As I was preparing myself before coming to the U.S., I experienced mixed feelings which included excitement, sad, nervous, and happy. All these just happened at once as I was thinking about leaving my family again (for the second time) and at the same time I could not wait to experience and explore new things.

When I arrived in South Dakota I did experience a major change regarding transportation and diversity, and these are the things that I found different from what I experienced before in Boston. It is difficult to travel around South Dakota as there are less option for public transportation. There are also not many international students in Vermillion, so, I believe that this is might be the reason why there are few options for Asian food. However, the good thing is that I am adapting to this new change and I am starting to feel ease. I am also happy that I have made many friends and recently I also did my first 3 hours community service in Vermillion.

Vermillion is very pretty and safe to walk around until night time, and what I like best about my community is that they are friendly. I found that there are similarities and differences between U.S. and Timor student life. The similarities would be that they work hard to achieve good grades and also to graduate. The differences would be the school system that students follow, students in the U.S. are involved in athletics and many of them love partying in the weekends too.

When I think about the year ahead, I am looking forward to travel, especially, road trips around U.S. for sightseeing. On the other hand, I also have big concern regarding the school meals as they are so high in calories and I am more into healthy food. However, I hope I will find a way for that.