Homesickness is a part of every college student’s life, no matter how well-adjusted someone might be. What makes it a problem is when home is an ocean away.
For Jakob Miller, a sophomore majoring in geology, home is almost 5,000 miles away, in Bonn, Germany.
“I get homesick sometimes, of course,” said Miller. “There’s a lot of things I miss.”
Bonn is a city of over 300,000 people, about 10 times the size of Laramie, so Miller misses a lot of the big city life that he taken for granted.
“So many things close early here, it’s hard to get anything late,” he said. “I tried to get some stationery for one of my classes at like 9:30, and the only place open was Walmart, and I hadn’t really prepared to see the sort of people you see at Walmart after dark.”
Miller has also had to adapt to Wyoming’s public transit, or, as he sees it, our lack of public transit.
“In Bonn, you can catch a bus anywhere, get anywhere you need to go. I’d ride the bus to school, to my friend’s apartments, to the grocery store,” Miller said. “You can’t really do that in Laramie, the buses just don’t run enough. You’ll wait 15 minutes for a bus that won’t take you where you need to go. It’s better to just have a car.”
The conveniences of city living aren’t the only thing that Miller misses. He also misses the food of his home country. While there are some good restaurants here in town, he said, there isn’t enough ethnic food to sate him.
“You have to drive all the way to Fort Collins for a good curry, or for anything that isn’t an American hamburger. I realize that Laramie’s a small town, but it gets tiring after going out to eat and getting a burger the 30th time. It’s this sort of stuff that makes me wish I was back in Germany sometimes,” said Miller.
Even when Miller cooks for himself, he often finds the selection of supermarket food lacking.
“The bread here sucks, to put it kind of bluntly. In Germany you can go to a bakery, and get any type of bread you want,” he said. “In the US, all the bread is pre-packaged, and even if you get it from the bakery section at like Safeway or someplace, it’s bland and not worth eating. Don’t even get me started on meat and cheese.”
There are less tangible things that Miller misses, too. Bonn is known for its festivals, he said, and celebrations in Laramie can’t compare. While he hasn’t been here for Independence Day or any other major celebrations, he said that Christmas in Laramie isn’t anything like Christmas back home.
Based on his disdain for many American things, one would think that Miller doesn’t like living in Wyoming. Miller wants to make sure that everyone knows that he still loves living here.
“It’s still awesome living here, I really do love it.” he said. “I know there’s a lot of things that I said I don’t like about here, but there’s so much to love here, too.”
