From studying abroad to studying at home

Harbour Bridge, Sydney

           Over the course of the past few weeks, my life, similar to everyone else’s around the world, has dramatically changed with the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic. Everything that was so concretely part of my life plan, turned into one frantic decision to book a flight back home to Dubai. 2020 began with me heading off to study abroad in Sydney, Australia, something I had been anticipating and planning for the past 5 years. When applying to universities from high school and seeing all the study abroad possibilities, something about Australia was enticing to me, and I just knew I’d be there one day. Having Australia as a study abroad opportunity was a prerequisite for almost all universities I applied to. Coming to UCSB, the EAP department knew me from the moment I walked in freshman year. After seeing all my friends go abroad fall quarter this year, my time had finally come to go to the University of Sydney. I worked tirelessly to organize my class schedule to perfection, moved completely into my new apartment, explored every corner and little street of my neighborhood to discover the best cafes, restaurants and study spots. My route to university was my favorite part of every day, simply walking through the city, listening to a podcast or my favorite music, and stopping at my favorite coffee shop to the “Morning Hana, the usual?” that the owner always greeted me with. I continued to explore every day, and made the best of friends from all different universities. Four weeks in, I was notified that my program would be suspended, and within 24 hours I booked a flight home back to Dubai for the very next morning. I can confidently say, that day was the most stressful and emotional day of my life. I rushed to pack up my new life in Sydney, said some quick goodbyes, and folded away the list of things I wanted to do and places I wanted to visit.

Opera House, Sydney

            So here I am, in Dubai with my family, back just in time to enroll in spring quarter at UCSB. My emotions are sporadic, to say the least. When I left Australia, it was such a spur-of-the-moment decision that I didn’t get the space or time to process anything, but being home in isolation puts me through what feels like a thousand different emotions a day. Some days I see a picture of Australia or remember a particular memory that makes me want to blame the world for taking my experience away from me after less than a month. The stress of online classes, the sadness of missing out on my abroad experience, the comfort and love of being home, the sleeplessness of waking up at 3am Dubai time for my 2pm lecture in California, the claustrophobia of being in lockdown, the irritability of living at home again, and the worry of what’s to come. These are just a fraction of the emotions I’m sure we’re all going through.

Bondi Beach, Sydney

What has helped me the most through this time, is acknowledging that no matter where you are in the world, no matter what background you have, or race you are, or beliefs you hold, we are all in this together. For me, being upset was part of the process, and still is some days. But being upset is okay, because as soon as I allowed myself to be emotional, I realized that there’s so much more to life than what we’re going through. In fact, there’s so much more to look forward to, whether that be planning my next visit to Australia and anticipating the things I never got to do, or something as simple as being able to hug my friends, jump in the ocean, and run in the park. As cliche as it sounds, distance makes the heart grow fonder, and quite frankly, I think the world is really taking that saying to an extreme, but truly there’s so many little moments to look forward to once we all come out of this together. Now is a time for me to stay home and use my time and energy into working even harder. No excuses. I finally have all the time I wish I had. Getting into a routine has been my kind of saving grace as each thing I tick off of my weekly “to do” list is yet another motivation to keep putting in that hard work.