A well loved passport via Instagram | Follow me @stormsatsea
I have spent the past 5 years traveling abroad. When I am not traveling, I am planning, researching, working saving for the next inevitable trip. With 100 countries and 7 continents on my horizon, my love for travel and incurable case of wanderlust will never be cured. I think one of the most interesting parts of my journey to becoming a traveler is that I didn't discover my love for travel. As silly as it sounds, my love for travel discovered me.
It was September of 2009. I was 19 years old in my 2nd year of community college. I believe at the time I was somewhere in between wanting to major in journalism and sociology, or maybe I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, I can't remember.
I had wanted to go, but being presented with this opportunity seemingly out of nowhere, I had a lot of questions. I had never been abroad before, and anytime I had been away or on vacation I was usually with my parents. And then there was the cost to think about. But I realized that I would be 20 years old by the time the trip came, and to me, this was a big step but it had to happen sometime. So I decided to do it. I worked and saved, and with that, financial aid and a little help from my Dad, I was able to finance it.
On February 26th, 2010 I left for London, England. I'm sure at the time I was eager to go on the trip, then would come back and continue to take classes and see where it took me. Fortunately, on that trip, something happened to me. In the course of the 9 day trip through London and Amsterdam I had just a small taste of the world and after that, I wanted to experience all of it. I was bit by the travel bug, and hard. Suddenly, I wanted to go everywhere and see everything, and knew I wanted to live abroad. The 20 year old me who left the Tampa International Airport on that day was not the same 20 year old when I came back. That trip changed me, and changed the path I was going to go down, even if I didn't know it yet.
The next year, I heard my school was going to abroad again, this time to Italy. To have the opportunity to see another country, I knew I had to go. Right before I went, a favorite professor of mine told us 'Travel is the best education you can have. Travel now, while you are young. Don't wait until you are my age, do it now.' And even then, I knew he was right. And I took his advice to heart, knowing that I wanted to see the world.
After Italy, I had set my sights on getting to Paris. At this time, I had transferred at a university in Orlando, and knew that a new school meant knew opportunities to travel. The same time the next year, in 2012, I got word that my former school was going abroad again, this time to Germany, Austria and Paris. I knew I had to go, but my school break didn't coincide with the trip. Somehow I made it work, determined to go. I missed school that week, but it was worth it (even though I paid for it dearly when I returned; I was stressed trying to catch up until finals). I spent the week in Paris, Germany and Austria then traveled for the first time by myself from Munich to Paris to stay with a friend for the week. It was a great experience, seeing Paris through a friend who lived there. It was different than seeing Paris as a tourist. We even took the Eurostar to London for a day, hardly knowing that London would play a big role in both of our futures.
That summer I went abroad again through my university, back to London, Paris and Rome. Going back to the cities I had been to two or three times before, and going back in summer were very different experiences than going to a place for the first time in winter. A group of us took a week and traveled around more of Italy after, so I was able to see even more of Italy I had missed the previous time.
Around this time I knew that travel was important to me, and I didn't just want it to be a hobby or something I did in college. I really loved it and wanted it to be somehow a part of my career. At 22, I finally figured out what I wanted after having no idea for so long.
I moved out of state back to New England to study Travel and Tourism. I think sometime between my summer trip abroad and moving to major in travel I realized I wanted to become a traveler. In that time and since, I have sent my sights on thousands of places all around the world to experience. Travel wouldn't be a once in a lifetime thing for me, it would be constant. I realized travel was not a luxury for me, it is a necessity.
I think that first trip abroad was the big step is setting the stage for me to become a traveler. The more I saw the more I wanted to see. One trip has manifested itself into 5 trips, soon to be 7 trips abroad to 4 other continents and 8 countries.
Never did I think 5 years ago on that first trip I would see so much of Europe and South America as well as South Africa coming up. Never did I think I'd be moving to London and be able to see so much more of Europe. People say I have seen a lot, and I have traveled a lot. To a traveler, though...the world is my playground. To me, I have not seen enough, or done enough. There is always more to see, to experience.
To become a traveler, if you wish to do so I think the biggest thing is the first step: to take a trip abroad. Take a trip to Asia, South America, Europe...study abroad, volunteer abroad, work abroad...anything to get you there. Once you get a taste of the world outside of your home country, you'll want to see so much of what our world has to offer. And maybe, once will be enough and you'll settle back into your home country, and that's fine. Or maybe, like myself, once will be enough, and you won't be able to get enough and want to travel to every corner of the world.
Travel showed up in my life during a time when I wasn't looking for it, or looking for anything really. That day I got that brochure in the mail was the day I found the thing I didn't know I was looking for. Out of travel I had found not only myself, but the best version of myself. Out of my adventures abroad I am proud to now, and forever, call myself a traveler.
"We travel, initially to loose ourselves; and we travel, next, to find ourselves." - Pico Iyer
0 comments:
Post a Comment