just over 2 years since I got home. 2 years of missing, reliving, talking about, longing for my home down under.

Winter 2014 I was just a college girl with a 10 year dream in my head.

Rewind to May 2010 when it was college decision time. I knew I had to get out of Illinois it wasn’t a place I saw myself. My whole life I wanted more and my dreams took over. I thought of college as my chance to finally get out.

I had letters from schools that wanted me and as it came to decision time I knew I was going to leave but then one thing happened...it was a “study out of state or study abroad” conversation. If there is one dream that I have always had that was bigger than anything else in my life it was going to Australia.

Ever since...ever I have had this insane love for Australia. I can’t put a finger on what it was. Was it the isolations? The mystery? The laidback lifestyle? I don’t know but I had to go there. So I made a decision, I chose a school that would give me Australia.

Australia was a decision I made years before in 5th grade. The second I started working I started saving. I was lucky that I knew this is what I wanted years before it happened.

Winter of 2014 everything is set I’m leaving for Sydney, Australia in just a few weeks. This is what my parents knew the night before I left: I was going to Coogee, I had a place to stay, and I was going to live near the school. Well...one thing was true I was going to Coogee. I had no place to stay when I landed. Australia was going to be the ultimate adventure for me and I wanted to plan as little as possible. I was going there for life and travel and experience, not school.

So I land get in a taxi and ask him to take me to Coogee (coog-E) he laughs and says “Coogee” (coo-G). I’m living a dream driving closer and closer to the beach. I remembered reading about a hostel in Coogee called “Coogee Beach House” and he takes me there. My first stop in Australia is a McDonald’s, how sad, but they had Wi-Fi. I let my parents know I’m safe and I’m able to get in contact with a girl who is also in my program and also staying in my hostel. Little did I know I was starting the best adventure of my life. Little did I know it would stay with me years later and draw me back to the place I fell in love with.