NSLI-Y SEMIFINALIST!

So I guess I should share the story of how I got my semifinalist notification and how everything went down. Remember, however, that this type of stuff varies from year to year and it might be completely different in the summer of 2015. Who knows with NSLI-Y, right?
So the stressful process of waiting began after my interview, and they finally started announcing notifications in March. Usually the notifications came out on Fridays but the second to last country, China, got their notification on a Tuesday (I think). Korea was the last country announced, possibly because of visa reasons (you don't need to get a visa to go to Korea for this length of time! Yay!), and was also announced on a day other than a Friday. Korea notifications came out on Monday, March 31st around 4-5 o'clock, which is the time they usually came out for the other countries too. Thank god NSLI-Y didn't take advantage of their power to play a cruel, cruel April Fool's day joke on us.
This is just speculation, but I think Korea notifications went out in alphabetical order because of the order people in the Facebook group and Kakao Talk chats were posting. As soon as I saw that people were getting emails I freaked out because I hadn't got it yet. I waited for 15 long minutes, where I frequently alternated between panic and zen. Then I got my lovely email, which simply said to see the attached document. The document held all of my hopes and dreams- the departure date, general information, as well as a couple of basic forms you had to fill out and send back with a copy of your passport picture. It was a beautiful day but it still doesn't feel like real life.
The interesting thing about this summer program is that there are kids going to both Seoul and Jeonju, which I don't think has happened in the past. I'm not sure how many kids are going to Jeonju, but there are 50 going to Seoul this year. The Jeonju program is run by American Councils while the Seoul program is run by iEARN USA. I was assigned to the Seoul program, where we will be taking classes at Sogang University. They said that we should expect a 45 minute to an hour commute simply because Seoul is a very large city. In a following email by iEARN, they invited the Seoul kids for a conference call to discuss general information and any questions or concerns. It was pretty straightforward and most of the information in the email was just being clarified by participants. They also provided a long FAQ document attached to the email.
I'll try to keep the blog updated as more information about the program comes out. My efforts to contain my excitement are failing miserably.
I want to go to Seoul with all of my heart and...seoul.
And with that....peace.