*throws handfuls of fee-money figuratively*
There ye sit, twirling thy mustaches and laughing sinisterly!
My sainted parents have purchased my plane ticket and pretty much everything is official. Especially on the API side of things. I'm going to spend the next couple of hours doublechecking to make sure that WWU has everything it needs besides actually confirming that my schedule has transferrable credits. That took a phone call (or two, or three, idk, i'll have to check back on monday and tuesday) to the Sociology department in case i will need to meet with them in person on Wednesday.
I have successfully declared my major! It isn't Human Services, like i wanted, but Sociology is what i got my AA in, and so it actually does make sense to continue that. And fantastically enough i took enough psychology credits at a community college level, that after a class i ALREADY TOOK at WWU, i already qualify for a Minor in Psych and i don't have to do anything extra. WHICH ROCKS MY SOCKS.
some stuff i've been putting on my own shoulders that has been weighing me down with emotion and pinned hopes and shit like that is missing me off. I've been down and out in kind of a big way for kind of a long time. Panic set in during december and it never really smoothed out. Stuff that i thought meant a lot to me just kind of don't anymore. I've left a few things in the back of my mind to simmer, but mostly it irks me now how much importance i've tied to various things that just aren't as worth it as i thought it was.
maybe over the course of the upcoming year those things will even out, but even if they don't, i'm sick of the pressure and the idea of setting my heart on something outside of my control is something i never really could get behind for long.
I know i'm being vague, but brainpatterns can be like that.
Anyway. Yeah. Small update.
STUFF TO BUY:
Plug Adapters
Retainer
Gas for work
Groceries
So yeah, even tho i worked so much i got a little more than i'd even hoped for, i still don't have enough to still not have to be completely responsible. (which is more of a reminder to myself than you guys.)
happy superbowl sunday, if that is a thing you do.
Saturday, January 31, 2015
Tuesday, January 20, 2015
Why is it that I do my best writing before I want to be sleeping?
A lot has been on my mind, lately. From car insurance, to a new retainer, to that last $250 fee that somehow still hasn't gone through (i freaking hate coincidences), to birth control, to power adapters a la europe, I still have a lot of stuff to buy, and working part-time for it is a total bitchcake. I've also been wondering where some of my clothes are (two pairs of leggings and my favorite shirt), because they've been missing for months, and i'm just hoping they're somewhere in the totes that i have packed and are sitting in my mom's house.
Trying to self-teach a new language is also hard. I have very little discipline, and gilmore girls is so much more accessible than a whole new language; so beyond a few phrases, i've been wimping out. LA was amazing, but i think that the easiest way to upload pictures is if I use a USB and plug my phone in. I know that the phone app won't let me upload it directly, because i've explored that app thoroughly.
There is a list of 339 books (at least a third of which were actually the movie form) of books mentioned in the show, Gilmore Girls. 5 of the titles were free on kindle, so i downloaded them and am trying to slog through Anna Karenina with my bestie, Destiny. It's exceedingly boring, SO she suggested giving them funny accents, which is amusing, but hard to do if you can't mimic the accents yourself. For instance, i can do russian and ridiculous french, but i really wanted to make Stepan Jamaican, and i can't do a Jamaican accent except to say "Jamayken, Mon." and that just really isn't good enough for a man who cuckqueaned his waifu.
There's also a bit that says "It was undoubtedly his fault, but the entire household was on his side." which made me think "oh good, this book won't enrage me at all." and also- this isn't an exaggeration- there is a part in which a french maitre d throws a tablecloth on the table EVEN THOUGH THE TABLE ALREADY HAS A TABLECLOTH ON IT.
...WHAT
My friend, Emily got me a double-faced watch that is absolutely beautiful and it means i can tell time in Krakow and Olympia all at once. I mean I have to re-practice reading analogue clocks, but it's so pretty i'd almost rather do that than use my phone. (Which is high praise, considering how flipping easy it is just to look at your phone.)
