Indicatively, I find myself writing a blog in the Vienna airport once more. This time, it’s off to Deutschland for a family reunion. My flight is delayed, but only 10 minutes, which already puts me in a position about 10000x better than my last harrowing flight experience. To finish off that epic tale:

I ended up poorer, but 24 hours in Istanbul richer, after booking a last minute flight for the morning thereafter. Istanbul is the most incredible city I have ever seen, extremely eclectic, bustling, and simultaneously reminds me of times spent in Vienna and Viet Nam. My friend Hiba Dhanani, who is currently on her own study abroad excursion there, busted out her Admission skills and gave me a wonderful tour of the city.

Next up on the ancient city tour, Athens. My friend Kat Wyly is teaching English in Athens on a now-Fulbright fellowship, so I had the incredibly good fortune of having a friend, hostess, and guide waiting for me when I disembarked my plane. It was so nice to see a close friend after almost a year, and surreal to do so in Greece! The Haverford network is seriously global. I spent my weekdays wandering ancient ruins and eating delicious gyros, and my Saturday with Kat on Hydra, a nearby Greek island.

Life was good. Extremely good.

So in the end, as terrible as that rebooking fiasco was, the days that followed were just that incredible.

The following weekend I was in Rome, eating the best tagliatelle, gnocchi, gelato, cheese…

After this trip to Germany, I’m off to Budapest, thereafter to Dublin and Copenhagen, and then I have a mere two remaining weeks in Vienna before flying back to Haverford for commencement. Life is currently beautiful insanity. I knew how quickly my time abroad would fly by; I remember thinking on the bus ride into Vienna, “at some point a couple of months from now, you’ll think back to this moment and be in disbelief that it’s already been so long.” Good work, Sonia from the past, that is absolutely true, but it doesn’t make the realization any easier to internalize.

Seniors at Haverford are finishing up theses, pinwheel day has come and gone, and I can finally retire snow boots to the back of my closet. My time here is waning, and that brings simultaneous anxiety and excitement. I’m sad to think of goodbyes to friends, Käsekrainer, and Kaffeehäuse; I’m a little scared but very excited to be thinking about my thesis, last year in college, and life thereafter; but I’m also looking forward to seeing my friends again, an incredible, paid internship in Philadelphia this summer (cue the next blog post), and reflecting on the incredible experiences I have had and will have in my time away from Haverford.

Who knew there was such a thing as life after Haverford…For the first 18 years of your life you are preparing to go to college, that is the obvious next step in life. You go to elementary school, then middle school, then high school, and then college. But here is the kicker, after college there is no universal next step. Everyone does something a little different and goes in a different direction. I have finally figured out my next step…AH. Starting in August I will be going to Georgetown University for graduate school to get my Masters Degree in Peace and Conflict Resolution.

Last May I came to the conclusion that I wanted to go to graduate school and began this graduate school search process. The first step I took was to meet with the CDO (Career Development Office), which is wonderful, and they helped me formulate a list of programs and schools that interested me and I began my search process, just like all of you did at first.

After visiting schools and getting a feel for what it really was I wanted to study and where I wanted to go to school I turned to my professors. With the help of numerous faculty members, my advisors, and my professors, I was given guidance throughout this entire process and was always supported. The student to faulty ratio here at Haverford is 8:1, and let me tell you, the professors here really get to know you. I was able to meet with professors who knew everything about me and were really able to give me informed advice about where to go to graduate school based on what they knew about me. I had a strong support system to get me through this process and never felt alone.

Here I am nearly a year later after beginning this journey making a decision about where to go next. It is stressful even for me so I understand how all of you must feel right now. But, I really think I have made the right decision and I am trusting my gut. It is really hard for me to believe that I only have a few short weeks left at Haverford and am a little jealous of all of you who are about to embark on the journey to college. While I am super excited for my next step and getting the opportunity to go to graduate school to pursue what I am truly passionate about, leaving Haverford will probably be one of the hardest things I have ever done.

Sorry I have not updated you all in quite a while…let me tell you, second semester senior year has kicked in. As I’m sure you have all heard, all seniors at Haverford write a Senior Thesis. This thesis is intended to demonstrate what we have learned and how we have grown academically and intellectually over the past four years at Haverford. Every senior writes one here because we believe we all deserve the opportunity to write a Senior Thesis, we have no honors students because in truth, we are all honors students. The other great thing about all seniors writing a thesis, besides the academic experience we all get, is that we are all going through this together. Every single one of us is having ups and downs, good days and bad days, and we all understand what the other is going through. Let me tell you, it makes this whole process a heck of a lot easier when 325 other students are in the same boat as you all trying to get this thesis done on time.

With that said, the thesis grind has begun. For most of us, our drafts are due April 1st, which means it is go time. For my thesis I am looking at the impact International Criminal Tribunals have on fostering reconciliation in countries recovering from intra-state violence. In particular, I am looking at Bosnia and the impact the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia had there. I am arguing that International Criminal Tribunals fail to ensure that reconciliation occurs because of 1) the distance at which they function, the international dilemma; and 2) the serving of justice is not enough for some individuals recovering from such atrocities. For some of you this may sound like gibberish, but I promise you, it has taken me months and months to get to this point where I am able to write down my argument in a few sentences. With the guidance of my wonderful thesis advisor Anita Isaacs, who I meet with once a week, we have reached this point together.

