Diary of a Wandering Student

Building the Human Brochure

2013-02-15T13:19:00.000+11:00

Everywhere we went in Canberra had these signs - they really pulled out
the stops to make us feel welcome.

The first stop for everyone during the October
Human Brochure weekend - the Australian
War Memorial.

If you're reading this blog, it's likely because you have a love of travel, whether you're a digital nomad or pack all your explorations into two weeks per year. But what motivates you to look at a map, point to a spot and say "I want to go there!"? If you're anything like me, tourism board ads and brochures probably don't even cross your mind in response to that question. Often, what makes me want to visit a specific place is what I hear from other people - and what I do once I'm there draws heavily from suggestions from Twitter, blogs and travel forums. I may occasionally visit a tourism board's website looking for information, but I can't remember a time I've actually been prompted to stay or eat somewhere or take part in an activity based on one.

Australian Capital Tourism is out to change all that.

Canberra, Australia's capital and the capital city of the Australian Capital Territory, is celebrating its centenary this year, and ACTourism is determined to take advantage of the opportunity to change the city's staid reputation. (If you're not from Australia, you're probably wondering where Canberra is and why you've never heard of it - it's a few hours' drive southwest of Sydney and has an unfortunate reputation for being full of boring politicians, windy days and little else. If you're from Australia, quit sniggering!)

Getting some basic mountain biking instructions from former
professional mountain cyclist Jarrod Rando.
Photo credit: Australian Capital Tourism

I'd always planned to make it to Canberra before leaving Australia but assumed I'd just make a quick daytrip, visit Parliament and wander around a little, then head back to Sydney, tick Canberra off my list and never think about it again. Then, in early September, Brooke Schoenman of Brooke vs. the World and Her Packing List posted a link on Facebook to an application for something called "the Human Brochure." Intrigued by the name, I clicked through.

Fast-forward to the last weekend in October and I was shrieking as I flew (okay, half-flew, half-wobbled) over a series of "rollers" at the ACT's Stromlo Forest Park on a mountain bike, laughing with delight at the sound and feel of a cheetah's purr at the National Zoo & Aquarium, and chatting with a park ranger on the way up to Tidbinbilla's Gibraltar Peak. And, it must be said, making a complete glutton of myself at some of Canberra's best restaurants.

One of my favorite experiences of the weekend - petting Shassa,
a playful, middle-aged cheetah with a purr like a freight train,
at Canberra's National Zoo & Aquarium.

Not an altogether unusual itinerary for me (minus the being spoiled in a nice hotel part), but the premise behind it was: I was in Canberra for the weekend as one of "500 humans" brought to the city from all around Australia to experience the variety of activities it has to offer and share my experience via social media. ACTourism put together four activity streams - Food & Wine, Family Fun, Arts & Culture, and Adventure, which was the stream I took part in.

I wasn't sure what to expect from Canberra, given its rather dull reputation, but I had a blast and would love to go back. The one big takeaway of the weekend, for me, was that Canberra is actually teeming with fun, historical, delicious, and interesting things to do, depending on what you're looking for. One of my fellow Adventurers, Anthony (@bloodytourist), put it best when he tweeted halfway through the weekend, "So far, I can't comprehend for the life of me why #Canberra has a bad rep. I could fill weeks." The variety of available things to do in Australia's capital will be especially diverse this year, when each month is packed with centenary celebrations.

The Sloe Kid - sloe gin, reposado tequila, mandarin, & lime,
a delicious start to dinner at Canberra hot-spot Soju Girl.

Aside from the great activities put together for the Adventure stream, which I thoroughly enjoyed, I couldn't get over the sheer brilliance of the idea of the Human Brochure. Created and executed by the wonderful team at The Works, this is a tourism campaign that takes the whole concept to another level. They aren't advertising Canberra, they're giving 500 people a semi-personalized overview of what the city has to offer and asking each of those 500 people to share their activities, reactions, and opinions with their friends and networks, essentially creating 500 different - and again, personalized - mini ad-campaigns. Considering that each of the "500 humans" selected from more than 31,000 applicants has something like a 45% higher-than-average social media reach, that's both gutsy and smart.