It occurred to me a couple of days ago how much I'm going to miss everyone, how much harder it's going to be to talk to everyone, when i'm 9 hours ahead, and that has tainted the excitement with sadness and disbelief. I'm supposed to be in Europe in a month. A month, and i cannot get thought my head. A month is no time at all. I don't understand how it isn't going through my head, but it isn't. I'm going to be studying at the second-oldest University in Central Europe. There is already a tiny, co-ed apartment waiting for me with no dryers, so i will have to line-dry everything. The food is meat and pickled-everything and i hate pickled stuff. i don't know what kind of shampoo, toothpaste, soap, conditioner they have. i won't know how to read the stuff. None of the stuff i find online teaches much about how to write Polska. I'm subbing in a little Russian for some of the words.
I'm scared. I'm honestly frightened. I'm a loud American. What if everyone in Europe just sees me as loud, arrogant, ignorant, and disruptive? I know my people here love me. Even the ones who hate me are completely unfounded in their hatred of me, and that's okay, too, because i don't need to waste my time with that. I probably shouldn't waste my time thinking about anything other than poland and only poland. But that's impossible too. There is at least one distraction that is so pleasant to be distracted by even when it's upsetting, Even though i have no expectations at all. And yet i wouldn't shake it even if i knew how. Or maybe i know how, and to do so would just hurt too much. You ever have a hope so big you can't let it go because the heartbreak would be too awful? Risk is addicting that way. Europe is like that, for me.
I'm terrified. I'm absolutely petrified that it will be a giant fuckup and I'll be irreversibly scarred, somehow, for the rest of my life. But not doing it would be worse.
And i have my visa. it's sitting at my parent's house, and all i wanna do is touch it. I have a picture of that, too, and i don't even know what information, if any, could be taken as a case of stolen identity.
I'm still waiting on my final packet from API, and my mother says she doesn't want to buy my plane ticket until she gets that packet. which is understandable, but still another stressor. And i want to look into getting a Eurail pass, though i may have to wait until i get to Poland to buy it with my Financial aid. Then i can train to other countries, and even if i walk around with nothing but a camera and my passport, i can at least SEE things.
There's a lady i met on the internet who offered to show me around Europe, and I'm DYING to accept her offer, but i'm also aware of how sketchy it sounds. It's a huge risk anytime you meet someone off the internet. Let alone a bright-eyed bushy-tailed little naive twenty-something meeting someone on a different freaking continent.
But hey, if i turn her down, i could be fucking up the opportunity of a lifetime.
Anyway, there's a small update. :3
Trying to self-teach a new language is also hard. I have very little discipline, and gilmore girls is so much more accessible than a whole new language; so beyond a few phrases, i've been wimping out. LA was amazing, but i think that the easiest way to upload pictures is if I use a USB and plug my phone in. I know that the phone app won't let me upload it directly, because i've explored that app thoroughly.
There is a list of 339 books (at least a third of which were actually the movie form) of books mentioned in the show, Gilmore Girls. 5 of the titles were free on kindle, so i downloaded them and am trying to slog through Anna Karenina with my bestie, Destiny. It's exceedingly boring, SO she suggested giving them funny accents, which is amusing, but hard to do if you can't mimic the accents yourself. For instance, i can do russian and ridiculous french, but i really wanted to make Stepan Jamaican, and i can't do a Jamaican accent except to say "Jamayken, Mon." and that just really isn't good enough for a man who cuckqueaned his waifu.
There's also a bit that says "It was undoubtedly his fault, but the entire household was on his side." which made me think "oh good, this book won't enrage me at all." and also- this isn't an exaggeration- there is a part in which a french maitre d throws a tablecloth on the table EVEN THOUGH THE TABLE ALREADY HAS A TABLECLOTH ON IT.
...WHAT
My friend, Emily got me a double-faced watch that is absolutely beautiful and it means i can tell time in Krakow and Olympia all at once. I mean I have to re-practice reading analogue clocks, but it's so pretty i'd almost rather do that than use my phone. (Which is high praise, considering how flipping easy it is just to look at your phone.)
It occurred to me a couple of days ago how much I'm going to miss everyone, how much harder it's going to be to talk to everyone, when i'm 9 hours ahead, and that has tainted the excitement with sadness and disbelief. I'm supposed to be in Europe in a month. A month, and i cannot get thought my head. A month is no time at all. I don't understand how it isn't going through my head, but it isn't. I'm going to be studying at the second-oldest University in Central Europe. There is already a tiny, co-ed apartment waiting for me with no dryers, so i will have to line-dry everything. The food is meat and pickled-everything and i hate pickled stuff. i don't know what kind of shampoo, toothpaste, soap, conditioner they have. i won't know how to read the stuff. None of the stuff i find online teaches much about how to write Polska. I'm subbing in a little Russian for some of the words.
