Featured image: Natalie Bhart

Homesickness hits different when you’re 10,000 miles away.

I’ve always hated the cold, so it’s a good thing that summers back home in Brisbane, Australia are practically year-round. Now, three weeks into my student exchange at Manchester Metropolitan University, I’m still trying to adjust to the seemingly persistent rain and freezing wind. But there’s nowhere I’d rather be.

I’ve lived in Brisbane my entire life. All those balmy, cloudless days were beginning to blend together, and I was itching for a break from the sunny monotony. After several months of non-stop form-filling and obsessively checking my email, the long-awaited acceptance letter to Manchester Met arrived. Despite my excitement, there was a gnawing uncertainty – a feeling that was strongest the moment my parents and I tearfully hugged goodbye.

My first few days here blurred into a jet-lagged haze crouched next to the heater in my dorm, shivering, while on the other side of the world my friends danced at music festivals and sunned themselves at the beach. I felt the bitter sting of #FOMO whenever I’d check my phone and see photos of them together – tanned, bikini-clad and beaming – and wondered if I’d made a huge mistake leaving them behind, even if only temporarily. After all, six months feels like an eternity when you’re 20, and so much can change so quickly. Would my friends back home forget about me?

I felt truly homesick for the first time when a stranger wearing my best friend’s perfume passed me on the street. The familiar scent stopped me in my tracks, and a sharp pang shot through my chest as I remembered I wouldn’t be home for her birthday this year.

At first I was terrified to speak to anyone. I cursed myself for being incapable of adjusting overnight to my new environment. Just one week into my exchange, I already felt like a failure – a feeling exacerbated by the fact that two of my friends from back home, also on student exchange in Bristol and Milan, were faring much better than I was. Friend #1 had made firm friends on her first day; Friend #2 was already going on Hinge dates. Meanwhile, I wandered around campus alone trying to keep my UGGs dry.

I walked around the city a lot in those early days, bundled in multiple coats and wearing at least three layers of pants. At first, not being able to recognise a single place or face was overwhelming and disorienting, but soon enough, I saw it for what it was – an opportunity for change.

Slowly, Manchester stopped feeling so foreign. It started to welcome me in small, unexpected ways. Maybe that started with the stranger on the street who, on my first day, seemed to telepathically sense my confusion and stopped to give me directions unprompted.

Then a girl who works at the vintage store invited me out for drinks, and my fellow students in my poetry class didn’t laugh when the tutor called on me to read my work aloud. Gradually these experiences chipped away at my uncertainty, helping me realise there might be a place for me here.

Just like I’m learning to withstand the cold, I’m also developing the skills and resilience to put myself out there. By leaving behind my friends and family – albeit temporarily – I’ve given myself the freedom to embrace a new community. Starting somewhere new is a process that can make you deeply vulnerable, and the initial loneliness can be overwhelming. But the experience of uprooting my entire life and ending up OK has given me a newfound confidence to try new things and seek out new communities, like volunteering for aAh! Magazine.

As a Journalism major, I’m grateful for the opportunity to get involved in Manchester Met’s student community through an outlet that gives me a sense of familiarity in this new place. More than that, volunteering here makes me feel like I’m not just passing through – I’m becoming part of something.