In this essay I will discuss why spring is objectively the worst season.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Spring is the worst. The absolute only thing it has going for it is that it’s starting to warm up.
The whole point of spring is just to try to get through it because then it’s finally summer!
Spring is always so hectic. You have to deal with the end of the school year stuff and finals (whether you’re a student or teacher, or your kids are in school- somehow school scheduling stuff will always seep into your life). There are always a million deadlines in spring that sneak up on you- signing up for summer programs and events, making plans for summer vacations, trying to schedule work off, signing up for school in the fall, there’s so much to do! Plus they expect you to do spring cleaning during all of this? No thank you.
Here is why all of the other seasons are objectively better.
Summer is great: vacations, pools, lakes, barbecues, parties, late nights, warm weather, and no school.
Fall is great: crisp and cool, falling leaves, spooky stories, dressing up for Halloween, pumpkin flavored everything, hayrides, corn mazes, and SOUPS!!
Winter is pretty good too: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, sitting by the fire, playing in the snow, pine scents, how beautiful it is when everything is covered in snow. Even if it’s dreary and cold, the holidays really give winter a leg up in this competition.
But there aren’t even any good holidays in spring. St. Patrick’s day? Meh. Valentine’s day? Even as someone in a relationship who loves love stuff, I think V day is objectively overrated and ends with someone being disappointed 90% of the time. Easter is a nice holiday, but it’s mostly just going to church and eating eggs.
I love that things start growing and turning green again in spring, but even the greenery is better in summer, when it really gets into full swing.
In conclusion, spring is terrible and if you say it’s your favorite season, you’re wrong.
So many non-Americans I know will probably only get the chance to come to the US once, and you can’t see it all. And how are you supposed to know where to start?
First question you need to ask yourself is “Do I want to see cities and history, or do I prefer natural wonders?” If you’re more into the cities, I’m no expert, but I would plan something on the East Coast. Hit up New York, DC, Philly and get some American History.
But my expertise is in road trips. More specifically the greatest road trip throughout the South West.
If you have the means, the time, and the desire, of course you should try to see all of it, though. Every state has so much to offer, and there is so much culture that you miss when you only go to the big tourist spots, but I know it’s unreasonable to try to do it all with limited lime and limited funds. I am, and have always been in the maximizing utility business.
So without further ado- the plan for the Great American Road Trip: Arizona, Utah, & California.
Flying into LAX, or PHX and renting a car from there would be good for a jumping off point because they’re big international hubs, and close to the action.
California: Joshua Tree National Park, Salvation Mountain, and your pick of some great beaches (Oceanside, Huntington, Santa Monica, Malibu, Laguna). You also have the Hollywood sign, Disneyland, and The San Diego Zoo which is widely recognized as the best zoo in the US. You could also go up to Northern California and hit up San Francisco, see the Golden Gate Bridge, and Alcatraz, but it’ll add about 11 hours of driving.
Santa Monica Pier
Salvation Mountain
Joshua Tree National Park
Arizona: Sedona, Grand Falls, Havasupai, Grand Canyon, Vermillion Cliffs, Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon, Lake Powell, tons of great mountains to hike (Mount Humphries, Picacho Peak, Mount Lemmon, Mount Graham, The Superstitions) and some really cool caves to explore (Kartchner Caverns, Lava River Tunnels, Colossal Mountain Caves, Peppersauce Cave) There are also lots of fun kitschy things and towns scattered throughout Arizona to give you a true “American road trip” experience. Roadside stops like “The Thing,” “Rooster Cogburn’s Ostrich Ranch,” Tombstone AZ, Jerome AZ, and Bisbee AZ.
Vermilion Cliffs
Horseshoe Bend
Antelope Canyon
Havasu Falls, Havasupai
Chocolate Falls or Grand Falls
Jerome Grand Hotel in Jerome, Arizona
Rooster Cogburn’s Ostrich Ranch
Sedona Arizona
Tombstone Arizona
Utah: Southern Utah has tons of great hikes and stunning views in their national parks, like Bryce Canyon, and Zion National Park, and Arches National Park. And if you want to go further North into Utah, the Bonneville Salt Flats are also pretty cool. They also have some cool cultural things like Amish Country to buy some soaps, desserts, antiques, and take a step back in time.
