Heartbroken

With a heavy heart, I am writing this post as I am on my flight back home to the US. From the last time I posted until now, we all know that everything in the world has dramatically changed regarding COVID-19. I am truly and utterly sad that I am being forced to go home two months early, and there was nothing that I can do about it but drag myself to the airport.

Last week when all study abroad programs were beginning to shut down, my friends and I knew that it was only a matter of time before DIS Stockholm was going to suspend its program too. Last Thursday when President Trump gave his broadcasted announcement, we all stayed up to watch it. It was 2 am our time when it began.

He threw every American outside of the US into a massive panic – he never specified that US citizens will still be able to return home once the ban was enacted. Once he said this in his speech, my friends all went into a frenzy calling their parents trying to get the next flight back home. I didn’t do that. I was mostly in shock about everything and I was in denial about the whole situation. Because I didn’t want to believe it to be true. It wasn’t until we received the email at 4:30 in the morning from our program telling us that we have to go home that I knew it was all over. Reality sunk in for me when I had no other option but to rebook my return tickets home.

I was able to extend my stay in Stockholm for an extra week. Part of it was because I recently broke my glasses and was hastily waiting for my new pair to arrive before I had to go home, and the other part was that I really really didn’t want to leave. I’m so glad that I didn’t rush to leave Sweden because I gave myself another week to explore Stockholm. I was allowed to take in the city and give myself a proper goodbye (for now). A part of me wished that my flight would get canceled so that I would be stuck in Europe. The way I see it and the way things are going on at the moment, it would have been much safer to ride out the coronavirus pandemic in Sweden than to get on a plane and go back to the US where the virus is silently spreading.

Once I am home I will have to self-quarantine for two weeks, giving myself plenty of time to sulk around and get really deep into my thoughts. I’ll be finishing my classes online this semester, but will all the free time I’ll have I may as well find a job for the next couple of months. But who knows how easy that will be given the current situation? One goal I am giving myself is to get back into an exercising routine and sticking with it.

I am sorry for writing this post with such a somber tone. I am just really sad that this is how the events unfolded. Studying abroad is something I was looking forward to for such a long time, and now it has been ripped from my hands, and I have no one to assign blame to for making me feel this way. I will just have to learn to let things go that are beyond my control – it’s just going to take a while to learn.

As I’ve been in tears through most of the day, I just want to acknowledge the people out there who are gifted with the ability to have compassion and empathy for other people. When I arrived at the gate for my flight, I was randomly selected for another security check. The security agent saw that I was in tears, and once I was cleared for boarding, she pulled me away from the main waiting area to sit and talk with me while giving me a welcoming hug. I’m in awe of people like her, who go out of their way to help others, even if it’s as simple as being there with them. And that is why I love Sweden: there are tons of people like that here.

All in all, I will be back in Sweden. Sitting at home for two weeks will also give me plenty of time to hunt for an internship there over the summer. I hope this pandemic blows over soon because at some point, we have to live our lives. It’s awfully weird sitting in a plane where there are only 26 passengers when this aircraft is designed to fit more than 200. But I guess I’ll appreciate this once in a lifetime experience of having literally no one around me on this flight. Chances of contracting COVID-19 here seem pretty slim, don’t you think?

All jokes aside, I’ll be back Sweden. I promise you that.

Tack för allt Sverige och jag ses snart.

(Thank you for everything Sweden, and I’ll see you soon).