Good news!

According to my BPSA General Orientation Guide, writing about my experiences in Italy and once I get back will help me cope with "culture shock".

I love how they explain culture shock in great detail (even including a letter from a school psychologist) in this thing, as if we don't know what it is and have never experienced it before. I have mild symptoms EVERY TIME I move back home or back to Berkeley (I usually need 3 weeks).

And um....moving to a city of 100,000, giving up my car, and living in a high rise matchbox with another chick at age 17? Yeah, I might have already experienced a bit of this "culture shock" they speak of.