To start off, my first international experience (that I can remember,) was visiting my dad in the US when I was just a little child. Although I did this multiple times a year, the first time I actually really remembered it was fascinating. It was truly my first experience of a foreign country. If you have ever been to a foreign country you know the feeling…you drive down the road and are just looking at every little detail, the trees, the houses, the fields, the way people walk…just Everything. All that, while my dad was re-teaching me all the English words I had forgotten since I was in the US the prior time.
Growing up in Europe made for very easy travel also, whereas in the US you may drive four hours to leave your state, in Germany you can drive four hours and be in a completely different country. This has allowed me to drive to countries such as France, Italy, and Austria (to attend a festival.) While you can categorize countries by continent, every country still has its very own and unique ways and traditions. Learning about different countries has always fascinated me, however an area to the world I have never been to growing up, but always wanted to go to was Asia.
On the left, Venice, Italy. On the right, Lake Garda, Italy.
Antalya, Turkey
In the summer of 2018 I was fortunate enough to go on a four week study abroad trip to China. It was BGSU faculty lead…and funny enough, our instructor for this course. Dr. Zhang, was the person in-charge of the study abroad program…Hi, Dr. Zhang! I won’t talk much about this experience here, because if your scroll down further on my blog, I wrote a very detailed post about my study abroad experience in China. But to summarize the trip, the first two weeks were spent at Shaanxi Normal University in Xi’an China, where we learned about international business in china, and about ancient Chinese culture and traditions; and the following two weeks were an internship at the Rural Energy and Environmental Agency in Beijing, China with a focus on marketing.
