Many families, especially those in the military, move year to year; however the move is typically stateside. In fact, according to The Future Children.org, “[Only] 5 percent [of the active forces] were stationed overseas.”

As many people know, living overseas is completely different than living in the States. There is a language barrier, the culture is completely different, and the geography is different.

Because of this, many students moving overseas often have questions.

Freshman Noah Honeycutt, who is moving to Germany, asked, “What is it like, how is it different, what is there to do, etc?”

Freshman Mailea Huber, who is headed to Rome, asked, “Is the language easy to learn or no?”

While it’s not easy to answer these specific questions, some students can offer advice.

Junior Jacob Best suggested, “Go out onto the economy and get to know your surroundings.”

Junior Holland Spears, who has lived in Europe for over three years, recommended “texting or emailing friends once a week.” In addition, she says to “enjoy things like zip lines in parks that you won’t get here without waivers.”

Moving away from friends is always hard, but even more so when you are going overseas. This is mainly because of different time zones.

Freshmen Reese Linder said, “The thing I [will] miss most is undoubtedly the people that I’m close with here and having a lot of people around.”

Before you leave, just take the time to plan ahead.

As Best suggested, “Do research before hand and be open to new things. It will be hard at first, but as time goes on you will learn to enjoy it.”