 Hey everybody, welcome to this week's video. We are going to be doing just like a fun little Q&A. I barely ever sit down and like actually film a Q&A. Also, can I just say, usually I've done a few Q&A's on this channel before and usually it's like literally two people that write me questions and then the rest of them. I remember the first Q&A I did on this channel. I think maybe two people asked me a question and one of them was like a YouTube friend. So the fact that I received like a lot of questions, so many questions that this may get split up into two parts, I actually don't know. It's really cool and like there's a lot of you. There's not really a lot like in the grand scheme of things in the scheme of YouTube but like we're almost at 4,000. Like that's a lot of people and yeah I just wanted to take a little moment because you know it rarely gets brought up in my content but I'm really grateful for all of you guys for like sticking around and for watching my videos. Like that's just it, it is truly still bizarre to me that I don't know, I'm just some girl. I have really oversold my competence. Like why are you guys listening to me? So the first question is how do you stay productive or just not bored during a gap year? On my gap year I experience something to what I would call like a panic spiral. Like sometimes if I just have a free day I wake up and I'm like well what am I gonna do? And for the first maybe month of my gap year I when I really decided I did what I would normally do in that situation and I applied for like maybe four jobs in my field and my field is arts management if you guys don't know that and everything was shut down the summer of 2020 when I was planning on getting a job so I basically got rejected from like every single job I applied for because the internship programs all shut down. Like everyone was closing their doors. I ended up getting a job in this company and that was just supposed to last for a semester but I ended up staying with them for like a year-ish like I'm not the length of a school year and I think that that was a really great way to parse out my time. I only worked part-time with them because it was an internship and they didn't really need me for that much work. I also took on like a small blog writing job that year. I still had all this free time and really during the pandemic like I wasn't seeing anybody so it was definitely a very different doing nothing than like I assume this person who asked this question like I know who asked this question if you don't know me at all. Is it fun when I over explain things? Yeah but I think that having a job really helped and even going for like a part-time job as much as like having those extra days off and in the middle of the pandemic really kind of stressed me out. As far as like exposure was going at that point like I wasn't really being exposed to any people and I was living with my family so it all worked out. It gave me a lot of time to work on YouTube which is something that I was like literally so scared to do but I had wanted to do for two years. Yeah my first videos are not good um at all like the first year of my videos are just like a little cringe. Some of them are just really chaotic so if if you want to scroll all the way back there and see what was going on with me during the pandemic you're welcome to. It's just it's just a little funny um but let me did I answer the actual question how do you stay productive and just not bored during your gap year? Um and yeah I honestly just made a whole video about this and about how I think like listening like a whole year you should do something with it. If you don't know what you want to do at the start of your year if you don't know what you want to do after your gap year it's just a really like nice I always called this in my old videos like a blank slate of time to figure some stuff out and I think having that little like panic spiral moment last for more than like a couple weeks of like I really don't know what I'm doing. It sort of makes you focus on what you're not doing so you can get to a place of being like no this is what I want to do and honestly I'm going to talk about this like a little bit later in the video because I know there are some questions about it but traveling is a really good option you can do like world packers I'll talk about them I'm actually an affiliate partner with them however besides that it was a really like eye-opening and one of the best experiences on my study abroad year in Edinburgh. I think that would be a really cool way to spend your gap year volunteering trying to find an internship in your field starting a passion project while you just like you know if you need to work work and then do your passion project on the side and just like make little challenges for yourself like I think when you're 18 you don't know anything like I mean just challenge yourself to like learn how to cook or learn how to go to the gym I didn't know what I was doing in the gym when I was 18 hell no I like went there and I like I don't even know like a go for a run go home like walk a little bit panic you can read readings fun the next question is there anything that you wish you would have done differently while studying abroad honestly I'm not the type of person I'm like I'm the worst type of person to ask this kind of question too because my answer is always like I don't have regrets um but I honestly I don't I don't like to live that way and yes there are maybe certain things looking back now that I was like I should have just calmed down and gone with the flow a little bit more and I like at the beginning I think that everybody who goes abroad is like a little bit resistant to change that's just very natural because you're in a holy place and you find yourself just like like I remember some events really in the UK don't start like club events don't start until like 8 p.m. and they're like on Tuesdays and Thursdays and that really upset me at first because I was like I school in the morning like what am I gonna do what are you talking about I have things to do and like I didn't have things to do well I had some I don't know I had some things to do but I was really resistant to that but then by the second semester I like kind of gave in and I was like no actually I don't have to get up at an early hour and like get all this stuff done that's arbitrary I should go out and like have some fun I guess that's my my answer is like don't let opportunities pass you by because you're like stubborn because when you when I gave into the non-stubbornness that's when like I really started having a lot of fun next question is how hard were University of Edinburgh's classes for you honestly I don't know I mean well I'll give an honest answer like I did I did pretty well in my classes over there I was a little bit concerned concerned but the University of Edinburgh is a very good school and I was a little overwhelmed thinking that I