The Art of Writing about Travel: Rewards of travel blogging, and closure that need be made

(The Art of Travel, post 15, Farewells

this is my final post for my blogging course!)

I still have four full weeks until I return home to the States, meaning the end is looming near, but I still have several days to explore and participate in activities on my list of things I want to do with my time here. Then, inevitably, and as is the case for most NYU students right now, school will take over with final papers, projects and presentations. I’m trying not to think about all of that right now, however, and enjoy my last month here in Buenos Aires.

By semester’s completion, I will be able to say I’ve been to two cities in Chile, two in Uruguay, and three different provinces (many visited cities within them) of Argentina.  Although these destinations may not be as extensive a list as others’, I’m still pretty impressed and more than pleased to have those passport stamps and stories to tell.  I’m seriously going to miss everything that is South America, everything that will become my memories of South America (preemptively making memories is such a silly game I play, or perhaps, a terrible habit I have).  The somewhat embarrassing self-picture I have posted here is from the trip I took by myself to San Carlos de Bariloche in Patagonia.

And throughout it all, I have been incredibly thankful to be in this course.  I haven’t been enrolled in a writing course since freshman year, and am pretty horrible at keeping up with personal writing if I’m not forced to do so.  And although I have not been all that great about the regularity of my posts (as is something to be learned about the ‘art’, per se, of blogging), I always find the time I take to sit down and write them enjoyable.  And in this last post, I find the time I have taken to look back on my old posts even more enjoyable, if not a shock, combined with humble moments of reminiscing.  I find it a fair generalization to say that all of us have certainly changed throughout this semester because of our experiences, and are able to notice these changes based on our recorded first memories and our knowledge now.  Is not that the point of a journal, or the public version, a blog?  Tracking these changes and these experiences has been, I think, essential, and that is why I am, as I will reiterate, thankful for this course.

Beyond this blog, I also have a more personal blog, conducted through blogspot, where I repost these pieces along with adding some other ones every now and then (when I can, and when I feel the need to – you can read these other posts here [this was originally a link to THIS blog!]).  And if I didn’t have this course to be a starter’s guide or a source of things to post on that other site, I would not have been quite as ambitious.  Another reason to be thankful.

Now here comes the hardest part of all: having to end both of these sources of public writing, having to end my adventures abroad, having to say goodbye to a city I have come to know and love.  As already mentioned, however, I still have time to make my farewells, but am most certainly not looking forward to it, no matter how much I want to see my friends and family at home.

I am more than happy that I decided to take a semester abroad, however.  It is something that is much more widely advertised for college students in our generation, just as it should be.  The encouragement comes with good reason.  I was scared to go at first, almost reluctant.  And now I think it crazy that I ever doubted coming to Buenos Aires.  The stories I have, the things I’ve seen, the new ways of living I plan to carry with me for the rest of my life, will be with me forever (I feel that goes without saying).  And I know, above all, that I will, one day, be back.  So perhaps this farewell is more of a “goodbye for now” type deal, because I find it inevitable that one day, I will return.

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Dear Ensueños readers:

Now I have posted all of my blog posts that I had to write for my 2-credit course called The Art of Travel. You can read them all here on this blog, with the tags of 'the art of travel', or you can go to the actual course's website and see my posts here. When pursuing the second link, I very much recommend checking out the other students' blogs (you will see a sidebar on the left called "Blogroll Spring 2012 -- make sure you are on the Art of Travel tab) where you can read about students' adventures, realizations, and tall tales from Florence, Paris, Berlin, Abu Dhabi, other students in Buenos Aires, and my favourite posts to read each week: the students in Accra, Ghana. It's been a semester of work, so please check them all out! I hope you've enjoyed the guided themed posts and everything. This last post expresses my gratitude for having this writing course this semester. And although the class is over, I do plan on continuing to write my own personal posts and keep up with the blog, until, of course, it comes time to leave this wonderful city.

Thank you all, muchísimas gracias :)