I'm scared. I'm honestly frightened. I'm a loud American. What if everyone in Europe just sees me as loud, arrogant, ignorant, and disruptive? I know my people here love me. Even the ones who hate me are completely unfounded in their hatred of me, and that's okay, too, because i don't need to waste my time with that. I probably shouldn't waste my time thinking about anything other than poland and only poland. But that's impossible too. There is at least one distraction that is so pleasant to be distracted by even when it's upsetting, Even though i have no expectations at all. And yet i wouldn't shake it even if i knew how. Or maybe i know how, and to do so would just hurt too much. You ever have a hope so big you can't let it go because the heartbreak would be too awful? Risk is addicting that way. Europe is like that, for me.
I'm terrified. I'm absolutely petrified that it will be a giant fuckup and I'll be irreversibly scarred, somehow, for the rest of my life. But not doing it would be worse.
And i have my visa. it's sitting at my parent's house, and all i wanna do is touch it. I have a picture of that, too, and i don't even know what information, if any, could be taken as a case of stolen identity.
I'm still waiting on my final packet from API, and my mother says she doesn't want to buy my plane ticket until she gets that packet. which is understandable, but still another stressor. And i want to look into getting a Eurail pass, though i may have to wait until i get to Poland to buy it with my Financial aid. Then i can train to other countries, and even if i walk around with nothing but a camera and my passport, i can at least SEE things.
There's a lady i met on the internet who offered to show me around Europe, and I'm DYING to accept her offer, but i'm also aware of how sketchy it sounds. It's a huge risk anytime you meet someone off the internet. Let alone a bright-eyed bushy-tailed little naive twenty-something meeting someone on a different freaking continent.
But hey, if i turn her down, i could be fucking up the opportunity of a lifetime.
Anyway, there's a small update. :3
Friday, January 9, 2015
Straight to racism
I go down to the lobby, check out, and ask for the shuttle service back to the airport. The lady at the front desk tells me that it runs every hour, on the hour, and I thank her and sit down. There's a guy in the lobby, but he's pretty absorbed in whatever it is that he's doing, and doesn't even look up. Which is whatever, I hug the back of the couch and close my eyes and listen to the trashy TV the hotel has on.
Dude had a kid die and one of his other's snapped her leg bones and the mother doesn't wanna believe it was anything other than an accident but cps and the courts have stripped him of his rights and he went to jail. But steve wilkos had him take a lie detector test and hey, his denials were the truth.
I hate daytime tv.
Anyway. The driver (who is Mexican) shows up early and gets my attention and I get on the shuttle and we go. We exchange quick pleasantries and he asks what terminal would i like to be dropped at? I hesitate before going "Uhm.... Delta?" And he says "Delta? Okay so terminal 5?" And I tell him "I guess so? You would definitely know better than me." He laughs and says "that's probably true." And we're on our way.
Yet before we are out of the neighborhood the front desk radios the driver and the dude who was in the lobby wanted a ride to the airport, too. The driver is a little irritated, because why didn't the guy get on? The Lobby lady, Taura (pretty freaking name), just says "if you're not on the highway can you please turn around?" And the driver says "yeah, can you have him wait outside, tho?" And Taura agrees.
He complains a little to me "Why he don't get on, hey?" And I tell him I don't know, I doubt the guy was paying attention to much of anything, but I'm 3 hours early so it really isn't any skin off my nose.
So the guy in the lobby (Asian descent) gets in the front seat and doesn't say anything and the driver sort of jokingly asks "Hey you were in the lobby why you no get on, eh? What happen you no get on?"
And the Asian guy immediately goes to, "I don't unserstand what you're saying. This is America, you need to speak English."
....what.
And the driver is pretty insulted. Which, honestly, I would be, too. He is OBVIOUSLY speaking english, and just because he has an accent doesn't make him deserving of disrespect. YOU were the one not paying attention, YOU were the one delaying MY transport to the airport. (You don't know I'm early, shut up.)
The driver responds "I'm speaking English! You crazy! Hey, are all chinese crazy like you? Huh? You all chinese crazy?"
What?