wouldn't be able to handle the workload or that my work wouldn't produce at a level they were looking for but honestly I did pretty well in my classes I think if you pay attention and you read all the things they give you and figuring out the system of learning if you're not from the UK and you're not used to it is a challenge within itself because a lot of the times I felt like I was doing no work for the class if you aren't keeping up with the readings and keeping up with your tutorial things like it really will bite you in the when exams come and honestly it was a I really enjoy the UK system of learning I'm back to US school and I'm like I'm doing so much work and for what reason I'm bitter about it guys I'm bitter about it and I no one understands okay no one understands me I still need to brought okay I'm sorry this isn't funny um yeah I really liked it a lot of it was independent work it stressed me out at first when I talked about that it really stressed me out at first I was like I I'm sorry ma'am I have to I have to read all these things and then go to class for like maybe five hours a week it was that really stressed me out but I think once you realize that it's like it's really nice to not be stressed out like that and you have more time to really plan and read and sit and think on the material because you still have to know the material but no one's testing you being like oh do you remember this one thing that you read two two times ago it's like it's well like when you get to the exam it's like do you know this thing and you understand it and can you analyze it in a critical way in writing paper which I found much easier than like a multiple choice test just in that's just my own thing though I've just always I've always had more of an inclination towards writing than I have for like I I did ap classes in high school and like the the trickery around like the one question two answers are right and one of them is more right absolutely not nope can't do it this person said must do in Edinburgh honestly if you're ever feeling emo just go up to Arthur seat by yourself and like sit on the cliff and look over at the city that is something that I miss doing so much like it was such a like the drama of it I just loved it um Arthur seat is just beautiful seeing the castle it's really hard to miss in Edinburgh it is it's honestly shocking the first time you see it because it's it's just a castle like you're in the middle of the city and then you look up and you're just like that's a that's a that's a castle and then the other question they asked were this is the same person what are classes like at Edinburgh slash the UK classes are split up I kind of answered like some of this but it's very disjointed I apologize so classes are very much like you have lectures attached to your classes and then tutorials and tutorials you have once a week for each class you're taking and you meet with about like 15 10 to 15 people and you discuss a topic that's usually to do with the lecture material that you covered the week before I really liked this style of learning I I at university of Edinburgh is a really really big school so I was thinking that it would feel I would feel a little bit lost in the shuffle but I actually found that during a lecture it was really nice to like sit and absorb the material just through listening and taking notes right and then you go to the tutorial and you really get to like talk about it and get to know some of the people in your like 10 to 15 person group and it definitely depends I mean it depends on everything always depends on who your group is whether people are invested in the topic and care but I really liked that system and then for each class I usually just had like a paper or two I think one class the most work I ever had in class was two papers and a final but the rest of it was just usually a paper and a final and most of the work that we did in our tutorials was not graded which really took the pressure off but it was like a new type of pressure where like you wanted to contribute to the conversation which I found really cool because it just created a culture of like not like you have to know this stuff to sit in class it's like no you should want to read this stuff and be able to talk about it so that you sound smart or that you can contribute you know that kind of thing what was your favorite food that you ate abroad when you ate when you studied abroad I'm looking at you Scotland yeah I mean Scotland's not exactly known for its cuisine um definitely not haggis you know what I can really f*** up a toss tiki toffee pudding I would maybe say that I love a sticky toffee pudding that's like I don't know the UK has really good Indian food I love Indian food and they had really good Thai food so I would say that Italian in Edinburgh is a little iffy surprised myself with my willingness to eat weird things like I did eat haggis that one I can with a hundred percent certainty I don't recommend it um I recommend the experience because having the experience I don't know it was just the haggis that I had it was really bad hi everybody my camera battery died I forgot what I was talking about so we're gonna move on to the next question how did you manage to keep your friends back home still close to you when you got back so I I have like friends I don't know guys I'm in a weird stage of life to be quite honest with you so I have friends that one of my very best friends in high school she moved away like right when we started to become friends so we have just been talking on the phone like every other week since we were 16 so that kind of thing we just kind of kept up and then I had other really good friends like at home from high school and we stayed in really good contact I had like one of my best friends uh my sophomore year of college is still here so we just kind of picked up like normal I feel like I'm getting to the kind of age where like I have all these really lovely people in my life and it's it can sometimes be hard to like keep up with people all of the time but when I do have time like I hope that I can just like be present with them and like get back to that place we were but a lot of my friends like were still really good and I think that if somebody like really is your friend they will you know a try to make an effort to call you and sometimes like I have some of my friends like we didn't call each other at all my best friend who's like all over this wall back here you guys have seen in video we never call each other we we actually joked about it because like we just like don't talk during the semester because we're both usually so busy but then we just like go on vacation we like did this last summer where we spent like a month together and then we did that again this summer and I don't know why we're like that but sometimes you just have people like that in your life who will just like understand your circumstances and be like a queen like I'll