Do I want to?

I'm not sure if I can handle it.

Went to Study Abroad orientation today. After the (multiple) welcomes, we were berated by the assistant director to "not drink ever" and begged to ask questions but then told that every time we ask a question, we slow down the entire process....interesting...

We went to our individual, country specific info sessions where, at first we were in a room that was WAY too small for us (you know, Germany, the country with the largest amount of students studying abroad) and then we moved to HUM 133, an auditorium. The panel informing us about our year abroad seemed to be entirely Tübingen specific, which was great for the 50+ people in the audience going to Tübingen but not for the 9 or so of us in the advanced/intermediate program going other places. After nine million questions from peoples' over zealous parents and several questions from the stupid blonde girls in the back (um? I don't wanna live in a dorm with other people? can my parents pay for me to have my own apartment?) We got to the point where the conversation was literally making my stomach hurt. Everything was framed in the privileged, white, straight, bullshit way to which I can't relate . NO, my parents can't pay for anything. NO, my bank account doesn't have enough money in it to fill the bullshit forms even you don't understand. NO, I wasn't in four semesters of German but am somehow going to be taking classes in a language that I only kind of understand because I had to bite off probably more than I can chew.

I don't want to take out loans to experience this even though I want it so bad. My way of dealing with the stress (other than calling my mom and crying) was to find more scholarship applications online and start filling them out. I'm up to 35 now...basically trying to make it statistically impossible that I don't win some money. I HATE that it has to be about money.

So, all of this in addition to the regular goat rodeo that is the SFSU music department (orchestration, lessons, juries) and legitimate things that I have to do for my real degree (performance, watch/grade final presentations) it makes me question my motivation....oh well.