Grüezi
Never in all my life have I survived off less sleep than I have this past week. I’ve never needed much sleep and in fact haven’t ever been one to sleep in everyday or take a daily nap. I have too much I want to do to waste it on sleep, even in my normal day to day routine. Take me out of that routine and put me in Europe, where the time difference is +7 hours from home, surround me with a society that moves at a slower, more relaxed pace that starts later in the morning and goes later into the evening and I’m all sorts of thrown out of whack. But, sleep is for the weak, and I suffer from FOMO pretty badly. FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) gets me when I’m back home, but it’s really gotten me here! The others studying abroad with me are truly a great group of people who are always up to do just about anything, so how could I ever say no?!?! We have limited time in Europe, so it’s a now or never situation, every day.
Take today for example. I am in Zürich, Switzerland. I bought my plane ticket on Wednesday, packed last night after ending our day at 10:30pm, got up at 3:30am and after a 2 hour flight I’m in Switzerland with a few of my new friends. When a plane ticket to another country only costs $200, you just do it, am I right? Switzerland wasn’t necessarily a bucket list place for me, but when you’re here, you’re sort of crazy if you don’t. After buying the ticket and doing some research I realized Switzerland, and Zürich specifically, is one of the most expensive cities in the world. Whatever the next 2 days brings us, I’m in, so long as I can get some sleep. An uninterrupted, 6+ hour stretch of time would be ideal. We did have brunch at a great place when we got to Zürich and then took a ferry ride around Lake Zürich. We’ve gone from Spanish as the primary language to German and that’s a whole new experience for me.
I’m also realizing that along with the lack of sleep comes the lack of time for updates. Just know, I’m meeting great people, experiencing great things and making memories I’ll have for a lifetime, as cliché as that sounds. For now, I’m off to practice political neutrality, eat some (swiss) cheese and (swiss) chocolate, perhaps make a deposit into my Swiss bank account and pick up an army knife!
Ciao!
