When you are going on a great study abroad opportunity no one ever plans on being sick or really even thinks about it, at least I didn’t.

Today was our second day in Malaysia and the adventure is just beginning. This was also one of our more busy days in our itinerary. I was pretty excited because I knew that we were going to be touring an agriculture facility. This was one of the most anticipated things to do while in the country. There were also several of our US team members that were presenting as well as several of the UTM students.

When I woke up this morning, I could tell that I was feeling a little iffy. I continued to get ready and thought that I would be able to pull myself together throughout the day. I was a little wrong. Gradually I felt worse and eventually made the decision to go back to our hotel. I felt awful for leaving when we had such a busy day planned with a bunch of great learning opportunities. In the end, this decision turned out to be the best one.

After I got back to the hotel I tried to pull myself back together and little by little I did. I also took this opportunity to talk with some family and friends back home. This made me feel better all on its own. After the conversations from back home wrapped up, I decided sleeping would be a great remedy. I slept most of the day and decided to start my adventures here in Malaysia again tomorrow.

Mikaella Koster (@MikaellaKoster) is a pre-service agricutlural education teacher candidate attending Iowa State University.