Arches National Park
Zion National Park
Bryce Canyon
It would also be easy to add a quick stint to Nevada for Las Vegas, and Death Valley, or even to pop down into Mexico to go to Rocky point or any part of Baja California if you want to turn it into an international trip.
I know there are a million things listed but the true must-sees are fairly close together and have an easy route between them: Joshua Tree & Salvation Mountain in California, on to Arizona, for Sedona, Grand Canyon, Horseshoe Bend, and Antelope Canyon, and up a little ways into Utah for Bryce, Zion, and Arches.
*Another thing to keep in mind is that hotels in the US are not like hotels or hostels throughout Europe. Even for the worst quality motel, you’ll be paying upwards of $50 a night. That is part of what makes it so cost-prohibitive to travel in the US. Luckily, when you’re outside of the big cities, you have the option to camp. If you have never camped, this road trip gives you the perfect opportunity to sleep in some beautiful and famous places and really enjoy nature while saving some money.
Everybody gets caught up in those late night schemes with their friends sometimes. You know, the ones where you plan to take over the world, go on a crazy trip, dye your hair magenta, or invent some insane pizza-pasta-sushi-burrito hybrid. But when the opportunity comes to actually do it, they back out.
And I’m not talking about those situations where you can’t do it. sometimes things turn out to be completely unattainable; Plans fall through. Sometimes you can’t get the support, or funding, or other responsibilities come up.
But I see people all the time say I’m going to do this! And they really want to, even if it scares them. But they don’t take the steps. They keep acting like they’ll really do it, but don’t even take the tiniest baby steps. It’ll change your life, and I really think it’s just a mindset holding you back.
I’ll be forever grateful for my family being that type to not only make wild plans, but to actually do them. My mom is the best at those schemes, and it made for an amazing childhood. We’d propose something wacky and Mom would just make it happen!
“Are we seriously going to do this?”
“I don’t see what’s stopping us!”
My mom decided she was going to hike the Appalachian Trail. And she did it. She got out there on her own and then my grandpa died, and she had to come home. She decided to go even bigger and hike the Camino de Santiago… AND THEN SHE DID IT.
I can’t believe her sometimes. She’s truly amazing. And I like to think a little bit of that passed on to me.
Right before my high-school graduation, I sat on the kitchen floor with my friend as we planned our grand European backpacking trip. I signed up for all online classes my first semester of college so there was nothing stopping me from leaving, I saved and saved, I researched and planned. I was so certain that I was going to make it happen with sheer force of will that I turned down the opportunity to go to Europe with my parents. I wanted to do it on my own! But I didn’t realize that people don’t have that mindset. My friend was saying we were going to go in the sense that everyone says they’ll eventually make their pipe-dream come true.
That was really tough.
But then I found somebody who was just as good at following through as the Washburns! We went to Italy and it was magical. And then he had the idea to go to China! I hadn’t ever thought about it before, but it seemed like a great adventure, so we made it happen! And then while we were in China, he decided to apply for a Master’s program…. In Russia. And he got accepted! When he told me he was accepted, we just looked at each other, like…. “Are we going to do this? Are we moving to Russia?” And then we decided we would! And we did it! We made it happen.
I hope that when I have my own kids, I can pass it on to them. I hope we can plan a road trip over breakfast and be there by midnight. I hope I can give my weird kid the ghost hunting road trip of their dreams, just for me and them. I hope that we can make a time investment to figure out how to fix up an old boat together like my dad did so many times. I hope when my kids are all grown up and come home for the weekend, that we can go skydiving on a whim.
I hope I can keep that same sense of “we really can do anything we want to” and pass it on to my kids.
I wrote about the catacombs for a travel writing class I took in college and I went back and edited 5 different pieces together to make this. It’s a little different from my normal writing style, but I hope you like it.
Nothing was turning out the way I expected it to. We couldn’t find any restaurants we could afford, the workers at the Eiffel Tower were on strike, the sun had gone down, and it was bitingly cold. This wasn’t the Paris I was hoping for, and I was desperate for at least one thing to turn out right.
The last thing to try was the catacombs. We followed to map to where they were marked, but there was nothing there! After wandering into 3 different buildings, we were ready to give up, when Lucas saw an unlit, brown sign that said “les catacombes,” in small lettering.
