No tags yet.
Throughout my time here in Europe, I have gotten the privilege to get to know so many wonderful people. From teachers, to classmates, restaurant workers, and random Europeans on the street, I have been so blessed with many different people who have enhanced this amazing adventure for me! I want to acknowledge a few of them however, no words could ever explain how much the following people have impacted my life. Here are just a few of the beautiful souls that I had the opportunity to get to know throughout my three months in Europe! :)
Tereza:
I am not at all exaggerating when I say Tereza was our lifeline on this trip. She’s the world’s best fill in mother. Whether you felt a slight cold coming on, or you had possible appendicitis, Tereza immediately would take you to the doctor and get it figured out. If we had questions planning flights/trains/trips she would be there to help us figure it out and get all our tickets printed off for us. She saved our butts more times than she probably wanted too and we most definitely stressed her out a time or two with various problems that arose, but no matter what she always helped us get everything figured out as quickly and smoothly as possible. We are all forever grateful that we had the chance to meet and get to know Tereza, but this isn’t goodbye forever because she is coming to Nebraska in the fall to do research for her PhD!! Tereza was one of the biggest blessings of this trip, and I am incredibly thankful for everything she did for me during my time here! :)
Monika & Makayla:
Teaching the Czech language to 23 American students is no doubt a tough task… Our two Czech language teachers, Monika and Makayla managed to always stay patient with us and helped us learn the basics of the Czech language. 23 college students aren’t always the most focused and receptive audience, and 23 college students on a three month vacation are most definitely not focused what so ever. Our two teachers did an amazing job of keeping us interested in the material and encouraging us to keep trying, even when it all sounded like jibberish to us. I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to learn a language that such a small portion of the world knows. It is a hard language to learn but I’d say we all are leaving the Czech Republic with an understanding of basic Czech words/ phrases/ and grammar. God bless Monika and Makayla for putting up with us over the last 3 months!
Jan & Martin:
These two lucky fellas got the opportunity to take vacations with all of us crazy kids throughout the semester, as well as teach us various lectures on the Holocaust and religion history throughout Europe. We Americans can be a lot to handle and I think Jan and Martin did good at rolling with the punches and helping us get through all the obstacles we created for ourselves on this trip! They taught us so much in their lectures, but even more on the field trips. The two of them are full of knowledge and I am so glad we were lucky enough to have two very knowledgeable and involved professors to help us learn and grow throughout this trip.
Various tour guides:
In almost every city we visited on our own, we did a free walking tour. If you want to meet some of the most genuine and authentic people that live in the country you are visiting, I would highly recommend free walking tours. Every single tour guide we had, some I have talked about in previous blogs, knew so much about their city and was so passionate about teaching other people all the history. They were all so welcoming of us loud American’s and so receptive to some of our weird questions. I was able to learn so much from each and every tour that we went on and although the tour guides probably already forgot my name, I will never forget them and the impact they made on my life.
Bob & Nancy/ Sherry & Glenn
While on our tour of the Roman Colosseum (which was AMAZING) we met some truly inspiring people. Sherry & Glenn were in their upper 50’s and they were in Rome celebrating their 1 year anniversary. Sherry used to be a teacher but she quit her job to work for a nonprofit organization that helps put mental illness clinics in schools. She was so passionate about her job and it inspired me to find my passion in life and not settle for a job that I don’t love. She also told us that she had been divorced once before and she had just kind of accepted the fact that she was never going to get married again, it just didn’t seem necessary or plausible to her and she had finally accepted that… and then one day she met Glenn! She told us that life doesn’t always go as planned and everything doesn’t always work out how you think it should but there is a reason for everything and God ALWAYS has his plan for you. You could tell how happy she and Glenn were together and it made me so happy to see. I am lucky enough to have two incredible parents who have been married for 37 YEARS! However, many of my friends have divorced parents and that is much more common in our world today. Obviously, divorce is never anyone’s plan when they get married and it is not something anyone wants to go through in their life but Sherry and Glenn are a good example of how life always works out :)
Bob and Nancy brought me to tears a few times throughout this 3 hour tour. They have been married for 62 years and they have 7 kids, 14 grand kids, and 7 great grand kids!!! Bob started up a conversation with me and I almost immediately broke down because this sweet old man reminded me so so much of my Grandpa Don, who passed away last Christmas. Bob was such a quiet and soft spoken man but he made little jokes here and there, just like my Grandpa. He talked to me throughout the tour and told me that he and Nancy met on a blind date after he had gotten back from being a mechanic in the war… my grandparents also met on a blind date after my grandpa got back from the war. He then told me they had been married for 62 years which is right around the same amount of years my grandparents were married if I’m not mistaken. The amount of similarities that Bob had to my grandpa was so crazy to me. It hit me pretty hard and made me miss my grandpa so much but at the same time it was kind of nice to get the chance to meet someone, so far away from home, that reminded me so much of someone who means the world to me. I am so thankful for the chance to meet Bob and Nancy and be
reminded of those I love back home.
My 22 Classmates:
Words cannot even begin to explain how eternally grateful I am for each and every one of the other students on this trip!!!!! We have so many different personalities in this group and it has been so fun getting to know so many people I might not have ever met in my 4 years at UNK. We all always talk about how we have such a different bond than any other friendship in America because we have been through so much together. You can’t travel the world and handle all the struggles along the way without becoming close to those you travel with. No one back home will ever be able to understand our stories and emotions from this trip like we all will, and that's pretty special. We will forever have a bond like no other and I wouldn’t have it any other way :)
Our Fearless Leader: DOUG BIGGS
Last, but surely not least is our chief, our capitan, and our commander. Doug Biggs. Keeping up with 23 college kids isn’t an easy task to be given. Especially when during week one in Europe we lose a phone, a passport, and everyone’s freaking out about being homesick. I can imagine at times Doug wanted to leave us in the Czech and escape back to America but he handled every situation and every freak out calmly and willingly. He always showed up to class and field trips with a smile on his face and ready to learn. I appreciate how involved he was throughout our Czech language class because I feel like some professors could have come on this trip and not attended classes with us but Doug fully immersed himself whether it was a history lesson or Czech language. I appreciate his positive attitude and his eagerness to adventure! Back at UNK he works in the history department so odds are, our paths would’ve never crossed at UNK so I am so happy I got the chance to meet Doug and learn so much from him!
Writing this blog made me tear up a few times reflecting on the impact people I have met throughout this journey have had on my life. Those are just a few of the people who have affected my life in a positive way while on this trip. Many people we met was just for 10 or 20 minutes, whether it was a short conversation on the train, a front desk worker at a hostel we stayed at, or a waiter at a restaurant, there was a large amount of people who changed me for the better and may never know it. Sometimes it was sad to think of some of the awesome people we met that we had no way of contacting and would never see again but I think that in life, everyone you meet isn’t meant to be a long term person in your life. Some people are just meant to be short term, even just a few minutes. But whether someone is short term or long term in your life, you can learn something from each and every one of them, so when I get sad thinking about how I will probably never see them again, I think of all that I gained from just a short conversation with them. One of my main goals coming on this trip, was to meet as many people as possible, and learn something from each one of them. I have met so many different people and learned more than I could have ever imagined from each and every one of them. Thank you so much Europe for giving me this life changing experience!