In a few weeks I will be embarking on an adventure unlike anything I ever imagined myself doing. But let me start from the very beginning. My very first semester at BYU I took a class called Human Development from Larry Nelson. Since my major was still undeclared at that point, I had an open mind on what I might want to study. I immediately fell in love with the class and the information I was receiving. I knew then that I wanted to know more and continue on this path of learning how human's develop. But what exactly is Human Development? Well it pretty much is exactly what it sounds like. It is how a human (starting from birth) develops socially, emotionally, cognitively, and even spiritually throughout their life. I have especially taken an interest in adolescent children and how they retain the skills and characteristics needed to properly develop and successfully build proper relationships with the people around them. This interest led me to take multiple classes on this topic in which I continued to fall in love with the information. Throughout these courses, I noticed a certain theme kept coming up when discussing children who were deprived of a proper environment to develop in. This is when I was introduced to the Orphans in Romania.

I saw countless videos and images of children who were malnourished, neglected, and isolated from any affection and love. It continued to break my heart. I wanted so badly to help these children but BYU no longer had the program allowing students to go work in the orphanage. However, one day as I was leaving one of my classes, I received a flier about a program that does allow students to volunteer in the orphanage. It is called the International Language Program. It sparked my interest and I decided to look up the website and check it out. Then, I started to research it. And the more I researched it, the more I realized that I could actually go! After about a month of researching and praying and trying to figure out if this was something I could actually do, I decided to apply. Once I applied, everything seemed to fall into place and I was almost ready to go. After a few more looks at my financial situation, I decided to defer a few semesters. I started to second guess my decision to go as I thought about everything I would miss out on while I was gone. Then one day, I read a quote that really put things into perspective. The quote was, "Making a big life change is pretty scary. But, know what's even scarier? Regret". After reading that and realizing how much I would regret not going, I decided to go as soon as possible and haven't questioned that decision since.

So what exactly will I be doing??? Well I will be living in Iasi Romania for four months. I am currently going with seven other girls, none of whom I have ever met. We will be living in an apartment and will volunteer in the orphanage for 3-4 hours every morning Monday through Friday. In the orphanage I will be working with kids of all ages who all have disabilities. I will get to help teach them, play with them, and show them the affection that children need to properly develop. I will also be volunteering in an apartment where children who are about to be put into the foster system live. These environments will be very difficult to experience, but I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to help these kids.

I will also have the opportunity to do some travelling while in Europe and experience the different cultures throughout the world. I am hoping to travel to Greece, Italy, and Paris but anywhere I go will be an amazing experience. I am especially excited to travel around Romania and learn the culture of the people I will be surrounded by for the four months I am there. I have already learned a bit about the country. For example, Romanians are very superstitious. One superstition is that if a woman (such as myself) sits directly on the ground, her ovaries will freeze up and she will lose her ability to have children. So if I sit directly on the ground in the next four months, elderly Romanians will scold me and accuse me of freezing my ovaries. I also started to learn the language. Romanian is one of the five romance languages but so far I have seen no resemblance to Spanish which is the language I studied all throughout high school. So I will enter a country knowing how to say "Good morning", "Good afternoon" "My name is Carrie", "What is your name?", "How are you?", and "Thank you". All things considered, I think that's a pretty good start.

 This blog is where I will post pictures and post weekly updates on what new things I experienced or places I visited. I am so unbelievably excited to experience this incredible and life-changing next chapter of my life and I am happy to be able to share it with all of my friends and family. Ureaza-mi noroc! (Wish me luck!)