We followed the sign, but all we saw was a dark, unlabeled shack with closed doors. It was late and I felt weird about just opening the door, but we were a bit desperate. We pushed the door open slowly and saw a snooty-looking woman at a desk.
Before we said anything at all she said “twenty-six Euro.”
Taken aback, Lucas asked in English, “is this the catacombs?”
“Oui.”
We handed over the money and took our tickets, and then looked up at her, waiting for some kind of instruction. Without looking up from her book, she pointed to a hole in the floor. Lucas and I looked at each other, shrugged, and headed down and onto a spiral stone staircase.
The air got steadily mustier as we went deeper down. There were bracketed lamps bolted intermittently to the walls, and wherever their light touched the stone, lamp flora was growing. When the stairs finally ended it let us out into a stone tunnel, completely empty, and dark except for one lamp.
At the end of this tunnel, there was a fork, and the oldest man I have ever met was sitting there in a folding chair. He didn’t speak, but pointed to the right. It felt haunted, like we weren’t supposed to be there.
We walked through the narrowing tunnel, getting closer and closer to the main entrance. We stopped in front of the archway to read the words etched there: Arrête! C’est ici l’empire de la mort. Lucas translated for me in a whisper saying “Stop! This is the empire of the dead.” The significance of the words struck me as we ducked our heads under the arch and stepped inside.
I love everything spooky, and I thought I knew what to expect, but no article could have prepared me for the sense of existential enlightenment I found there.
Walking between the bones of millions of unknown people made me feel incredibly small. Looking back, I think that most people don’t take the experience as seriously as I did, but then again, most people don’t get to experience it the way I did. The catacombs are usually packed with people. Most people only have the time to snap a few pictures before they’re rushed out to make room for more tourists. It’s rare to find yourself alone down there, with only the souls of those long dead to keep you company.
It was a little bit overwhelming for me to consider that many individuals as a whole. I felt drawn to them and wanted to be able to pay my respects in the same way you can in a modern cemetery.
I sat for a few minutes in front of just one skull. He was a person once, and I wanted to know him, but I knew I never could. This man (or woman) didn’t even get to be buried with his name. Thousands of people walk past him daily, but no one will ever be able to know anything about him. The last person he knew would have died hundreds of years ago, and his bones were dug out of an overcrowded cemetery and tossed together with countless others. I doubt any other tourists have ever even noticed this one person. How could they possibly? He has no distinguishing marks, and if you walked through the catacombs and spent even just a few minutes on each person, it would take you years to get through.
It made me sad for them, but it also helped me come to the realization that my own insignificance can be freeing. There are millions of people laid to rest within the miles of catacombs, billions of others who came before them in countries all over the world, and billions more alive today. I am just one person, not even a grain of sand on a beach in the big picture.
These men and women who lost their identities and individuality to be re-buried in a mass grave underneath the streets of Paris gave me the freedom to no longer care so much about what people think about me. I am free to live without fear of how I will be remembered, because in the scheme of things- it doesn’t really matter.
Nothing I do matters and no one will ever remember me. When I die I will end up a pile of bones, just like everyone else on the planet, and even then my bones won’t even get to be part of history. My bones won’t be displayed for tourists to gawk at, or for teenagers to deface. They’ll be put into a little wooden box, buried six feet under, and the only part of me anyone will ever see again will be a tombstone. Even then, they’ll probably only find it if they’re looking for it.
That freezing winter night, in the silent and empty catacombs, under a Paris bustling with Christmas shoppers, my outlook was completely changed.
If you want to read more about the catacombs and quarry tunnels under the streets of Paris, please check out this amazing National Geographic article and this one from Atlas Obscura.
And if you do go to Paris, I highly recommend prioritizing the catacombs. Its a wonderful experience and one that will stay with you forever.
In the United States there are 2 types to choose from:
An exchange, where you pay a small program fee (a few hundred dollars) and your normal tuition. You pay rent and feed yourself on your budget, just like you would at home.
A program like CIEE, IES, or USAC. Usually running anywhere from $20,000 to $40,000 a semester.
The choice is pretty clear, right? But people still choose those expensive programs! So they must be offering something amazing, right? Something that makes all that money worth it.