Omfg DON'T STOOP. DON'T STOOP YOU ARE DOING YOUR JOB WHAAAAAAT.
I don't know what to do I am soooooo uncomfortable. Do I speak up? Do I change the subject? Do I interject? Honestly I kind of want to yell at them both. I don't understand how someone, anyone, can so comfortably jump to so much condescension and their own superiority complex. Especially over what couldn't be more than a 10 minute delay.
The Driver (he wasn't wearing a nametag) turned on the AC back vents and I quietly thanked him. The Asian guy, who had an american accent (also not wearing a nametag but he had Korean on his jacket) tried to make smalltalk. It honestly still came off as arrogant and lame to me. He commented "no traffic, huh? Just wait till 6. When to you get off work? 2? Yeah just wait till six." Like come on. His life is more than just his job, ass. Do you live here? How are you qualified to comment on traffic at six? Shut up.
We get to the airport and start cruising past terminals. The asian guy asked asked what terminal the driver was going to and he responds "Five." The guy goes "No. I need to be dropped off at two. Drop me off here." And the Driver does this and the guy opens the door and says "Hey I will be downstairs at terminal two and I will need to be picked up. So circle back around."
Basically the guy drops me off at terminal five and opens the door for me and all and before I walk away all I can say is "Thank you. And i'm sorry for that guy."
What a fucking snob. And I mean the driver didn't handle it well at all, but seriously ugh.
Anyway, inside the airport my boarding pass came up and printed right away and I totally have a window seat. Score.
Thursday, January 8, 2015
oh hey there's a title feature
Hello from L.A.! I am sitting in a Best Western and wondering why my check-in for tomorrow's flight won't work. It worked for my travel agent but when it comes to technology every once in a while there is just something about me that makes everything SNAFU. It's irritating, but I'll just end up at the airport early tomorrow anyway, so I'm trying not to panic.
The Polish Consulate was very fast. The longest time I spent was seriously waiting while another family was being helped. The lady took all my stuff and said everything was all good. After the $76 fee for the visa and the $16 fee to FedEx everything back to Washington when they're done... they said everything looked fine. I should be getting my passport back in a week (hopefully with my other documentation; I kinda wanna frame the acceptance letter). I'm going to say it again to reassure myself because for some reason I am STILL NERVOUS... All the documents were sufficient except one.
They had me retake pictures.
This is the third time I have done this.
Once when I thought I was going in the fall, and apparently the API people didn't keep the old ones. Once for this quarter, and I got two extra just in case, and then again today because my pictures weren't acceptable.
PLEASE NOTE THAT IF YOU NEED BIOMETRIC PHOTOS FOR YOUR VISA IN EUROPE DO NOT TAKE IT WITH GLASSES ON.
CVS is within walking distance of the consulate, but the biometric photos there cost $13 after tax for two. Which is bullshit, I promise you. At Walgreen's it's around $7 after tax for two. RiteAid charges around $8, and idk how much Walmart charges. I know you can take and print your own and depending how many you need, it might be worth it to invest in photo paper and do that crap yourself. Or save it on a flashdrive and take it to office depotmaxstaples. The requirements are 2x2 inches white background nonsmoking and your hair can't block your face.
Keith at the Best Western in Lawndale was suuuuuuper nice and called a taxi for me. The taxi driver's name was Martìn and he was 25 minutes early for my estimate of an hour-early transport. So if he had showed up on time, I would've been late. So.
Martìn was very nice. I told him I flew in yesterday, and leave tomorrow, and he insisted that he take me to Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. I have to admit that at first I thought he was trying to get more money out of me, but then before I responded, he said "and it's on me." We agreed on the price ahead of time and he didn't ask for more or anything. I tipped him $10 coz it's all I could afford, but yeah. $55 one way and he didn't push.
We talked about history, religion, our families, and the politics of my career choice. It was really cool, and if I do come back, I will probably just stay here and use that taxi again of I can. Good business, really.
And I really have to say, it was a really very fun trip. I got to see the Pier, and the Regent Beverly Wilshire, where if you haven't been LIVING UNDER A ROCK, you know is the major setting of Pretty Woman.
