How I got to this place

I don't know the exact moment I was actually like 'Wow I want to leave my house and go away for a year to a place where I don't speak the language and live there. For a year'. Yeah I don't remember that. I remember in 7th grade reading the Georgia Nicholson series and she also talked about Sven the foreign exchange student and Germany. Not together though. Sven wasn't from Germany. But anyway I had though about going to Germany because of that. Then the summer 9th grade (yeah 9th grade was last year but don't I sound older when I call it 9th grade) I just started looking up all these exchange programs.

Then I found the scholarships. I don't know, I thought why take my parent's money when I could just get a scholarship. And I applied to YES Abroad and NSLI-Y. The applications were basically the same.

Why do you want to go? Tell us a time where you felt like an outsider and how you dealt with that. Are you good at adapting? yea yea questions like these

After a few months maybe February/March (??) I was selected as a semi finalist for both. My interview for NSLI-Y was here in Los Angeles. For YES Abroad there was a In Person Selection Event in Denver. Denver was awesome I met with 73 other kids who wanted the same opportunity I did which turned out not to be awkward at all. I mean here we are competing for a scholarship but we're having a really good time. It was weird, in a good way. I mean how often do you just like people? (I'm kidding of course I love people otherwise why go on exchange)

But I returned home from that and then come April people start getting emails about acceptances.

It was the worst. Here I am on my nice 2 week long Spring Break freaking out over what country I'm supposed to be in next year. Then like 2 days after I go back to school I get the email. 'You've been accepted to the YES Abroad program to go to Indonesia with AFS. '

And that is how I became a YES student to Indonesia. Ok you probably only half know what that means by now. I'll explain YES next time. Promise.