Those programs offer complete support. I have a group to meet you at the airport, they take care of the apartment hunting for you (read you have no choice where or who you live with), they take care of your meals. It’s a smaller group of foreign students together so you get more one on one attention, and they plan outings for you to other cities.
That might appeal to you, but it doesn’t appeal to me. The point of studying abroad is to learn, grow, and become more independent. With those programs, you pay more to lose the freedom of choice. On an exchange you get to do everything yourself, and it gives you so much freedom, and that freedom helps you to build lifelong skills.
On travel: You make fast friends with a huge group of foreign kids who all have the same interests to go to museums, travel, and see history. It’s easy to find a group of people and learn to book your own tickets when and where you want to go.
On housing: You get to find your own apartment, you set your own budget and choose where and who you want to live with! Most of the times you’ll be saving money renting in a foreign country than you would paying for on campus housing at any American university anyways!
On food: You get to grocery shop like a local, and find your own favorite restaurants rather than eating at the dining hall because you already paid for it.
I truly think if I had done a program in Italy rather than an exchange, I never would have built the confidence to go on and live in China and Russia.
The only major benefit I DO see from programs like those is they tend to cater more to other majors besides business and economics, majors like English, drama, or history. I ended up taking masters level design courses, mixed with Italian, Italian history, and Italian markets, and I loved all of them, even as an English Major. I loved getting to choose my own classes out of everything the university offered, just like I would have at my home university. I think when you study abroad, you should be learning about the country you’re in too! So if you do want to try to do an exchange, the only thing I would recommend is saving as many of your electives as you can for it!
And there is one other crazy option too. I know a guy who didn’t find any programs he liked, so he switched to all online classes at his university, found an apartment to share with a bunch of exchange students and just moved to Spain for the semester. I think you miss out on a lot of the camaraderie that way, but you do have more time to travel than anyone else because you aren’t stuck in physical classes! College really is the age to live abroad. Once life gets started and you have commitments and responsibilities, it gets so much harder to leave.
This is one of my favorite things to give advice about, it might seem like such an easy concept, but a surprising number of people don’t think it through. Almost every time I’ve given my spiel about what to pack for a long term trip, I get the response “oh, wow, that’s actually really helpful, thanks!” They don’t think it’s going to be helpful- BUT IT IS.
My first strategy is to keep your big suitcase open in the middle of your floor for a week. Just throw stuff into it as you see something you want to take with you. Looking at that huge pile of stuff you want to bring is a great wake-up call. When you’re ready to really pack, you need to pull everything out and have a good talk with yourself to see if you really need it. Does this bring me joy? It really is quality over quantity- bring your favorite and the cutest outfits, they’ll be in all your pictures!
When it’s time to really pack- you have a choice to make: to roll, or to fold? I’m not that into rolling when you roll EVERYTHING, but it does have its benefits. Fold the big stuff- jeans sweaters, etc, but roll the small stuff, and tuck it into the spaces. When you roll big stuff it leaves big canyons between the rolls and you lose all that space.
One thing you might not think about when packing for a long period of time is the changing of the seasons. Its hard to think about what you’ll be wearing in spring in the middle of winter. My favorite advice is pack more warm weather clothes than cold weather clothes. You’re going to be wearing a coat in all of your winter pictures anyway, so it’s not like you need the variety. Another plus side is that shorts and shirts are smaller, so you can fit way more of them!
My last bit of advice is a trick to give yourself more room to bring home souvenirs- pack BIG bottles of your favorite bath products. Not only will you have a nice luxury from home for a while, but you’ll be able to fill that space with trinkets later!
So if you travel a fair bit I’m sure you have googled or at the very least noticed the difference between American milk and European milk. Shelf stable is the norm in most of Europe and it is EXPENSIVE compared to American milk at least. Also, once it’s opened it only lasts for a few days, which drives me crazy. I’m a true blooded American who loves her chemicals ;).
In Russia it’s a lot of the same as the rest of Europe. You can buy shelf stable milk in Tetra Paks or you can buy fresh milk in bottles. The fresh tends to be a little bit more expensive, doesn’t last as long, and tastes… funky. More funky that other European countries’ fresh milks. I don’t know what it is. I don’t mind the boxed milks, but I haven’t been able to find a single brand of fresh milk here that I like at all. So I’m stuck with TetraPaks, which seem really bad for the environment because they’re not ~really recyclable. (Not that Russia has a recycling program anyways.) I feel really guilty using so many TetraPaks, but they’re so common here!