I'm gonna burst your bubble- the RegBevWil (thanks, Kit DeLuca!) Sits in the middle flat part of a T intersection. Which means that when they edited the movie to make it look like Vivian was going to Rodeo Drive to shop, it was actually nonsense, because all she had to do was walk out the front entrance. There's also outdoor flame thingies that look like they would be outdoor heaters BUT IT WAS SERIOUSLY 70° OUTSIDE WHY WOULD YOU NEED HEATERS.
Also it was smaller than I thought it would be but Martìn tells me that if you look up you can see the balcony from the movie.
It's kind of pink.
I tried to take pictures but my phone died right as I clicked the "Rodeo Drive road sign/Louis Vuitton store" pic (despite being at 8%) and when I was finally able to turn it back on,the file was broken.
On the plus side, I did get some pics of Santa Monica's Pier and I'll post those later.
I'm going to sign off on this for now, because I want to make sure I have enough time to charge all my devices.
Know why?
Coz I'm spoiled and addicted.
The Polish Consulate was very fast. The longest time I spent was seriously waiting while another family was being helped. The lady took all my stuff and said everything was all good. After the $76 fee for the visa and the $16 fee to FedEx everything back to Washington when they're done... they said everything looked fine. I should be getting my passport back in a week (hopefully with my other documentation; I kinda wanna frame the acceptance letter). I'm going to say it again to reassure myself because for some reason I am STILL NERVOUS... All the documents were sufficient except one.
They had me retake pictures.
This is the third time I have done this.
Once when I thought I was going in the fall, and apparently the API people didn't keep the old ones. Once for this quarter, and I got two extra just in case, and then again today because my pictures weren't acceptable.
PLEASE NOTE THAT IF YOU NEED BIOMETRIC PHOTOS FOR YOUR VISA IN EUROPE DO NOT TAKE IT WITH GLASSES ON.
CVS is within walking distance of the consulate, but the biometric photos there cost $13 after tax for two. Which is bullshit, I promise you. At Walgreen's it's around $7 after tax for two. RiteAid charges around $8, and idk how much Walmart charges. I know you can take and print your own and depending how many you need, it might be worth it to invest in photo paper and do that crap yourself. Or save it on a flashdrive and take it to office depotmaxstaples. The requirements are 2x2 inches white background nonsmoking and your hair can't block your face.
Keith at the Best Western in Lawndale was suuuuuuper nice and called a taxi for me. The taxi driver's name was Martìn and he was 25 minutes early for my estimate of an hour-early transport. So if he had showed up on time, I would've been late. So.
Martìn was very nice. I told him I flew in yesterday, and leave tomorrow, and he insisted that he take me to Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. I have to admit that at first I thought he was trying to get more money out of me, but then before I responded, he said "and it's on me." We agreed on the price ahead of time and he didn't ask for more or anything. I tipped him $10 coz it's all I could afford, but yeah. $55 one way and he didn't push.
We talked about history, religion, our families, and the politics of my career choice. It was really cool, and if I do come back, I will probably just stay here and use that taxi again of I can. Good business, really.
And I really have to say, it was a really very fun trip. I got to see the Pier, and the Regent Beverly Wilshire, where if you haven't been LIVING UNDER A ROCK, you know is the major setting of Pretty Woman.
I'm gonna burst your bubble- the RegBevWil (thanks, Kit DeLuca!) Sits in the middle flat part of a T intersection. Which means that when they edited the movie to make it look like Vivian was going to Rodeo Drive to shop, it was actually nonsense, because all she had to do was walk out the front entrance. There's also outdoor flame thingies that look like they would be outdoor heaters BUT IT WAS SERIOUSLY 70° OUTSIDE WHY WOULD YOU NEED HEATERS.
Also it was smaller than I thought it would be but Martìn tells me that if you look up you can see the balcony from the movie.
It's kind of pink.
I tried to take pictures but my phone died right as I clicked the "Rodeo Drive road sign/Louis Vuitton store" pic (despite being at 8%) and when I was finally able to turn it back on,the file was broken.
On the plus side, I did get some pics of Santa Monica's Pier and I'll post those later.
I'm going to sign off on this for now, because I want to make sure I have enough time to charge all my devices.
Know why?
Coz I'm spoiled and addicted.
Monday, January 5, 2015
First real post
Hello lovely loves.
I believe it is time to start this thing for realsies. The first thing i want to get out of the way are my experiences so far, in just getting things lined up and not even going anywhere yet.
