IPSE

IPSE was the best weekend of my life and that is why I just got around to a blog post about it. It was so so so great I don't even know how to describe it! Just FYI, IPSE was about 2 million times more fun than this post makes it sound. Also sorry this is so long!

Friday- On Friday I woke up at 4:45 AM so I would have time to finish up with packing, and get to the airport by 6:30 for my 7:30 CST flight. Just a word of advice: Packing the morning of IPSE is NOT a good idea. So I after I finished packing I was off to the airport! I was the first of my flight buddies to get to the gate, but soon Bianca got there and a little bit later Lucien (Morocco) and Sydney got there. We boarded and took off. We landed about a half hour early at 10:35 EST, and made our way to baggage claim to meet the YES Abroad volunteers/alumni. The Minneapolis flight was to first to land so we had to wait for about 6 others people to land before taking a shuttle to the 4H Center. While we were waiting, Brandon (Thailand), Celeste (India), Will, and a couple others I can't remember (sorry!) showed up! We took our shuttle through DC and Celeste and I (Both midwesterners who had never been to DC) took pictures of EVERYTHING from the Washington Monument to The Famous Construction Site of America ;). Once we arrived at the 4H center we got our name tags and semifinalist handbooks (AKA YES Abroad Bibles). Since our flights and shuttle was very early we were there in time for lunch. After lunch, we found other people in the rec room and played all kinds of get to know you games. The next organized thing we did was the official welcome ceremony at 6:00 PM so me, Brandon, and Connar (Malaysia) made our way to the auditorium. During the ceremony, Abeeha and Faber (Macedonia) showed up because they were on the west coast so their flights landed a little bit later. After the ceremony if was off to dinner and then after dinner some people had interviews and the rest of us had fun talking, playing games, and getting to know each other!

Saturday- Saturday was the only full day at 4H and it was a lot of fun! So at IPSE, every semifinalist will have an individual interview, 2 group interviews, a workshop, and if you have 3+ years of French, a French interview, and country tables. I ended up having everything on Saturday which was kinda nice because it meant Friday and Sunday I could just relax. The first thing I had on Saturday was the workshop around 9ish. An hour or two after that I had my individual interview, then my group interview, then country tables, then my second group interview, then my French interview. None of these we immediately after each other and I had LOTS of down time. The time when nothing was scheduled were the best time!! Most of the time I was up in the third floor lounge with the best people ever. All of us had just met in person that Friday but we got along like we had all been best friends our entire life. 9/11 of this group of people ended up being accepted by YES which is kinda odd because YES was created in the aftermath of  9/11. I cant wait to spend more time with these people at PDO and then our reunions in the years after our exchanges! Saturday night before we fell asleep my roommates; Celeste(India) , Lily(Morocco), and Mariah had roommate bonding time and it was super fun!! So Saturday was a busy day but it was really fun!

Sunday- Sunday was a really short day and it went by super fast.  I woke up around 6:40ish I think and went to breakfast. After breakfast Brandon, Faber, Abeeha, and I decided to pack and bring our bags to the best room ever(The Minnesota room), which is where they told us to bring our bags. Some people had interviews that morning so I had more time up in the third floor lounge which was super fun! Before long it was time to go get our boxed lunches and eat before we leave. I actually ended up grabbing ham and I don't eat pork so that was kinda sad but I traded with someone and it was all okay:). When we all finished eating we took a bunch of pictures and some of them are on here. So after that, everyone in the third floor lounge reluctantly went downstairs for the closing ceremony and then the Dulles airport people, including me and Abeeha, were rushed out to get our bags and get on our shuttle. Well for some reason most people put their bags in a different room so I got lost trying to find the Minnesota room and I was scared I would miss the shuttle but my luggage was found and it was all good. The Regan airport people, which was about 75% of everyone, left soon after us. Once my shuttle got to the airport we were separated into groups which were pretty much our flight buddies and we went to our gates. The Minnesota flight was one of the earlier flights but we still had about two hours before boarding. Abeeha, who I think had like 5 or 6 hours came to my gate so that was fun:) When the plane took off the hardest wait of all started. 17 days.




