Lucky Girl - Completed

"hellohannah2;c-18217692" wrote:

So yes, her worldview is limited, and I can see why that might be surprising, but later on in the story I'll touch on class and privilege a bit more, why might explain her mindset. Yes, Berlin is close, but her visiting him would depend on him actually wanting her to come and see him. At this point in her story she doesn't know what he thinks about her, and doesn't really think that he'd bother asking her. She feels it's a one sided thing - she thinks he's too hot for her, too smart too popular, and just because she's interested in him doesn't mean he's interested back. Maybe he hangs out with girls in their bedrooms all the time, how would she know how these things are supposed to work?

This is why I so badly want to give Evie some confidence. She can have a hot, smart, and popular boyfriend (who is hopefully kind and considerate of her as well). It may not be Jude, but hot, smart, and popular are things that she can have.

I got that she wasn't confident in his feelings for her yet, but by this point, they're friends? Now that I think about it and her personality a bit more, they would probably need to be more than casual friends for her to take a trip to Berlin. She's not a jetsetter, so it wouldn't make sense for him to say, "If you come to Berlin, let's meet up." Casually traveling around is also a very privileged thing to do.

it was definitely a very exotic choice to study abroad, the attitude being, well, why would I go there when everything I need is here?

I don't want to make this a US-thing because not all of the US is like this and it's also not just the US, but there's an upper middle class attitude of "I'm going to X uni. because it's the best in the world (or at least top 10 in the world at) ... It makes no sense to stay here and study at a mediocre place. Why would I settle for less than the best I can get?" A lot of countries (including the US) have a really messy college/university system where acceptance rates are 4% - 7% at certain schools and it creates an interesting/toxic/less than ideal culture around education in some communities, but on the flip side, it also creates some independence and a willingness to study abroad and adventure around. For those in relationships like Jude and his ex, they can realistically hope for the same city, but when universities are handing out rejections all over the place, it would be hard for them to feel comfortable planning (instead of simply hoping and praying) to go to the same university. Everyone has to have a plan to go alone or with a new friend or two from their city or country they just met and who is also going.