By telling us your country of residence we are able to provide you with the most relevant travel insurance information.
Please note that not all content is translated or available to residents of all countries. Contact us for full details.
Shares
When I first arrived in Peru for my university year abroad, I was overwhelmed. Growing up in a tiny Austrian village, Lima felt loud and dirty, the unknown smells of markets were around every corner and everything was so colorful! As an exchange student my first new friends were other internationals. They were in the same boat as me. They were the ones who knew what I felt like when spending important holidays away from my family – so I spent Thanksgiving with Katie and Amy from the US and they spent Easter with me. Linda also from Austria were the ones who were daydreaming about Schnitzel with me when I desperately wanted something familiar and Hadrien from France was the one who shared the joy of “pooping normally”. However, as time passed and I grew more accustomed to Peruvian culture, I realized there was something missing. While I was having a great time, I kept feeling like I was missing out on something. I couldn’t really put my finger on it at first and it felt like an itch I couldn’t scratch. Then, four months in, my laptop broke. Studying in a foreign country where I didn’t really speak the language, my first reaction was slight panic. I needed to write papers! Study! Skype with my family! Help! To my rescue came my buddy that the local university had assigned to me who recommended a friend to fix my laptop. The night I met that friend, my whole exchange turned around. We hit it off, bonding over a mutual love for different cultures and stupid jokes no one but us thought were funny, that overnight we became best friends. While he never did manage to fix my laptop, he gave me so much more than that. He went ahead and took me to soccer games with his friends, invited me to Sunday dinners and BBQs, took me on trips with his family and to his favorite restaurants. His family taught me about local foods and had me practicing my Spanish (which didn’t always go well – I have yet to forget the time I mistakenly told his grandma I was exitada (aroused) rather than emocionada (excited) to meet her, or the time I told his mom I needed something to cagar (poop) instead of cargar (charge) my phone). Through him and his family, I experienced a connection with Peru and its culture that I never expected. The acceptance, inclusion and generosity his family showed me truly gave me a home 10000km away from home. To me, there is no saying that holds more truth than “You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere.”