So as an outline:
First attempt (or: WHY YOU SHOULD NEVER GO ABROAD IN FALL Or: Bye Bye Tonsils.)
Second Attempt:
-What you should know
-Overwhelming lists
-That pesky Visa
-The whirlwind end of term
-dastards at financial aid
Have you buckled in? I'll try to keep it primarily brief. I mean, no promises, but I'll try.
Disclaimers: Typos will abound. I mean, they bug me, so it's not like i''m just going to ignore them and NOT EVEN try, but I rarely press shift when talking about myself of a place, so i feel like you should just know that going into it. I'll be updating from a laptop, a tablet, and a phone, and so i can't ever make promises when it comes to the consistency of of spelling errors or capitalizations of proper nouns. It would be nifty to make this a semi-professional thing, but as it's primarily for my friends and family and myself, i think instead i'd like to just have fun with it.
First attempt:
I thought to myself as i raced to the IPE (international programs of education) office in WWU (Western Washington University) that it would be fun to travel and that my favorite seassons are falll and winter and there HAS to be a way to travel abroad on financial aid, right? RIGHT?
Because let's just get this out of the way off the bat: THERE IS NO WAY IN HELL THAT I COULD EVEN BE IN COLLEGE IF NOT FOR FINANCIAL AID.
I got my AA 85% done because of the kind kind gift of a kind-of well-off Grandmother who set money aside for me to go to college from when I was a baby and about 20% under my own steam. (I know that leaves an extra 5% but i have that in there because I graduated with extra credits.) Getting an AA in this country is hardly better than having a diploma (at least, when it comes to trying to get a job). So that meant going to University someplace that the Financial Aid is exceptional. WWU has that reputation, and a fantastic sociology/psychology focus, AND IT'S IN MY STATE, so that is where i went.
HOWEVER:
I am nothing, if not ambitious, and so I set my sights of studying abroad.
I don't know if i can recommend this to someone else. Or if so, prooooooooobably not Poland. Poland (I'm sure) will be the most amazing experience of my life so far, but it would just be about a thousand percent simpler is you start out not needing financial aid.
So here's how things look stacked against me at the end of the year during summer going into fall:
-To study and get financial aid during summer, it's this whole other application for separate funding
-I was going to be couchsurfing with friends because only having a couple of months would be ridiculous to try to find an apartment for three months
-I work a part-time job so i make less than $800 a month
-I thought to myself "Hey, I'll be getting financial aid and I'm frontloading my loan. This will be fine."
NO.
See, here's the thing:
I've go ZERO access to Financial Aid during the summer, WHEN I NEED TO PREPARE.
I can't pay fees, I can't schedule appointments, I can't buy plane tickets. And right around this time i develop a case of strep that's so vicious it positively giggles in the face of three rounds of antibiotics.
So I skate by a cancellation/deferment policy because I was sick enough that I needed to get my tonsils out.
Bye bye, Tonsils.
So okay, I have a second attempt facing me, because a cancellation outright would actually be $1000 more expensive that postponing and going during a different term. But i still have obSTACKles looking me in the retinas.
Firstly, Poland passed a law as late as March 2014 which said "Everyone who wants a visa to travel in our country has to apply in person." Now, this caused a panic in me. The closest consulate to me in Bellingham is up in Vancouver. But when i called the Polish Consulate in Vancouver to ask if it'd be acceptable to go THERE for my Visa appointment, the answer was "No." (If i had been able to attend Fall term, it is from September to December, so that's only about 90 days. I wouldn't actually need a REAL Visa, because it's right at the 90-day limit.)
which means that essentially, I have to travel from Washington to LOS FREAKING ANGELES to run an errand. But at least I have months of staring me in the face.
INFURIATINGLY ENOUGH, it STILL came down to the wire, because the way appplying for a visa works is that you go in through the consulate website and you apply for a visa and an appointment in person at the exact same time. (AND FOR THE LUVVA GOD, YOU SAVE THAT APPLICATION WHEN YOU COMPLETE IT.) And because it's a government website, there is: A time limit, the phrasing is different, the questions are kind of unclear, calling the consulate is unhelpful because 80% of the time YOU WILL NOT GET ANY ANSWER AND THEY HAVE "No inbox set up at this time. Goodbye.", as well as this important info: If you don't see a confirmation screen and get a confirmation email within 24 hours, you better bite the bullet and do it again.
