Obligatory Introduction Post

Welcome to my blog, One Foot Home, the Other Abroad, a personal look into my life spent as a graduate school student/nomadic traveler.

My name is Mido and I am a 22 year old American who will be spending the next 3 years studying abroad in Canada. It is hard to describe my studies in layman's terms, but the simplest way to put it is that I am most interested in doing comparative literature/mythology studies between the ancient west and the east (i.e. Mediterranean vs. Asia). This is very similar to what anthropologists do, however it has a greater emphasis on reading primary source literature. I am focusing on improving my ancient Greek and Latin language skills while in my masters' program, but I am going to continue to devote my free time to learning Japanese/Kanji. I am a stubborn, yet motivationally-dedicated student, working hard despite my own numerous failings. I believe that this is what has allowed me to progress this far, even when I have often wished to give up.

This blog will be a mix of my reactions to studying abroad for an extended time, along with my observations and reactions to the various places I visit (more often than not, probably Japan). I think it is interesting to be able to react to one's own culture by experiencing other contexts and I want this space to allow me to express that.

There will probably be a good amount of space dedicated to other interests as well, as I am sure I will not be having profound realizations about my own biases/ignorance every single day.

At this point, I hope that you have found me interesting enough to stay tuned. Please leave comments or raise discussion questions, though ad hominem attacks on my character will not be tolerated (though I hardly can think of a reason why anyone would do this, but there are internet trolls, aren't there?).

And now with the obligatory introduction post done (man I hate these things), I can finally start blogging!