Gilman Scholarship

A couple of days ago I found out I was the recipient of a scholarship given by the Benjamin Gilman foundation together with the Department of State. It's $4200 to be used for studying abroad; however, when I applied I agreed that should I win, I would prepare a project that would educate the public on my experiences abroad. Thus, I have decided to use this blog for a duel purpose: making it easy for friends and family to see what I'm up to, but also to provide any one who's interested with the details of my trip. Therefore, I am going to begin today with an update as to how the preparations are proceeding.

I have booked a flight. I was lucky enough to find a guy from St. Olaf College to travel with, so we leave together on January 14th. With all the time traveling and date-line crossing, I don't really know how long the flight(s) will take. I do know that we arrive on the 15th, right around the same time we left on the 14th.

There has been an inane amount of paper work to complete throughout this process. First I had to get a passport, then I had to apply for a Visa (and the visa application was in Hungarian, so that made the process as easy as spreading frozen butter). There were mounds of paperwork to fill out for the Budapest Semesters in Mathematics program, and even more hoops to jump in order to persuade Gustavus to let me go for a Semester. My advice: when you get a passport picture taken, get at least 5 or 6 copies made because there will always be ONE MORE form that needs a passport-sized photo.

More and more information arrives everyday. However, we recently received a list of all the participants in the BSM program and it's been really helpful to talk to them via the internet. Everyone is bouncing ideas off each other and just getting excited.

Maybe it's time to describe what exactly it is for which I'm abandoning my comfort zone. I'm attending the Budapest Semesters in Mathematics program. It's an acclaimed program during which students are given the opportunity to study advanced mathematics under world-renowned Hungarian mathematicians. Along with math, I'm going to be taking a Hungarian language course because... well, my Hungarian language skills are lacking a bit.

That's enough information for now. Look for more posts regarding the latest news from my preparations!

The countdown

I'm leaving for Budapest in 66 days from today. This will be my blog for my duration abroad.