The biggest problem with the dairy industry here is that it’s completely government controlled- its a command market, not a free market. (I had to look up that term. The more you know! Lol) So all milk, and all dairy products are produced IN Russia. If you look for some specific cheese imports, you won’t find them because of sanctions and Russia’s counter sanctions. (I clearly do not know enough about this topic to explain literally anything about sanctions or how they work.) All I know is that you CANNOT buy real Italian or French cheeses here. That Parmesan is a LIE.
The milk, cheese, yogurts, sour creams here are definitely okay, but I wouldn’t say they’re great. And it is kind of sad that you have limited options, because all the brands are basically the same. The nice thing about government control though is that the prices are also controlled so that they stay reasonable. So you win some, you lose some.
In researching the dairy industry, I also found out that Russia has sanctions on all sorts of things- mainly things that are deemed necessities, like eggs, bread, flour, chicken, dairy, etc. The only ones that I have noticed really aren’t great are dairy and bread though.
All stores carry the same brands of bread, and none of them are great- they don’t taste amazing, and they mold really quickly, which makes me think the mold was there to begin with. You can go to bakeries, but it’s nice to just be able to buy your bread while you get the rest of your groceries. On the plus side it’s made me get really good at making homemade bread!
Mixed China and Russia flag, three dimensional render, illustration
Pros and Cons
This is just based off of my experiences, but I think for the most part they are fairly similar to most people’s experiences. Paperwork for both is equally TERRIBLE.
Pro-China: great pay, low expectations, low cost of living, easy to get the job
Pro-Russia: organized, official, good communication & expectations, more western culture
Anti-China: poor communication, often unofficial, unstructured, unpredictable
Anti-Russia: snobby, critical, lower pay, high rent
The Good and Bad of China
I’m definitely glad I did the China experience. That being said, I’m still glad I limited it to only 6 months.
China is tricky- you can’t predict what kind of job you’ll land (the school, the location, the manager, the people, the PAY) but in general, it is fairly easy to land a job. If you have a bachelor’s degree, are a native English speaker, and have a TEFL degree, you’ll have no problem. If you look around enough you can find a REALLY well paying job, and there are TONS of schools that are always looking. If you’re going for money alone, China is your place- highest pay coupled with the lowest cost of living. Don’t settle for those low paying ones though.
It’s kind of a show up and start system. you don’t get a lot of training at most places, which would be bad, except they also have matching low expectations for teachers. If you want to learn how to teach without limitations, restrictions, or really any structure at all, this would be ideal. It stressed me out though- I love teaching, but I need some kind of structure to follow beyond “teach shapes for 4 weeks straight.”
Living in China is tough: questionable hygiene, very different food, and very different culture. Its very common for your managers to not tell you expectations for events or meetings and then expect you to learn a complicated dance in one afternoon. By far the most difficult thing to get accustomed to though was that literally no one speaks English. In most European countries you can throw a rock and you’ll find someone who can speak English, not quite so in China. Working with people you can’t talk to gets pretty lonely. I constantly felt like I didn’t know what was going on, because, well, I didn’t.
The Good and Bad of Russia
I would say overall Russia has been better than China for me. From the beginning, expectations were made clear. The interview process was THOROUGH. They wanted experience, teaching videos, and a mock lesson- it felt a lot more like a real job from the very beginning. I had support and advice for the whole process of my initial paperwork.
Russian is super hard and I think it helps Russians be really good at languages. Of all the people I’ve met who speak English as a second language, the Russians have the best mastery of it. It makes a big difference at work to be able to talk to my coworkers, and I think the fact that Russia has a more Western culture than China made a big difference for me too.
The flipside of all of the nice things about Russia though is that they expect a lot more. The highest paying jobs in Moscow are patroned by the ultra-rich, and they want to be in control of every word you speak to their children. And unlike China, the parents speak enough English to actually know what’s going on. Culturally, Russians tend to be a little bit brusque with their criticism and it comes off as harsh, especially to Americans. That’s difficult to get used to, but if you like following really specific rules and love structure, it could be great for you.