see you when you get back like I don't know did that help I hope so how to deal with homesickness and or anxiety so I will point you to my study broad diaries episode three I believe which is about homesickness and I feel like that is a really like definitive these are tips to like get through homesickness I don't think you could ever get through homesickness I am a person who loves my family so much and it definitely gets easier to do it like I have lived away from home like right now I live 10 hours away from home I haven't seen my parents in like a month or so and I miss them on my family like my my cousin's gonna come visit me in a little bit and I haven't seen her and like I don't even know like six seven months since Christmas that's a long time ago that's like almost a year actually which is scary that's really scary I don't know because like even I have everyone has moments of homesickness especially when things are like not going well in your like the life that you're in you're just like I'm at home um and I think that it just recognizing that it's completely natural and it's okay to be like a little sad sometimes about it that some of us are just built that way and that's life I don't know that's really sad that's a sad answer I just gave you I think that's that's my honest answer sometimes I still get homesick this person also wrote are you happy you did a year abroad instead of the semester I am going to recommend this to like all of my introvert ladies and gentlemen because I think a year abroad was the perfect amount of time for me it takes a really long time for me to like settle into a new place I was watching this Jonathan Van Ness video I love him so much and he was talking about how moving to a new city is one of the most traumatic things that you can go through and I think that that is so completely true because you have to figure out like a whole new city also make friends and then after like a little while things start to settle you finally get to a place of like oh this is sort of forming my life like this is it and I got to that point because you know I was just really tread water my first semester and then second semester I was like I gotta buy new friends I really strengthened the relationships with like actual students in the university rather than like my study abroad friends I still had to study abroad friends like a hundred percent I think it's a good to have a mix if you go for a year abroad but honestly the best thing that I ever could have done because it really gave me time to like really settle into life because like a semester is a long amount of time yes it completely is but a year I really had the chance to like fully commit to like what a life there would look like like I know because I I did a lot of stuff and I saw a lot of stuff and I really had time of like I live in the city I'm everyone went home like what am I gonna do and I think that it was a really important experience for me to have it's definitely a test of your independence if you do it for a year because regular life things will start to pop up and it going like I'm sorry I'm just like going on and on about this but I think that it's like such a cool thing because there are so many times during a year if you think about it we're like something will happen and you really are on your own and it was a really good experience for me because you know you know like I don't know if like people still do this I was doing this like till I was like 20 21 we're like I was like writing an email somebody be like mom dad like can you read the email and like I really I really had to take the reins of my own life in a way that I hadn't done like I had done but like in a completely different way of like there's nobody to help you everyone's asleep you can't there are certain things when you are abroad like you have to lean on the people that are a around you I'm not trying to say it's just to scare you guys I think that it's honestly one of those like magical parts about studying abroad is like you have to like be resourceful if you want to make something happen if you want to go on that trip if you want to like do all these things like you have to do it it's very empowering I guess is what I'll say this person just wrote how are you I'm good I'm okay sorry that made me laugh this person wrote what are some tips you have for the prep slash anxiety in the week before you move to the UK I have no tips my friend I think just like try not to think about it because either way it's gonna happen and it's gonna be a great thing that you do so just let it happen and try not to overthink it I think honestly my skills of not overthinking just improved with such vastness oh my gosh I used to overthink everything and I think having the shock of like I can't think my way out of this like I just got to do it it really teaches you to like break your overthinking habits with action I don't know that's just like an age thing like you just get better at it I don't know I actually don't know um yeah I still overthink but sometimes anxieties like that like you're doing a big scary thing it's supposed to be big and scary just ride the wave ride the wave man cowbunga never said that word in my life you can tell if you have some more questions for like a part two and I'm slowly running out of steam um you can tell because I just started singing my friend Andrea when we were traveling she I I would do this thing when we went and stayed in my grandma's house in Oregon we're like at 10 o'clock at night or like 11 I would just like come in her room and I'd be like hey hey bestie after a while like I would just like go in her room be like who do you have a crush on like like just like ask her stupid questions like we were in summer camp because it felt like summer camp I was like oh two besties on the road my grandma's house like this is amazing but now it has become like a thing like honestly it's becoming camp hours for like I just it's like someone takes over it's like little little camper Katie takes over and she's like let's talk and sing and I should not be allowed to post that online so I hope this video was helpful to some of you because some of this stuff is like really scary and I wish that I had somebody to be like everyone's so anxious about getting on the plane like but I'm I'm like glad that we can create a safe space here on this channel to like talk about these things because some of the stuff it's spooky life man it's spooky anyway thank you guys so much for watching I hope you have an excellent day subscribe comment down more questions um let's see if this like sparked any other questions for people that too okay I'm gonna end it now you just end it like that's how you do it you just end the video sometimes it's so hard to end the video I don't know how to explain it like I just get to the end and I'm like oh wait I have more even though I absolutely I don't have more I've been talking for like an hour straight