By: Julie Han, Simon Fraser University, winner of the BC Study Abroad: Stories from Abroad Scholarship
Study Abroad Destination: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
In secondary school, I got the opportunity to attend a program at the University of Calgary for four weeks. The first weekend, I got 56 mosquito bites in 24 hours. The next morning, my legs swelled up like balloon animals by a drunk birthday clown. Two weeks later, from maybe 100 meters above, a seagull dropped a gnarly bomb right on my phone screen – bullseye. One week later, I ripped my big toenail off with a door frame. And those four weeks were eerily reminiscent of my first four weeks here at the University of Amsterdam. My dumb luck.
As soon as I landed, I was struck with the thick m...