My time in Chile is coming to an end.

It´s so weird. I remember during week two thinking, "goodness, I have six weeks left. Sooooo much time," and now all I can think of is how quickly it has passed by, as cliché as that sounds.

I´m ready to be home. I´ve had an excellent time full of lots of sporadic moments, but I can´t wait to get home to my family and WSU. That´s one of the things about traveling, I always feel good to come home. It´s amazing experience but I always come back feeling proud of where I come from.

My time here has been exhausting in a good way. I´ve accomplished learning more Spanish. I´ve had six articles published in a fairly prominent newspaper. I made a lot of great friends down here. I learned a lot about a culture that I knew nothing about when I arrived. More or less, I think I´ve accomplished everything I came here to do.

One of the hardest parts of going home is answering the question, "so how was it? Tell me ALL about your trip." Where do I even start with something like this? The big moments, like meeting President Bachelet or accidentally being cast as an extra in a Chilean movie? My very first salsa lesson or the time I tried my first completo? My decision to leave my host family? Sútbol? The internship? I can´t even pick out the most important bits to share, because they´re all so much a part of the experience as a whole.

Perhaps I can share my biggest lesson. I can never expect to understand a culture or another group of people without living in it. It´s so funny to think of all the stereotypes people have about cultures they don´t understand. I surely had them about Chile. I had my expectations... lots of latin music, hot men, long nights of dancing. And yeah, I got all of that. It lived up to my expectations. But there´s so much more to this part of the world. Their love of a good time, a good night out. The fight for more women´s rights. The way everyone gives out money to the people begging on the streets without judging their intentions or whether they´ll just use it to buy a pack of cigarettes. The countless numbers of songs and chants they have for soccer games. These and so many more that I could never finish listing.