1.54am in the morning

Packing luggage for exchange is like preparing for war. Milo, rice, noodles, cleaning materials, clothes.

It is like food rationing as well, because you have to strategize and see which items are more economical to put in the hand luggage, or checked in luggage, because petty KLM refuses to grant me extra baggage allowance.

So I pack, and repack, and weigh that it's 35 kg, 15kg overweight which will cost me a hefty (ok lemme tell ya hefty doesn't even begin to describe it) sum of money.

So I repack again and throw some things out with a heartache because I can't bring my favourite shampoo and conditioner and shower foam and that familiar air freshener which I always use for hall (amongst other things) there and I whine to my parents.

And then the sis and I strategize again and now we are 10kg down (I hope, or at least 8kg). And I hope at the airport later we won't have to repack again. Sigh.


*


For a few weeks now every time I take a cab, this thought would always cross my mind, that the day and point in time where I am taking a cab to the airport to catch the flight to Göteborg will be the time and day that I am always wishing to go back to. The time where everything hasn't begun yet, the excitement, the adventure, the anticipation bursting, everything everything. That's the day that I had always been wanting to fast forward to, and will want to go back to one day.


*

People keep asking how I feel, about leaving for exchange. I don't know how to answer; how to put these feelings in mere words? It is a complex mix.