{"id":313537,"date":"2025-11-23T11:14:57","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T11:14:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/alabama\/this-is-your-sign-study-abroad-with-the-university-of-alabama\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T11:14:57","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T11:14:57","slug":"this-is-your-sign-study-abroad-with-the-university-of-alabama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537","title":{"rendered":"This is Your Sign | Study Abroad with The University of Alabama"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Study abroad was nothing like I had possibly imagined \u2013 and yet it was everything that I needed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Before I left, I would have <strong><em>totally<\/em><\/strong> considered myself an introvert. I studied alone, and that is what I spent most of my time doing just to survive my engineering career. If you know, you know.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I was stuck in my comfort zone: only speaking to old friends, working a minimum wage job , and sticking to chicken tenders and ramen whenever possible. The typical life of a struggling college kid.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">So, when I enrolled in a semester abroad in my sophomore year, my family was shocked.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Going to a country where I knew nobody and didn\u2019t speak the language\u2026what could <strong><em>possibly<\/em><\/strong> go wrong?<\/p>\n<p>You might be thinking, \u201cWhat changed?\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Nothing. That\u2019s the thing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Nothing had changed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Growing up, I envied college kids because they were only subject to their own limitations, not those set by their parents. This illusion was crushed sophomore year, when schoolwork and friendship drama made life feel like an extension of high school \u2013 just a new town. After being in college, I started to look up to graduates instead, thinking \u201cOne day I will be that independent.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">But\u2026and this may be very clich\u00e9\u2026why wait for \u201cone day\u201d when you can make tomorrow day <strong><em>one<\/em><\/strong>?<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I always wanted to go abroad but never thought it was within reach until after graduation. It is.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Start that application.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Talk to your parents and advisors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">This is your sign to start <strong>NOW<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Is it hard to live in a country where you do not speak the language? Yes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Would I do it again? Absolutely.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I cannot put into words how much fear I had when my plane landed in Madrid, knowing I knew zero Spanish and had no friends. If something went wrong, I was completely on my own for the first time in my life. It was scary but equally freeing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Because, in the end, if I didn\u2019t click \u201csubmit\u201d on that application on a random Tuesday, I would never have met some of the best friends of my lifetime. Studying abroad throws you into the dark but also allows you to meet people that you would\u2019ve never would\u2019ve otherwise been exposed to.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I learned to ski in Zermatt with friends I met outside of Alabama.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I got to watch the sunset in the Saharan desert.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">I\u2019ve gone from eating chicken tenders every meal, to experiencing local cultures (ex: trying paella in Valencia and chicken tagine in Morocco).<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">And it is some of the best food I\u2019ve had in my life.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Prior to studying abroad, I was waiting for my dream to go. But taking one risk changed everything. I finally felt as though I was living my college experience \u2013 not just surviving it. I learned how to balance life and school so that I could do things which I enjoyed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">And, as it turns out, that\u2019s the whole point.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">Don\u2019t wait to start living how you want to live. Your new life <em>just<\/em> might start on a random Tuesday.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bamabloggersabroad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/IMG-20250505-WA0005.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bamabloggersabroad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/IMG-20250505-WA0005-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-33803\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.bamabloggersabroad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/IMG-20250505-WA0005-980x735.jpg 980w, https:\/\/www.bamabloggersabroad.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/IMG-20250505-WA0005-480x360.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"(min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) and (max-width: 980px) 980px, (min-width: 981px) 1024px, 100vw\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Study abroad was nothing like I had possibly imagined \u2013 and yet it was everything that I needed. Before I left, I would have totally considered myself an introvert. I studied alone, and that is what I spent most of my time doing just to survive my engineering career. If you know, you know. I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":313538,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11763],"tags":[12750,689,2677,10980],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-313537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alabama","tag-alabama","tag-sign","tag-study","tag-university"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>This is Your Sign | Study Abroad with The University of Alabama - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"This is Your Sign | Study Abroad with The University of Alabama - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Study abroad was nothing like I had possibly imagined \u2013 and yet it was everything that I needed. Before I left, I would have totally considered myself an introvert. I studied alone, and that is what I spent most of my time doing just to survive my engineering career. If you know, you know. I [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-11-23T11:14:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/IMG-20250505-WA0005-1024x768.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371\"},\"headline\":\"This is Your Sign | Study Abroad with The University of Alabama\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-11-23T11:14:57+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\"},\"wordCount\":533,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/IMG-20250505-WA0005-1024x768.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Alabama\",\"Sign\",\"Study\",\"University\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Alabama\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=313537\",\"name\":\"This is Your Sign | Study Abroad with The University of Alabama - 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