Realities of Living in a Different Country for a Year

This blog post is a little different than what I normally write about, but I think the topic is very important to address. Traveling is not all rainbow and butterflies. No matter how amazing a Working Holiday Visa sounds, living in a different country has a little more to it than just being one big holiday. No matter how many spectacular photos you may see posted on Instagram and Facebook, social media definitely falls short of being a realistic representation of someone's life. You only see the good things. We post about all the amazing things we are doing and seeing and our whole life of travel looks like nothing short of a dream. And I am definitely as guilty of this as anyone else. But the thing is, people don't get to see the real things - the very real and challenging things that are going on behind all the breathtaking photos of mountains and videos of swimming with dolphins. So I'm going to put aside the beautiful photos and be real for a second.

Today sucked. I did not have a very good day.

There was really no particular reason why. I was just feeling crummy and sad. But just like any normal person, I still had to go to work and pretend to be super happy as I served a ton of customers in the cafe I'm working at. I came back to the hostel I'm living at, seeking some relaxing alone time, which is pretty difficult to come by when you live in a place constantly filled with people. There's really nowhere to go to be alone. Honestly, I just wanted to be by myself and have a good cry, but that didn't happen. I soon had to start my three hour cleaning shift at the hostel which also requires me to be social and happy - which I clearly did not feel like doing. Am I looking for your pity that I had a bad day? Absolutely not. There was nothing in particular about my day that made it any different from the rest; I just didn't feel happy. The crazy thing about this is, whenever I have a day like this, there is always part of me that doesn't want anyone to know. I almost feel guilty telling people back home that I had a bad day or am sad, even though honestly all I want to do is call my mom or my best friend and just tell them all about it. Why is this? I think as a traveler, I realize how fortunate I am to be able to live and travel in such an amazing place. I realize that some people unfortunately don't get the opportunity to do what I'm doing. So I feel bad for even in the slightest making it sound like I'm not happy. But here's the thing:

That is life.

Life is not all rainbows and butterflies. Traveling is not all rainbows and butterflies, especially when you are traveling for a year. There are going to be days when you are sad. there's going to be days that just plain suck. And you know what, that's okay! That's totally normal and nothing to be ashamed of. Before I came to New Zealand, I prepared myself for the fact that I WOULD have bad days and that things wouldn't be all good all the time, but no matter how much I tried to prepare myself, it couldn't change the fact that it would happen. Here are a couple things that I didn't prepare myself for that have been particularly hard.

1. Figuring out what you are doing with your life for a whole year in a different country is incredibly stressful. When I first got to New Zealand, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, where I would be living, working, or anything else for that matter. I planned it this way because I wanted the freedom to get to New Zealand and "see where the wind took me." I don't regret doing this because I think looking for present opportunities is a good way to travel. It didn't change the fact that the uncertainty of where you will be for a whole year of your life is a pretty uneasy feeling.

2. The amount of change that occurs is very overwhelming. A couple weeks ago I was blessed to get a job in the beautiful town of Kaikoura. Things worked out so that I was able to work for accommodation at a hostel as well. But I soon found myself completely overwhelmed by the amount of change that happened all at once. I was suddenly starting a new job at the cafe and meeting new people, starting a new job cleaning the hostel and meeting all new people there, living with 5 new roommates, starting a whole new routine, being in a completely new town, and not to mention living in a completely different country. Folks, let me tell you, that is a whole heck of a lot of changes all at once. And it was pretty overwhelming. Amazing? Yes. Do I love it? Yes. But also very very overwhelming.

3. When I do have a bad day it's actually pretty hard to find someone who I am able to talk to about it. I love both of my jobs but at this point, I haven't made close enough friends to be able to feel comfortable enough to talk to them about the crap day that I've had. That leaves me with talking to my friends and family back home. The only problem is, by the time I'm done working, everyone is sleeping. It can get pretty lonely when you don't have close friends to talk to in person, and the ones on the phone are in a completely different time zone making it impossible to talk whenever you want.

4. Meeting friends that come and go so quickly is very hard. As a solo traveler, meeting new friends is incredibly easy. I meet wonderful people that I would like to be friends with all the time, but the problem? Pretty much all of them are traveling as well and don't stick around for long. They are off on their own adventure. It's pretty sad to always see potential friends move on to the next place and knowing you probably won't see them again.

So the moral of this blog post is if you look at my pictures and think that I must have the perfect life, just know that I don't. Traveling is amazing and I am so blessed to get the opportunity to be in New Zealand for a year, but I have also gone through so many challenges, changes, and ups and downs in the past couple months that I think I have in the past few years back home in the US. I can honestly say that I am proud of myself. Though it may seem like I'm on one big vacation, this whole year in New Zealand has been an amazing growing opportunity for me and has challenged me and pushed me out of my comfort zone more times than I can count. I believe this is a very valuable thing about traveling. It provides you with tremendous room for growth, even through the days that aren't so great.