Two weeks to go

Tying up the loose ends here in Taiwan. The Fulbright final dinner is on Friday, followed by our last week of school then it's a few days of down time, backpacking with the cousin, San Francisco, and finally home.

My initial feeling when I arrived in August was that by June an ostensible sense of community would arise and you'd have to pry my feet off the grounds of Yilan county. But after 10 months this isn't the case. I miss having a TV. It's weird having such a passionate relationship with my Skype account. And my American life has more or less been placed on hold for the past 300 days, which gives me a really eerie feeling.

I'm ready to progress. The town I've called home for the past year is very much so a beautiful one but also a bubble; once you get out you don't come back, and if you stay you never leave.

I still haven't left yet so this certainly won't serve as any type of reflective abstract of my year, but with things quickly coming to a close I've never had such a feeling of completion. I took this year to do things I, for whatever reason, never really had the chance to do, and I'm happy to say every box on my to-do list created in August is now filled. Were the sacrifices over four years of college worth it? Absolutely. Will I have regrets looking back? Without a doubt. A handful of particular memories and my understanding of Taiwan, as well as myself, has increased dramatically, which is indeed the mission of the Fulbright program.

My Taiwanese friends in Taipei and Taizhong are this country's future leaders. I'm excited to return in the future and see them all having reached their fullest potential. As for Fulbrighters, I knew realistically it would be difficult to be everyone's best friend with so many type-A personalities in the room. The friends I have made, it's safe to say the roots are deep. The ones I was never able to, I've learned a great deal about how people think. The multitude of different intelligent types in this year's program really could conquer the world, I'm convinced. Sometimes talents were maximized, and it was interesting to observe when others were not--and the consequent feelings experienced, and reactions, by that party.

If I had to narrow it down to just that one thematic "thing" to summarize the year, I'd say I learned how to live just a little bit better. I was able to do what I wanted, when I wanted, and how I wanted.

I learned how to oppose a respected opinion, position oneself, and finally to navigate through true ingeniousness. If every year is a building block for the future, this is the final piece of the foundation.