Previously published on Bina Antarbudaya Medium page on November 3rd, 2016. Words may have changed due to the fixing of any grammatical error.
October 2016. Tecumseh, Michigan.
It was sunny when I first stepped my feet in Tecumseh, Michigan. As the wind breezed, I looked around in this unfamiliar neighborhood; not knowing that I will soon know this street like the back of my hand. I glanced at the foreign couple in front of me; not knowing how easy it will be to call them mom and dad later on.
It was rainy the next day when my parents took me up north and camp for the first time. The next three days I did what a real Michigan girl does: canoed and swum on the lake. When I finally got back to Tecumseh, I explored my city. It amazed me — someone who lives her whole life in Jakarta, the Capital of Indonesia — to hear how silent everything is; the streets were not filled with traffic and of honking cars. I walked again and breathed deeply. Again, it amazed me; the air was so clean and fresh. That was when I realized, I am 15,000 miles away from home.
It was sunny the first time I rode my bus to school. I was smiling that day; I was still smiling this morning when I went there. For all the relationship I share with friends and teachers, I am happy. School has been going on very well. I was chosen to be the Student of the Month in business class. I won the debate on presidential election in my government class and eventually chosen to be the president of the class.
There are outside of school activities that I have been doing as well. I join Tecumseh Community Choir and we are going to have a Christmas Concert on December 4th. I have a Musical Theatre Dance class and we are going to have a recital in a couple of months. I volunteer to help a theatre play for elementary student as the production team. It is amazing because I get to do the things that I like and do not have a chance to do in Jakarta.
I visited all kinds of beautiful places; from Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in the wonderful Lake Superior, to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in Lake Michigan. I saw the Noah’s Ark Encounter in Kentucky and visited the famous Henry Ford Museum in Detroit and also lots of waterfalls in Michigan Upper Peninsula. I gazed upon God’s creation and I thought I should come up with something grand and poetic, but all that I can say is, “It’s lovely.”
It was loud when I first stepped my feet inside the biggest college football stadium in U.S.A. More than 100.000 people were all chanting for the University of Michigan Football team. We drove home happily that night; we won 41 to 8.
It is wonderful on how my exchange year has been going so far. From the magnificent thing like cruising around the largest body of freshwater in the world to small simple things that I do for the first time like kayaking, playing putt-putt golf, going up to a lighthouse, carving pumpkins, and going for trick-or-treat.
It was cold the first time I saw the trees started to change colors and eventually lose their leaves. It’s breathtaking on how they reveal colors they have been hiding all summer. And in the midst of cold weather, with the breeze of the wind, and with 15,000 miles in between, tell the world that here, is my home too.
