Now whilst this entire process was a cycle of excitement and stress for me I can’t help but wonder how my parents would have felt during this period. I am their first child after all and it cant be easy to prepare to see your child leaving. I wasn’t allowed to go to sleepovers until I was a teenager so how would they let me go to the other side of the world in a foreign place we had never even been to before? Living in Dubai my entire life I am used to a very cocooned and utopian world that is safe and comfortable a life for which I am grateful for. Nevertheless in every conversation with my parents about moving out they always emphasise of the cultural and social shock I will experience when I leave my comfort zone and become vulnerable to peer pressure and “dangers of the real world”. In my head I like to believe I’m ready I’m a mature person how bad can it be? As the first child I was more of an experiment of sorts. All first happened with me and then the takeaways were applied to my younger sister. And as the oldest cousin in the family there aren’t that many people my parents can relate to in terms of emotions and dealing with empty nest syndrome. Every conversation at family gatherings revolve around it. Moving to college is an exciting and anxiety provoking process in a nutshell.

The transition between finishing High School and preparing for university is a surreal feeling. The drastic contrast between hustling through A level exams to and counting down the days to summer and now when summer has arrived and all of a sudden there is very little work to do is very difficult for my type A personality to fathom. At times it sounds like my family is getting prepared to send me on a one way mission to Mars! But that is probably equivalent to what it feels like in their eyes once I leave to comfortable shelter of their protection it is unlikely that I will return. Change is difficult but it is also exciting as it means taking on new journeys and growing up.