Rent in Russia is also more expensive. Not crazy expensive, not like Switzerland or Austria or anything, but Moscow and St. Petersburg’s costs of living are significantly higher than anywhere in China. Even the highest paying English teaching gig in Moscow pays a lot less than you could be making in China, and that’s not ideal when paired with higher rent costs.
Should I teach in China or Russia?
They both have good and bad. I like living in Russia more, but its definitely a harder workload with less money than China. But at least the kids are cute in both countries!
Grocery stores are absolutely one of my major passions. It’s one of the most fun things about living in another country and its a great way to really “be” more local.
Before you move to or just visit another country, people (I’m sure) will come up to you and offer advice; what to expect, etc. In my experience they are wrong. I don’t know if I’m listening to the wrong people or what, but if someone says I can’t find something, then I always do, and if they say its easy to find it never is! So you can choose whether or not to believe me, but I swear this is the honest-to-God truth (at least it is true in 2019).
Before coming to Russia, I was told that food would be incredibly bland. Absolutely not true. They told me when I tried to cook I wouldn’t be able to find any good spices and that I should bring some taco seasoning/mexican spice blends with me from Arizona to use “when I got tired of eating boiled potatoes.” Wrong on both levels- Russian food is delicious and healthy! Also I found every spice I could want in the grocery stores as well as Mexican seasoning and taco blends. They also have tortillas and salsa!
I had another lady go out of her way to tell me that I wouldn’t be able to make chocolate chip cookies here. I asked in a forum if there were any American Expats in Russia with advice for what I would miss and she said she couldn’t find chocolate chips and vanilla anywhere here. It wasn’t hard. The baking aisle has both. Although I will grant that the chocolate chips are a little bit overpriced compared to how cheap a regular chocolate bar is. Also vanilla is a little bit different here. In the states we sell big bottles of brown imitation or real vanilla. In Moscow, however, they sell it in little droppers of clear liquid that is SUPER strong. It’s different, but it’ll definitely fill your need for vanilla flavoring.
I have been told by Russians here that you can find “anything you could ever want” in Moscow and it might be a little bit harder in St. Petersburg, and definitely harder out in the sticks. And it has mostly been true. Grocery stores in Moscow have been amazing. They have all the best parts of European grocery stores without missing out on any important American imports.
Stores in Moscow have a far better range of products and imports than the rest of Europe I think. They have peanut butter, they have donuts, frozen pizzas and chicken nuggets! They have salad dressings and grape juice (albeit it’s not great). They have ziploc bags when the rest of Europe doesn’t. I even found rootbeer in a regular store here! I’m still looking for ranch dressing and stuffing mix, but I’m sure they’ll turn up.
One thing you would expect them to have but they don’t though, is brown sugar. They technically do, but it’s weird. It’s not packed brown molasses sugar. It’s light brown granulated raw sugar. Not great for baking but not a big deal to live without.
I’ve heard talk of an American import store inside of the American embassy. Apparently you have to make an appointment to go shopping there, it sounds very secretive and fun- I’ll fill you in when I finally go.
*Baking Powder* This is one of those things that’s hit or miss wherever you go, so I usually just play it safe and bring some with me. Italy had something CALLED baking powder, but really it was baking soda. Everywhere has baking soda, and it is definitely possible to substitute, I just don’t like to. You can get baking powder in Moscow though. It comes in little packages and it is called Разрыхлитель теста just know that on a lot of packaging fonts, the T changes to a lowercase m. Couldn’t tell you why. It’s super frustrating when you’re trying to learn.
There are always a few things I miss from the states, (like American milk) but Russia ticks most of my boxes. So don’t worry about not being able to find the things you want in Moscow grocery stores- they’re likely to have it and lots of other fun things to discover.
When I leave Russia there will definitely be things I will miss too- like the amazing selection of pickled things, the variety of dishes featuring beets, and the delicious prepared котлета which is just ground meat and minced veggies and spices in a giant meatball shape.
1st- It was my first time in Europe. It was my first time flying alone, it was my first time flying out of the country even! Up until this point, I had driven everywhere I had been except once, when I flew to DC on a school trip. This trip was BIG for me.
Luckily, I already had my passport, even though I had never used it. I was supposed to take the customary best friend backpacking trip after high school, but I put my eggs into the wrong basket and it didn’t turn out.
