Goodbyes and Going Home :(

A bunch of Northeastern people left Sydney earlier than originally planned to get back home for various reasons. Lauren left on the 22nd so that she wouldn't have to start classes and her job the day after she got back and Brian and Cat left on the 23rd. Jim left at the end of May (crazy!) and Kaitlyn decided to stay in Australia for the rest of the year and do her co-op there--very cool. So, there were only a few of us left that stayed until the 28th (Me, Becca, Amy, Kate and Theresa). It was really bittersweet leaving Sydney because I knew that I would be seeing everyone from Northeastern again which was amazing because we all got so close, especially towards the end. But it was also really sad because there were SO many people that I met that I probably will never see again, at least not anytime in the near future. It seemed like we all got really close and became really good friends in the last month or so that we were in Sydney and it just kind of sucks that we all had to leave.
Packing was probably the worst thing ever, and I threw away all kinds of stuff that I brought with me in order to made room for souvenirs and other stuff that I acquired over the 5 months I was in Australia. The night before we left, the girls and I rented and watched Marley & Me because we all felt like we just needed to cry and that is the absolute best movie if you feel like being sad. Our flight was around 2:30 the next day so we packed up, cleaned up, checked out, moved out and piled into a van that took us to the airport. When we got there we found out that they had apparently overbooked our flight to San Fran and were asking people to give up their seats for an $800 United voucher and a seat on a flight the next day. All of us declined except Kate (of course!) and we finally boarded our first plan home. It felt really strange and really surreal to be going home and I couldn't quite process what was happening. I felt like a zombie, just going along with it, not really knowing what I was doing.
I sat next to Becca on the long flight (thankfully) which actually wasn't that bad and went pretty smoothly. We had a short layover in San Fran during which we all turned on our American cell phones for the first time, called friends and family and paid for stuff with American money--very strange and exciting! We got on our flight from San Fran to Boston and I immediately passed out and slept through the entire flight..take off to landing. I was SO excited to see my mom, Joy and Grace waiting for me at the bottom of the escalator when I got off the plane. Grace made me an awesome welcome home sign and Joy brought me a giant nalgene filled with MILK!! SO GOOD! (I drank the whole thing in like 15 minutes and then immediately regretted it). THEN I saw Kate and Laura run around the corner and I dropped all my stuff and ran to give them hugs! So good to see them after so long and I'm so glad they were able to make it to the airport to meet me! They too had some awesome welcome home signs for me :)
We all went back to my house (kate and laura slept over) and I sort of felt like I hadn't even been away. It was so weird to be home but at the same time I kind of felt like Australia was just a dream. It was really nice to be with my best friends and family when I got home though because they had already heard about everything I had done there and didn't have to ask any questions. I was still on Australia time, so I don't think I ended up going to be that night until like 4 in the morning. The next day my mom had to wake me up at 2pm so that I wouldn't sleep the rest of the day!

I was glad to be home, but it was really strange not sleeping in UniLodge and being just feet away from all my friends. I felt like all I wanted to do was talk to the people from Sydney because those were the people that I had become SO close with in the last 5 months and I didn't really know what to do without them yet..