If you do decide to participate in Study Abroad, there are some things that you’ll need to do in order to be prepared. And, thanks to the World Wide Web, it isn’t difficult to find out how to do them.

1. Shots. There are certain immunizations you must have in order to travel internationally, and you may need different ones depending on where you’re going. You can find out what vaccines you need for your trip by visiting the Center for Disease Control.
2. Learn the language, or at least some of it. There are great programs out there that can teach you at least the key phrases you’ll need to get around without offending anyone. A great site for learning key phrases in several Indo-European languages is ielanguages.com. Or, you can tutor yourself using an online translator.
3. Passport. Actually, you may want to put this before one or two. You want to apply for your passport yesterday if not sooner.
4. Educate yourself. The world is FULL of interesting places to see and amazing things to do and wonderfully delicious things to eat. When you take a trip, you are presented with multiple opportunities to do things far outside your definition of ordinary. Don’t miss them because you didn’t know what to look for. Run a Google search on your destination country. Find out the national food, fruit, alcoholic beverage. Find out what the locals do for fun. Make sure you don’t miss anything.
5. Get better advice. After all, I too am still a novice. But there are those who are luck enough to do this for a living. Benefit from their handiwork.

Just have fun, take lots of pictures, and don’t close your eyes for a moment – you don’t want to miss a thing!

Information provided by Katy Gray, participant in SGC’s Maymester 2007 Costa Rica Program.