I have three weeks to finish the first full draft of my thesis…but I think I can do it!

It is amazing to me how fast time has gone by. I can still remember getting admitted early decision to Haverford in December 2008…I’m now embarking on my final semester here. AHHHH.

Last week I had my first last day of school. A group of my friends and I decided to take a photo to mark this momentous day for our parents and for ourselves. These girls in the photo were the first friends I made at Haverford on my very first day of preseason freshmen year. We have been though everything together over the last few years, the good and the bad, and in truth, have grown up together.

Right now we are all in a state of limbo as we are trying to figure out what comes next…terrifying I know. We are all applying to different jobs, graduate school, medical school, fellowships, and internships. We have no idea where we will be in 5 months after graduation, but we making sure we enjoy every last minute we have together at Haverford.

Haverford bring together a unique group of individuals from all over the country and allows us to truly be ourselves. As a result, we are able to meet people who appreciate us for who we are and embrace every quirky trait we may possess. We each have something interesting and original to offer and this community values what we have to offer.

This year we started classes a week later than usual, while that meant summer was a tad bit longer, it also means we do not get out for winter break until December 21. Given the fact that we will all have such a short time at home before Christmas (3 days), my roommates and I decided to decorate our common room to make it feel like home!

Over Thanksgiving break we all planned to bring in as many decorations as we could fit in our suitcases back to Haverford with us…the result was the creation of a winter wonderland in our common room. While 2/3rds of our housing on campus is singles, that doesn’t mean Haverford is trying to isolate us, it means that we have our own space, but also these awesome common rooms that we can all share. It is the place where we can all hang out, relax, watch TV, and avoid homework ha-ha.

I currently live with 5 other seniors (and a hamster named Barry) who actually all lived in my Customs Group with me freshmen year. We decided to start and end our college experience together. So last week we all came together and went on a decorating spree. We put up lights, a tree, cut out snowflakes, and put out nutcrackers. Now every time I come home from a long day I get to sit in my wonderfully Christmas decorated common room and I couldn’t ask for more.

This semester, I am taking a class called Case Studies in Chemistry. The class is a non-lab chemistry course for non-science majors- for those of us that are looking to learn the basics of chemistry through our own research into various “case studies.”

To supplement the course material, my professor assigned Michael Frayn’s play, Copenhagen. This famous play speculates on what occurred during a secret meeting between Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, two influential scientists in the mid-twentieth century. As our class had looked at the development of atomic theory and key chemistry and physics discoveries, the lives of these two scientists were particularly relevant to the class material.

While the play was relevant because it referenced scientific theories and discoveries we had learned about, the class in which we discussed the play stood out to me for a number of reasons. As a History major, reading a play that placed incredible scientific discoveries in the historical and personal context of the scientist’s lives made concepts, such as atomic theory, come to life for me. Our class discussion around these ideas and their impact on society was lively, as everyone brought their perspectives from different majors and classes to think critically about science. My classmate even shared several of her ideas for her senior thesis on cultural memory as we discussed how Bohr and Heisenberg’s discoveries and inventions are remembered today.

One of the most striking elements of the discussion, however, was the number of ethical issues surrounding science. Looking at chemistry and physics in the context of World War II opened up a debate that each of us could participate in, even with varying levels of expertise in the sciences. This assignment and discussion was one of the highlights of the class for me because we broke outside the boundaries of a traditional chemistry class. Not only did we look at why these scientific issues are so important today, but also had the opportunity to hear different opinions from each other.

On November 4, our Women’s Soccer Team became the Centennial Conference CHAMPIONS for the first time since 1995 and for the second time in history of the program. They upset the powerhouse for the past 5 years Johns Hopkins University 2-1. I was unable to go to the game since Baltimore is quite a trek from Haverford for someone without a car, but I, along with 5 other friends, streamed the game live in the new study room in Kim Dorm on the big screen TV. When they won…I started balling, tears were everywhere. It was a true demonstration of what my best friends have been working for over the past four years.

I played soccer at Haverford for my first two years and being a student-athlete here is a truly amazing and wonderful experience. I remember meeting my 5 best friends on the first day of preseason in August 2009, geeze its already 2012. We were the 5 freshmen. We were terrified. But within a day, I had made a group of friends who would stick with me throughout my 4 years at Haverford. When they won, it was amazing to see my best friends accomplish a goal they had been fighting to achieve for four years.

The story gets better… not only did the girls win, but so did our men’s team. Haverford Men’s Soccer also became the Conference Champions on November 4th for the first time in program history.

This past weekend Haverford hosted the NCAA Regional Playoff Tournament for the women; rounds 1 and 2 were played on Walton Field. The men’s regional tournament was played at Arcadia University. On Saturday the women’s team played MIT and the number of fans at the game was incredible. Alumni, students, parents, and faculty were everywhere. People flew across the country. The stadium was packed. The cheering was out of control. Later that afternoon, the fan bus took about one hundred students to Arcadia where the men were playing. Not only did the fans travel to cheer the women on at Haverford, but they also traveled to Arcadia to cheer on the men.

It was a true demonstration of the community that exists at Haverford. Our Honor Code says that Haverford is a community, but oftentimes people will ask me on tours…well is this true? Trust me it is. This weekend was a true representation of those connections that exist between our students, our alumni, and our facility. When something is important to a group of us, we all go out to support them. Could you ask for more?