I applied 4 or 5 times, and I got an appointment a week out and a pplane ticket to L.A. (round trip) for around $380 courtesy of my parents (who have bailed me out for this and will be FORCED TO if i'm to get a plane ticket to Poland at all) until I can pay them back.
That brings me nicely to my second point.
FINANCIAL AID HAS BEEN DELAYED UNTIL THE FIRST DAY OF THE ACTUAL TERM.
Studying abroad of financial aid STILL MEANS that you DO NOT actually get Financial Aid until the first day of your term abroad. Which means that everyone else getting their money on Jan 6, you won't. It means you won't get your moneys until Feb 19.
Which means you cannot purchase tickets on financial aid.
Which means you also aren't going to be able to use Financial Aid to fly to L.A. to go the the consulate in person. (Hence my Parents having to purchase the ticket for me until i can pay them back.)
Which means you're gonna need $1500ish up front, aside from all the other fees which also come out of pocket. Which include A $650 fee, a $250 fee, a $150 fee, and that's just from API. (Acedemic Programs International. This is the company that coordinates between WWU and the Universities abroad.)
In retrospect, I wish I had applied to go somewhere else, but I committed to Poland before Germany decided to make tuition free for Americans. (Which kinda sucks, because I actually sprechen sehr kleine Deutsche.) But c'est la vie. If i can get a decent handle on Polish, I think i'll be alright.
That's also a thing: They require you to take a language course when you get to Poland. Which I FULLY SUPPORT. I think it's really important to at least TRY TO SPEAK the language of the country you travel to. The idea that "everyone just speaks english anyway" is both arrogant and infuriating to me.
THE PROBLEM IS that the A1 Beginner Polish language course is taught.
drumroll please.
IN POLISH.
BASICALLY, you darling dovies, I have to learn Polish in order to travel to Poland, to learn Polish.
Laughingly enough, all my other courses are taught in English.
Go figure.
ANYWAY
I'm off to L.A. in a few days, I'll tell you how it goes then.
I believe it is time to start this thing for realsies. The first thing i want to get out of the way are my experiences so far, in just getting things lined up and not even going anywhere yet.
So as an outline:
First attempt (or: WHY YOU SHOULD NEVER GO ABROAD IN FALL Or: Bye Bye Tonsils.)
Second Attempt:
-What you should know
-Overwhelming lists
-That pesky Visa
-The whirlwind end of term
-dastards at financial aid
Have you buckled in? I'll try to keep it primarily brief. I mean, no promises, but I'll try.
Disclaimers: Typos will abound. I mean, they bug me, so it's not like i''m just going to ignore them and NOT EVEN try, but I rarely press shift when talking about myself of a place, so i feel like you should just know that going into it. I'll be updating from a laptop, a tablet, and a phone, and so i can't ever make promises when it comes to the consistency of of spelling errors or capitalizations of proper nouns. It would be nifty to make this a semi-professional thing, but as it's primarily for my friends and family and myself, i think instead i'd like to just have fun with it.
First attempt:
I thought to myself as i raced to the IPE (international programs of education) office in WWU (Western Washington University) that it would be fun to travel and that my favorite seassons are falll and winter and there HAS to be a way to travel abroad on financial aid, right? RIGHT?
Because let's just get this out of the way off the bat: THERE IS NO WAY IN HELL THAT I COULD EVEN BE IN COLLEGE IF NOT FOR FINANCIAL AID.
I got my AA 85% done because of the kind kind gift of a kind-of well-off Grandmother who set money aside for me to go to college from when I was a baby and about 20% under my own steam. (I know that leaves an extra 5% but i have that in there because I graduated with extra credits.) Getting an AA in this country is hardly better than having a diploma (at least, when it comes to trying to get a job). So that meant going to University someplace that the Financial Aid is exceptional. WWU has that reputation, and a fantastic sociology/psychology focus, AND IT'S IN MY STATE, so that is where i went.
HOWEVER:
I am nothing, if not ambitious, and so I set my sights of studying abroad.
I don't know if i can recommend this to someone else. Or if so, prooooooooobably not Poland. Poland (I'm sure) will be the most amazing experience of my life so far, but it would just be about a thousand percent simpler is you start out not needing financial aid.
