No puedo creer está el fin.

Writing this today I only have a week left in Europe. Five and a half months went much faster than I ever thought they would. All semester I kept telling myself, “I need to update my blog!” Well, I failed miserably at that. But now I can write about my study abroad experience in Vigo in reflection, with a wider perspective.

I have seven days left including today. In the past 161 days I’ve visited 14 countries on two continents. I rode camels in the Saharan desert, hiked the Swiss Alps, ran into a high school friend in Spain. Experienced strawberry picking in Bavaria, Germany, and countless museums. We watched the French Open in front of the Eiffel Tower, and watched Germany play in the world cup in a German beer garden. I gained cankles and swollen feet while in Verona, and celebrated my 21st birthday at a music festival in Marseille. I stood in the Anne Frank annex, and I walked through Auschwitz, shocked at what humans could do to others. The list of experiences I’ve had is endless and not finished.

But more striking than the Eiffel Tower, or the lavish halls of Versailles are the people and friends I’ve met. Including the man who gave me 20 Swiss Franks on a train to Zurich, and the girl from Amsterdam who spent a year at circus school in Spain. The fleeting moments I had with each of them touched my life. More impactful are all the people I met in Vigo – my friends from around the world (Germany, Brazil, England) and those not that far from home (Louisiana, California, Nebraska) – these people have molded me into who I am now.

These people are the ones who share those memories with me that sound like they came straight from a movie. We share inside jokes about trains and pants, appreciate that first bite into a kebab, the coveted last caramel wafer, and the endless Vigo rain.

There were days I never wanted to end and others I wish I would forget, but I wouldn’t trade in any experience. Each brought with it something to learn, something to laugh at, or to make me cry. I won’t lie, I’m excited to be coming home. But I also don’t want to leave. People always say, “bittersweet” but I don’t think that’s strong enough. Gut-wrenching pain and inexpressible joy. How can we feel two competing emotions so strongly?

I’m still planning on updating my blog when I return home. I have a long list of things I want to write about, especially considering I only wrote three posts in the last five months. But the next seven days I’m going to be present in each moment – soaking up the last memories, eating countless pastries and Swiss chocolate, riding public transportation, walking endlessly, and being annonymous in countries where I don’t know how to speak a single word of the native language.

Who knows what the next seven days will bring, but I know I will have even more stories to tell.