Voices from Abroad: Francesca Calo'

Austin (USA), Exchange Program, TheUniversity ofTexas at Austin
Quito (Equador), International Internship, self-organized for a micro-credit fund
Shanghai (China), Double Degree DDIM,FudanUniversity

Double Degree students

How is it possible for me to explain the last three years of university?

I sit down and I began to collect my feelings and ideas, trying to go back in my mind.

I think that all four short and long trips that I have made in these past three years began with the consideration that without noticing it, time runs away and you find yourself in airports and in railway stations, in seaports and in lounges (waiting rooms). And almost nobody speaks your language. And here is where the magic of being abroad begins, the simple and easy communication through glances and gestures; it is extremely intriguing to understand how to speak only with your eyes and body.

My first experience was almost three years ago, the first semester of my third year of the Bachelor degree, in the United States. I lived in the real United States, not big cities, but the small university reality ofAustin, Texas. It was incredible, simply beautiful, amazing, for the group, for the university, for the freedom of being away so far in such a different world. It was the first experience, the first trip by myself, the first really different reality in which I had lived.

The second experience was completely different: it was in China, inShanghai for the Double Degree program organized between Fudan, Bocconi and LUISS. This is the experience that has changed my life, it was difficult to understand, to study, to appreciate such a different culture. It was difficult to love and clash with this controversial culture. It was incredible to know stories about really poor people that earn 8 euros per day with a degree, working 8 hours in a

Historic Quito

European multinational. And the life that an international student can have is so different. You love but you also hatedeeply. You can live one year in the most polluted country and you can appreciate the little streets and the dirty restaurant in the Shanghai periphery. You can live in a country that attacksand you can smile, laugh and be friends with the people of this country. I don't think I would like to live more than few years in China but nowadays when I am writing I really miss China, I really miss the meaning of living there, I really miss my life there.

After I came back tofor just 5 days and I flew off to another experience. I flew to Latin America, Equador,Quito. I worked there for three months in a micro-credit fund. I have helped poor people to build a little business that can help them, a real business with market analysis and financial evaluation. Here I have met people that can live with 2 American dollars per day, I have met women that try to begin a new life after being in prison, I have met couples with 3, 4, 5 children trying to give them an education, I have met ethnic minorities that don't speak Spanish and that try to sell their products on the streets (en las calles).

I have met honest people that represent a part of the future of this poor country, and I have met the honest people that try to help others with their university knowledge everyday, with their experience, with their passion. And I really want to be part of these people.

Finally I would like to include one of my favorite poems, Itaca by Costantino Kavafis, the most beautiful poems about travel:

ITACA
Quando ti metterai in viaggio per Itaca
devi augurarti che la strada sia lunga
fertile in avventure e in esperienze.
I Lestrigoni e i Ciclopi o la furia di Nettuno non temere,
non sarà questo il genere d'incontri
se il pensiero resta alto e un sentimento fermo guida il tuo spirito e il tuo corpo.
In Ciclopi e Lestrigoni, no certo nè nell'irato Nettuno incapperai
se non li porti dentro
se l'anima non te li mette contro.

Devi augurarti che la strada sia lunga.
Che i mattini d'estate siano tanti
quando nei porti - finalmente, e con che gioia - toccherai terra tu per la prima volta:
negli empori fenici indugia e acquista madreperle coralli ebano e ambre
tutta merce fina, anche profumi penetranti d'ogni sorta, più profumi inebrianti che puoi,
va in molte città egizie
impara una quantità di cose dai dotti.

Sempre devi avere in mente Itaca - raggiungerla sia il pensiero costante.
Soprattutto, non affrettare il viaggio; fa che duri a lungo, per anni, e che da vecchio
metta piede sull'isola, tu, ricco dei tesori accumulati per strada
senza aspettarti ricchezze da Itaca.

Itaca ti ha dato il bel viaggio,
senza di lei mai ti saresti messo in viaggio: che cos'altro ti aspetti?

E se la trovi povera, non per questo Itaca ti avrà deluso.
Fatto ormai savio, con tutta la tua esperienza addosso
già tu avrai capito ciò che Itaca vuole significare.

-Costantino Kavafis