Paris is that beautiful girl in high school. The one with the piercing eyes surrounded by abnormally thick, dark, eyelashes. The girl with the great wardrobe and the older boyfriend that always picks her up after school. Paris is stunning, sweeping and yet no one really knows her. She’s distant and a bit untouchable. Peru…
John Muir said, “The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.” He was an adventurer, an unbound spirit, a roamer. Any time I read snippets or quotes by people that travel, change, or see the world, they always appear fearless. In my mind they are…
Never has choosing a pair of pants seemed so important. The trek to Machu Picchu is now three weeks away and I have read everything I possibly can on packing tips and the like. Some say travel pants, some say workout pants, others swear by those ones that zip into shorts. I’m literally sweating about…
I need to write something. It’s been three days and even though it was a pretty shitty weekend, there must be something to say. I…I spent a couple of hours today obsessing about whether or not I should bring a walking stick when I hike the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu at the end of May.…
I left pieces of myself in Paris. Some of them I won’t miss, others I am finding as I start to unpack my bag that spent an extra day in the Detroit airport, but there is a piece of me that I’m not seeing anywhere. I’m a little panicked because I need this piece, it’s…
I never feel more like a rat in a maze than I do in a Metro or subway system. Don’t get me wrong, there’s an energy. So many different kinds of people moving en mass, all with different agendas, it’s electric, but the the underground shuffle is a soulless place. There’s very little eye contact,…
Hemingway called Paris a “movable feast.” I’m not really a Hemingway fan, but when he says, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris … then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast,” I have to agree. There is something about…
It seems like planes shouldn’t be able to fly. I’m not an engineer or plane designer, or whatever college major builds planes, but as a passenger I cross my fingers because it really looks a bit impossible. They are too big, too bulky, they rattle around at crazy speeds and then…glide as if they weighed…
“Fuck” sounds like Fük or “Foook” if said by a sixteen year old French exchange student. Last year I exclaimed, “never again,” but I’ve come to realize that no one ever really listens to me, so here we are, one more time committed to scholastic international relations. We have a French exchange student staying with us…