Data in Deutschland #0: The Journey Begins

Hi everybody, I’m Jason and I’ll be blogging my experiences in Berlin this summer. As I sit here writing this, I am not yet in Berlin but in the comfort of my home near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It’s surreal, knowing that I made a decision last year to go abroad somewhat on a whim. I had been doing research on what to expect out of an internship abroad and the city of Berlin, but I was never able to find enough information that warranted the leap of faith. So, I took the jump anyway and now, here I am a few days away from boarding a flight and starting a new chapter in my life. So, emotions are running high as I sit here writing this. Not necessarily in a bad way, but there is just a lot to be thinking about before I embark.

I just finished up my Junior year at Commonwealth University Bloomsburg and now am being thrust into an opportunity like this. I worry about being a little homesick or worry about how I will adjust to my first internship. All of it is compounding into this conglomerate ball of emotions that I think is excitement. I know that it’s all temporary though. I am going to love Berlin. My life has been leading me towards the path of resistance because that is where the most fruitful outcomes come from. I could have decided to stay at home and live a complacent life but while I’m still young, why not make a lasting memory. My dad instilled in me, since I was a teenager, that if you are in a position to do something that will most likely never happen again, you must overcome any fear you have and “just do it.”

I’m writing during the planning part of the process of the trip, as I pack whatever invaluable items I own to start my life over there. This proved to be a bit challenging as I fear what I might forget or might not need. I also have been doing research into what kind of things I hope to prioritize while I am over there. During the weekdays, I’ll be focusing on classes and working at my internship, while the weekends are when the experiences of Berlin truly begin. Each weekend serves as a valuable set of days I can do whatever I want with it.

My plan for this summer is to take you, the reader, into a different kind of blogging experience over the course of this summer. As a Data Science major, I value numbers and data to make my everyday decisions. It’s a beautiful form of art to study numbers because unlike thoughts and feelings, they are generally avoiding to biasness. So, over the course of my journey this summer, I aim to uncover the secrets of going abroad through the use of data I will be collecting on my journey. My next three blog posts will consist of a different point of data I have been tracking over the course of my time in Berlin, with my final post being the culmination of all that information. This way, I hope to give you an added dimension of what it is like to spend the summer in Berlin as I find out myself. This is the start to, Data in Deutschland!