Friends

A really hard part of being away from home is learning how to balance your old friends and your new friends.

Having done two separate exchanges in my life, one thing I have learned is that being away from home for an extended amount of time really helps to weed out the "kinda-sorta" friends from the ones you know will be there forever.

Since we are only at the beginning of the term and a lot of you exchange students have just arrived, I'm sure you still want to spend time calling, and messaging, and chatting with those you left behind, but make sure you don't become alienated from the people around you. It is important to use this time to get to know the people in your classes and make some good friends. If you don't make an impression now you may get left behind in the dust, and next thing you know its time for you to go home and you may not have had the experience that you hoped for.

The other side of the story though, is that as the year moves on you may lose touch with people you were once closer with. I've lost a few friends due to the excessive space between us, but what I have found is the ones that really truly love you are always waiting for you to come back. I still remember the day I met my best friend when we were six years old. We haven't lived in the same city since we were 15 and we don't even talk to each other weekly, but I can count on her to be exactly the same as she was the last time we spoke.

I hope that everyone had a great second week of school, and we should all look forward to only having ten more weeks left in the term!

Good luck,

Mallory Bailey