At the time it was horrible and absolutely crushed me, but it turned out great in the end! I took all my savings for the trip and I bought a Mini Cooper instead! I waited a few more years and when I finally got across the Atlantic it turned out exactly how it was meant to be!
Finally getting to Europe was such a long time coming, but it turned out so much better for me to go when I did, with the person I went with, and where I was at in my life at that point. It was better than I could have ever imagined.
Honestly, I had no idea what I was doing. I had such a different vision in my mind of what backpacking Europe was going to be like. It probably would have worked out fine if I had gone with my friend, we would have floundered a bit, but figured it out as we went a long. I’m sure it would have turned out in the end, and it’s not like we would have died or anything, but I was doing all the planning myself and I had no idea what I was doing. I knew what I wanted to see and where to go, but I didn’t know how to actually get anywhere.
When my friend backed out, my mom tried to get me to go by myself. I could have! I thought about it… But I’m just so glad that I didn’t. I wanted someone to share it with, and going with someone that I love makes all the difference! I don’t know what I would have done without Lucas with me.
Side note: I also don’t know how I ever would have made it through without a smartphone. How did people do it back in the day?! No pocket translator? No scanning QR codes? No online tickets? No train schedules? No Google maps?!? The horror.
So, Lucas and I had only been dating for about 7 months when he left for Madrid for 4 months. That was hard. Real hard. Spare you the details. I promised him I would come to Spain to be with him after the semester was over. I don’t think he believed I was really coming until I was actually on the plane though!
The day before I left I was a wreck. I had a final at like 7 pm, I got home, did homework til 1 am and then finally started packing. So long story short I ended up with like 6 shirts, 3 pairs of pants, 2 dresses, 1 pair of shoes and 30 pairs of underwear lol. I could have fit everything I brought into a carry-on no problem.
I flew from Phoenix to Dallas, and then Dallas straight into Madrid. On the way to Dallas, I sat next to the sweetest little old lady. She asked me where I was headed and I told her that it was my first flight, and I was going to Madrid to see my boyfriend! She told me how romantic it was and how excited she was for me right before I fell asleep. Something about the cabin pressure knocks me right out. It’s wild. When we landed in Dallas she knew I was nervous and she walked me all the way across the airport, helped me get to my connection and gave me a hug. I wished I could keep her.
That wasn’t even the best part of my luck though. While I was waiting, I logged into my flight check-in one more time to check my seat and I saw that I could still change it! So I did. I moved myself from a window seat with two other people on my row to the only completely empty row on the plane. It was so awesome. The lady at the gate had to reprint my tickets when I tried to board, which was a little bit stressful, but it was well worth it. I slept sprawled out for most of the flight, but every time I woke up I caught the lady across the aisle glaring at me. The entire flight. It was awesome.
When I finally landed in Madrid, I was so excited to see Lucas. I met a girl while I was waiting in baggage claims and we started talking because we were both alone. I told her I was meeting my boyfriend who I hadn’t seen in 4 months and that I could not handle waiting for my luggage any longer. While I was talking to her all the sudden I see Lucas running towards me! I was so blown away. Somehow he had SNUCK into baggage claim because he couldn’t wait one more minute either. 😍 My favorite memory. Probably of all time.
Finally back together again! ❤
The first day in Madrid was pretty boring. I was so dazed from the time change and staying up so late, and the pure excitement. First thing we did was drop off all my stuff at Lucas’s apartment. He had a room in a flat that he shared with 9 people in the dead center of Plaza Mayor, which is in the dead center of the city. Then we went to the metro office to set up my student metro card, which was a bit of a hassle, but well worth it. The metro system in Madrid is great.
Madrid is just beautiful in general though, everything you could want from a European city: the architecture, the food, the street performers, the lights, cathedrals and museums.
Let’s start with the museums- Madrid has some of the best. They call it the trifecta. (At least Lucas does.) Prado (the love of my life), Reina Sofia (which is incredible if you’re really into modern art), and Thyssen-Bornemisza (which has everything else you might be missing). But those aren’t even all of the museums. There’s also a naval museum, history museums, and the Museo Archeologico Nacional- MAN, all super close to each other, and they are some of the best museums in the world. I’m serious. Prado is in the same league as the Louvre. You cannot go to Madrid and not go to Prado. (You can get in free with a student ID!) I should know, I’ve been there 4 times. 😉 I really enjoyed the MAN too. Lucas says it’s the best archaeological museum he’s ever been to. But if you only have time for one museum, I can’t recommend Prado enough.