So here's how things look stacked against me at the end of the year during summer going into fall:
-To study and get financial aid during summer, it's this whole other application for separate funding
-I was going to be couchsurfing with friends because only having a couple of months would be ridiculous to try to find an apartment for three months
-I work a part-time job so i make less than $800 a month
-I thought to myself "Hey, I'll be getting financial aid and I'm frontloading my loan. This will be fine."
NO.
See, here's the thing:
I've go ZERO access to Financial Aid during the summer, WHEN I NEED TO PREPARE.
I can't pay fees, I can't schedule appointments, I can't buy plane tickets. And right around this time i develop a case of strep that's so vicious it positively giggles in the face of three rounds of antibiotics.
So I skate by a cancellation/deferment policy because I was sick enough that I needed to get my tonsils out.
Bye bye, Tonsils.
So okay, I have a second attempt facing me, because a cancellation outright would actually be $1000 more expensive that postponing and going during a different term. But i still have obSTACKles looking me in the retinas.
Firstly, Poland passed a law as late as March 2014 which said "Everyone who wants a visa to travel in our country has to apply in person." Now, this caused a panic in me. The closest consulate to me in Bellingham is up in Vancouver. But when i called the Polish Consulate in Vancouver to ask if it'd be acceptable to go THERE for my Visa appointment, the answer was "No." (If i had been able to attend Fall term, it is from September to December, so that's only about 90 days. I wouldn't actually need a REAL Visa, because it's right at the 90-day limit.)
which means that essentially, I have to travel from Washington to LOS FREAKING ANGELES to run an errand. But at least I have months of staring me in the face.
INFURIATINGLY ENOUGH, it STILL came down to the wire, because the way appplying for a visa works is that you go in through the consulate website and you apply for a visa and an appointment in person at the exact same time. (AND FOR THE LUVVA GOD, YOU SAVE THAT APPLICATION WHEN YOU COMPLETE IT.) And because it's a government website, there is: A time limit, the phrasing is different, the questions are kind of unclear, calling the consulate is unhelpful because 80% of the time YOU WILL NOT GET ANY ANSWER AND THEY HAVE "No inbox set up at this time. Goodbye.", as well as this important info: If you don't see a confirmation screen and get a confirmation email within 24 hours, you better bite the bullet and do it again.
I applied 4 or 5 times, and I got an appointment a week out and a pplane ticket to L.A. (round trip) for around $380 courtesy of my parents (who have bailed me out for this and will be FORCED TO if i'm to get a plane ticket to Poland at all) until I can pay them back.
That brings me nicely to my second point.
FINANCIAL AID HAS BEEN DELAYED UNTIL THE FIRST DAY OF THE ACTUAL TERM.
Studying abroad of financial aid STILL MEANS that you DO NOT actually get Financial Aid until the first day of your term abroad. Which means that everyone else getting their money on Jan 6, you won't. It means you won't get your moneys until Feb 19.
Which means you cannot purchase tickets on financial aid.
Which means you also aren't going to be able to use Financial Aid to fly to L.A. to go the the consulate in person. (Hence my Parents having to purchase the ticket for me until i can pay them back.)
Which means you're gonna need $1500ish up front, aside from all the other fees which also come out of pocket. Which include A $650 fee, a $250 fee, a $150 fee, and that's just from API. (Acedemic Programs International. This is the company that coordinates between WWU and the Universities abroad.)
In retrospect, I wish I had applied to go somewhere else, but I committed to Poland before Germany decided to make tuition free for Americans. (Which kinda sucks, because I actually sprechen sehr kleine Deutsche.) But c'est la vie. If i can get a decent handle on Polish, I think i'll be alright.
That's also a thing: They require you to take a language course when you get to Poland. Which I FULLY SUPPORT. I think it's really important to at least TRY TO SPEAK the language of the country you travel to. The idea that "everyone just speaks english anyway" is both arrogant and infuriating to me.
THE PROBLEM IS that the A1 Beginner Polish language course is taught.
drumroll please.
IN POLISH.
BASICALLY, you darling dovies, I have to learn Polish in order to travel to Poland, to learn Polish.
Laughingly enough, all my other courses are taught in English.
Go figure.
ANYWAY
I'm off to L.A. in a few days, I'll tell you how it goes then.
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