I went home that very day to start my application, and about one month before my high school graduation, I found out that I’d been chosen! I left for Germany later that year, and I can definitely say that I've found a second home in this new country.
When I began college at West Virginia University in Morgantown, West Virgnia, I studied German as my major and Japanese as my minor. Asa part of my studies, I had the opportunity to finally travel to Japan on a Benjamin A. Gilman International Exchange Scholarship during the summer after my freshman year, and I also went back to Germany on a Boehm Scholarship the summer after that. I ended up graduating from college early because I'd taken extra classes during all of my semesters. The truth is, I was so eager to start traveling and working towards my future that I couldn't wait any longer! After studying languages for so long, and given how much I love other cultures, I set out to keep learning and working with people who are from places that are different from what I'm used to.
Since August of this year, I’ve been living and studying in Germany for the third time and I couldn't be happier with how things have gone. I am currently a U.S. Fulbright Scholarship recipient, and I will be teaching English at a German high school in Essen, Germany for the next nine months. Not only do I get to share my American culture with my German students, but I can also share German culture with American students back home--you! I hope that you all will enjoy reading about my adventures as much as I enjoy writing about them, and hopefully what you read here will also inspire you to start your own journeys one day! The sky is truly the limit, and if you can think it up for yourself, it's totally possible to achieve it.