When I got settled in, metro card, sim card, luggage, shower and nap, Lucas took me around and showed me his favorite places. We walked the streets hand in hand, and he took me to my first cathedral – Catedral de la Almudena. I was in awe. I had never seen a building so beautiful or grand. Now that I have seen lots of other cathedrals, I don’t look back and think it’s the most beautiful anymore, but it will always have a special place in my heart.
2016
2018
We walked through the gardens as the sun was setting and had the sweetest time together. I still couldn’t believe I was in Spain!
The next day we toured Palacio Real de Madrid. A PALACE. It was lavish and shiny and huge and everything you’d expect from a Spanish Palace. I loved it!
Afterwards Lucas bought me my first sandwich from Museo de Jamon, and from then on an obsession was born.
I love Museo De Jamon so much
“The products in this section are only for consumption outside of the establishment”
We spent hours in Prado, and finished the evening walking through Retiro Park, lush, green and cold in early December. On the edge of Retiro there is a pathway that always has accordion players next to a miniature lake circled with monuments. We sat across from the lake at a little restaurant where we ate baby eels and watched the birds. I didn’t think it could get much more magical, but then Lucas went and rented us a little boat on the lake! My heart melted. All of my very best days somehow involve a boat. I couldn’t think of anything more romantic.
Best day of my life!
We walked the city, we went into so many museums and found a secret garden under one of the old train stations. We went into Lucas’s favorite coffee shop, Jaleo, for neopolitanos and magic orange juice. We wandered through El Rastro street markets where I bought the cutest gloves and hat. We went into so many antique shops, and antique bookstores. We spent a nice evening going up in the Faro De Moncloa and looked down at the whole city lit up at night.
Libreria Bibliofilos
Faro De Moncloa
And one of my all-time favorites- in the middle of Plaza Mayor, is a man who stand there every day dressed as spider-man. But he weighs like 300 pounds. He is “Fat Spider-man” and he is hilarious. I only saw him the first time in Madrid, but when we went back again in 2018 we stopped to talk to him and I laughed my ass off. I ended up giving him all the money I had on me. He earned it!
Fat Spider-man is an icon of Madrid
Lucas had done all these wonderful things with me, but he still had finals to study for, so I had the chance to do a bit of wandering on my own. It was good for me to get out of my comfort zone. Be forced to speak Spanish, figure out the metro on my own and try to remember where things were.
I went and hunted down a bracelet I had seen in a kiosk at a metro stop, and decided to see some of the things that Lucas hadn’t gone to. It turned out later that he hadn’t gone to them because they were pretty disappointing, but the real magic was in my adventure to find them.
The first one on my list was Plaza Cibeles. I had seen the outside of it with Lucas, but for some reason I was dying to know what was inside. It’s really close to Retiro Park, but I didn’t trust my memory, so I typed it into Google maps. Or I thought I did. For some reason I just typed Cibeles. And followed the map. All over the city. it actually turned out quite well to get lost because I got to see so much of the city that I wouldn’t have seen otherwise. I did eventually find my way to Plaza Cibeles, There was a small museum inside, but nothing too spectacular.
Next I wanted to see the inside of the Crystal Palace, which Lucas and I had walked past the evening before. He told me that there was some sort of art installation inside, but by the time we got to it, it was already closing. So I walked and walked, deep into the park. Some immigrant guys tried hitting on me in Spanish and I just hurried past them and pretended I didn’t understand what they were saying. It was pretty awkward. By the time I got there I was tired and I really hoped there was something good inside. But it turned out that the art installation was just the fact that it was an empty room. The art part was how sound travels. I was pretty disappointed, but the lighting was nice for some pictures at least!
I ended up wandering around for 7 hours throughout the day and I just felt so safe and capable (even though I got lost, and even though I got hit on). Madrid was just a wonderful experience for me.
We ended the evening with a lovely Spanish tortilla in a restaurant outside of Plaza Mayor before we flew to Paris the next morning!
Finding Eden 