June is a strange month. Two years ago at this time, I had just completed a rather harrowing first year of college. My dad was undergoing chemo and my first real relationship with my first real boyfriend had fallen apart right out from under me. That summer, I worked in the kitchen at an overnight camp a half hour away, and every day during my commute I would listen to “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergie on the radio and sob.  On my days off, I laid in bed for hours at a time, inconsolable, always thinking “Things will never, ever get better.”Last year, I had just arrived in New York with a very cool job and a near-microscopic apartment in Hell’s Kitchen. I came expecting a life I’d only seen in glossy magazines, but in my flip-flops and ponytail it was proving difficult. I was clueless and terrified, but mostly I was lonely. My friends were limited. I dated my bartenders and drank my feelings. But some nights on my way home from the East Village (drunk off something no one carded me for) I’d look up at the Chrysler Building, feel a surge of gratitude and joy, and think, “Things will eventually get better.”This week marks the end of my semester in South Africa. Coming here has proved— far and away— the best thing I’ve ever done. The other night Nira and I were walking along the ocean on the outskirts of this tiny Xhosa village, separated by miles and miles from anything familiar. South Africa is so politicized, so volatile, always on the brink of another explosion. This place felt like nowhere— not the Eastern Cape, not South Africa, not even Africa itself. It felt like everywhere, too. It was one of those moments where you feel so insignificant and tiny but also a part of something so much greater than yourself. “I don’t think things could ever get better than this,” I remarked to Nira. We walked along for another few minutes in silence. The stars overhead shone so bright.

June is a strange month. Two years ago at this time, I had just completed a rather harrowing first year of college. My dad was undergoing chemo and my first real relationship with my first real boyfriend had fallen apart right out from under me. That summer, I worked in the kitchen at an overnight camp a half hour away, and every day during my commute I would listen to “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergie on the radio and sob.  On my days off, I laid in bed for hours at a time, inconsolable, always thinking “Things will never, ever get better.”

Last year, I had just arrived in New York with a very cool job and a near-microscopic apartment in Hell’s Kitchen. I came expecting a life I’d only seen in glossy magazines, but in my flip-flops and ponytail it was proving difficult. I was clueless and terrified, but mostly I was lonely. My friends were limited. I dated my bartenders and drank my feelings. But some nights on my way home from the East Village (drunk off something no one carded me for) I’d look up at the Chrysler Building, feel a surge of gratitude and joy, and think, “Things will eventually get better.”

This week marks the end of my semester in South Africa. Coming here has proved— far and away— the best thing I’ve ever done. The other night Nira and I were walking along the ocean on the outskirts of this tiny Xhosa village, separated by miles and miles from anything familiar. South Africa is so politicized, so volatile, always on the brink of another explosion. This place felt like nowhere— not the Eastern Cape, not South Africa, not even Africa itself. It felt like everywhere, too. It was one of those moments where you feel so insignificant and tiny but also a part of something so much greater than yourself. “I don’t think things could ever get better than this,” I remarked to Nira. We walked along for another few minutes in silence. The stars overhead shone so bright.