First, you notice it, and it’s annoying. But whether or not you decide to do something about it depends on how comfortable you currently are. For lots of people, the itch is impossible to ignore. For others, it scratches away for years. But you know you can never be fully fulfilled without silencing it.
For me, that itch started in high school. I knew as soon as I finished, I wanted to get out. Obviously, life doesn't always go to plan; a few years of lockdowns later, I'm 21 and still yet to take that leap.
Still, 21 is not that long to wait in relative terms. Some people wait their whole lives to be able to escape. My swift departure from my home in Australian is both a result of being privileged and my internal drive to travel. I blame my parents for the latter and thank my lucky stars for the former.
Over the next five months, I'm going to share my journey as an exchange student in Liverpool. Storytelling is the best platform to eliminate prejudice. I have plenty of prejudice about where I'm headed. I’ve been told it’s one of the best cities in the UK. I’ve been told it’s unsafe. I’ve been told it has great nightlife. I’ve been told Newcastle's nightlife is better.
Currently, my best window of understanding into Liverpool's culture comes from a video of a Scouser explaining why Sadio Mane is the best football player in the world. If you don’t know the video, I advise you to look it up. Other influential figures you might have heard of also hail from here and somewhat shape my opinion. Do the Beatles ring any bells?
This will not be a "move abroad, it will change your life" blog.
So, that's the start. It’s a very crude, basic, and ignorant understanding. Let's hope that by recording my journey in online print, I can change my own and others minds about what the real Liverpool is like.
However, note to the reader: This will not be a "move abroad, it will change your life" style blog. Exemplar: I have just completed a three-month "trip of a lifetime," where the main thing I learned is that running from your problems doesn’t work. (Sorry to break it to you, but looking at some old buildings on the other side of the world doesn’t magically fix you. Besides, a great view is only magical until you're back at work, wishing your troubles away again.) There is a clear distinction anyway: this is a move abroad, not a vacation.
In an age where Instagram and TikTok feeds are full of van life and unobtainable vacation inspiration, this isn’t that. My life is not better than yours because I've decided to incorporate travel into my lifestyle. But if you have or think you might have that itch too, why not come move abroad with me for five months? Virtually, of course.
It’s going to be cold, it’s going to be wet, and it won't always be magical like the highly edited photos suggest. Instead, it’s bound to be funny, hard, boring, inspiring, unrelatable, relatable, and, most importantly, educational.
But hey, at least we're in it together, right?
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