I'm assuming a lot of the people reading this are either semifinalists or semifinalist hopefuls so I cant say a lot about the interviews but here is some stuff that might interest you-

Individual Interview: The waiting before the interview is way more stressful than the actual interview. All the interviewers are really nice and they aren't trying to trick you or make you look bad. They just want to get to know you. Relax and be honest!

Group Interviews: The group interviews are super fun! You are in a group with about five other people and you work together to accomplish something. The groups were with the same people for both interviews. I was really nervous about the group interviews but they ended up being one of my favorite parts of IPSE!

Country Tables: There were either 2 or 3 time slots for country tables and each person was assigned to go to one of the times. It's basically a room where you can go to get information on the YES Abroad countries, pick up info sheets, and ask questions.

Food: The food was pretty good but the ice cream was a new level of great. Also they had my favorite juice which is like mango passion guava or something but it's heavenly. I had only ever seen this juice on one of my cruises but I am obsessed with it so I was ECSTATIC when I saw that it was there! If you are somebody about to go to IPSE or PDO you MUST try this juice.

Down Time: There is a lot of down time at IPSE but you will never be bored! There are always other people to talk to, play mafia with, or start a game of volleyball!

If you have an other questions just comment and I'll add them!

Waiting

If you apply to any of the Department of State scholarships you will spend forever waiting. So far, in one application cycle of YES Abroad and NSLIY I have had 9 countdowns + "Last Day of School"

NSLIY Application deadline (November 7th)- The first and most painless of the countdowns because at that point I was mostly applying because why not?

NSLIY semi notification (December 8th)- This one was also pretty easy because I was hard at work with my YES application (YES was my 1st choice anyway) and I also wasn't expecting it until later in December.

YES Abroad Application deadline (January 15th)- This one was a little more stressful because I was scrambling to make sure my essays were exactly how I wanted them and I CONSTANTLY was changing country rankings.

YES semi notification (February 28th)- This was a really long wait, about 50 days I think. A great distraction was the YES Abroad Facebook group and my YES group message with Victoria (Indonesia), Eileen (India), Faber (Macedonia), Vatrelle (CBYX), Abeeha, Brandon (Thailand), Emily (Thailand), and Baillie (Indonesia). By the way, if you are an applicant reading this a HUGE tip is get to know some of the other applicants! If you make it to IPSE, they will be a big encouragement!

IPSE (March 21st)- This was a 22 day wait and I was really excited to go to IPSE but the wait went by pretty fast! I am currently working on an IPSE post but it's really hard to describe such a magical 3 days so it will take me a while. Something the semifinalists on the Facebook group did during this wait that was fun is we had a question of the day everyday to get to know each other!

YES finalist notification (April 12th)- For me, this wait went pretty fast except for the last 3-4 days which were S O  S L O W. Once I got my wonderful and surprising email, this wait was totally worth it!

NSLIY finalist notification (Rolling Mid April)- This wait was pretty much non-existent for me because I had already accepted Bosnia. I know some YES kids really had a hard time with this one though because for some people accepted into YES were also considering NSLIY but did not yet know if they had been accepted.

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Last day of School (11 days-June 5th)- I can not wait for school to be done, but I will also miss some aspects of it. For instance, a lot of my friends are juniors so this will be my last year with them at school. On the other hand, it will be nice to be able to focus on learning Bosnian and not school.

PDO (32 days-June 24th)- I really really really cannot wait to be reunited with all the finalists at PDO! It's sad that we won't get to see all the people that were at IPSE because are were all amazing people who will all be doing something great next year no matter where they are!

Bosnia (82 days-About August 15th)- This is only an estimated date but it totally has not hit me yet. In less than ninety days I will be in a country trying to speak a language that eight months ago, I didn't even know existed. I will probably have more posts about this this summer as it gets even CLOSER.

These countdowns have consumed the past seven/eight months of my life and I'm sure once I get back from Bosnia the waiting will continue with a countdown until I go back!

Sarajevo