People speak about moving abroad for university as if it is one clean emotion: exciting. I am excited. I have wanted this for a long time. I chose Maastricht because I wanted a wider education and a life that did not feel decided before it began. But leaving is not just walking toward something. It is also walking away from a version of daily life that held me without asking. At home I knew which shop would still be open, what every sound in the kitchen meant, and how long it took a friend to arrive. I did not have to translate my humour or explain why a certain meal mattered. My family could annoy me in person instead of lovingly asking for updates through a screen. There is guilt too. The money required for this move is not abstract. I know what my family is postponing and how carefully they avoid making me feel responsible for it. When they say they are proud, I hear the trust underneath. On difficult days, that trust can become pressure: I must be happy enough, successful enough, and grateful enough to justify everybody’s effort. Some friends at home talk about my move as escape. In a way it is. There were opportunities I could not see for myself there. But calling it escape makes the people and the place sound like something I am happy to leave behind. I am not. I can want more options and still love what made me. Then there is the strange difference between being international as a fact and as a personality. Before arriving, international sounded open and interesting. In practice it can mean being the person who does not know the system, cannot make the right small talk, or needs an extra second to understand. It means building competence again from the beginning. I am writing this because I keep seeing two stories: the student who is having the best time of their life, and the student who wants to go home. I do not fit either. I can have a great afternoon, call my family in tears that night, and still wake up wanting to stay. Maybe becoming independent is not proving that you no longer need anyone. Maybe it is learning how to carry the people you need into a life they cannot organise for you.