I was thrilled to take part in building the Human Brochure, and I hope to see similar campaigns start to take place worldwide. I had a fabulous time, and I enjoyed sharing my experience as it happened - it's what I do anyway when I travel, but doing so with the idea of encouraging people to visit an underrated destination with a lot to offer added to the fun. I don't know what kind of impact Canberra tourism has seen or will see from this, but I know another campaign like this one would make me sit up and take notice of all the area had to offer and the experiences the people participating in it had.

On the way up to Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve's Gibraltar Peak.
Photo credit: Australian Capital Tourism

And the Human Brochure is only half done! 250 of us tweeted, Instagrammed, foursquared, Facebooked, and blogged our way through the first weekend in October, and the remaining 250 humans are beginning to arrive in Canberra as we speak, preparing to do the same this weekend. Check out my #humanbrochure stream, then watch the full stream to follow along as this weekend's humans experience all that Canberra has to offer. You just might find a reason - or a handful! - to visit Australia's capital city yourself.

The trip written about in this post was paid for by Australian Capital Tourism, at no cost - other than the occasional latte and the risk of sore fingers from tweeting so much - to me. Accommodation, meals, activities, and transport within Canberra were provided; I received reimbursement for the cost of transport to and from Canberra. All opinions, however, are my own.

Gratuitous cute-Aussie-wildlife photo - I've never seen so many kangaroos
in one place in the wild as at Tidbinbilla. And who can resist a cute roo
and her little joey?
Photo credit: Australian Capital Tourism

During the (very few!) hours we weren't out adventuring,
the staff of Canberra's Mantra on Northbourne went above
and beyond to be sure the Adventure stream was comfortable,
supplying us with welcome snacks, a lovely breakfast spread,
and snacks, water, and hats for our trip to Tidbinbilla.

The Day the Kawarau River Punched Me in the Face

2012-07-05T23:15:00.000+10:00

Kawarau Bridge, the birthplace of commercial bungy.

In Queenstown, NZ, the question of greeting in hostel common rooms isn't the usual "So, how long are you staying?" or "Where are you from?" Instead, without fail, it's "What are you doing tomorrow?"

I loved Queenstown from the moment I drove into it, more in spite of its adrenaline-junky status than because of it. It comes closer to picture-perfect than any other town I've seen, and its gorgeous setting certainly doesn't hurt, with stunning views and a staggering range of outdoor adventures on offer.

Queenstown was the last stop on the solo portion of my road trip around New Zealand and I'd already done most of my thrill-seeking for the trip; the only thing left was bungy-jumping. If I had a bucket list, bungy would not be on it - as I've said before, I am not an adrenaline junky. But Queenstown is the birthplace of commercial bungy and if I was ever going to hurl myself off a ledge with no more support than a glorified rubber band, I figured there was probably no better place for it than where it all began. In the interest both of budgeting and not giving myself a chance to back out, I booked my non-refundable jump date online well before I arrived in New Zealand.

Still laughing - I hadn't actually looked down yet.
Photo credit: AJ Hackett Bungy

I had chosen to jump from Kawarau Bridge, the original commercial jump site, operated by AJ Hackett Bungy. At 43 meters (~141 feet), Kawarau is the shortest of AJ Hackett's drops on offer in Queenstown, and I was feeling pretty cavalier about the whole thing as I boarded the bus for the 20-minute drive to the jump site. (After all, I'd jumped out of a plane barely three days earlier. Clearly, this would be a piece of cake.)

Upon arrival, I tightened my sandals and pulled off my watch and earrings, laughing at the "I Was Too Chicken" shirts on display in the gift shop. In a brilliant flash of self-preservation, I decided I didn't want to wait around watching people jump first, I just wanted to do it. I was second in line out on the bridge, joking with the British guy behind me while I climbed down onto the back part of the ledge to have my legs wrapped and secured.

I told the guys operating the jump that I wanted to touch the water (the options are bungy over it, touch it, or get dunked), and waddled forward when they told me to. Distracted by the guy telling me to look at various cameras, I didn't actually look down until they were resetting one that hadn't gone off the first time. All of a sudden, my heart leapt into my throat. I was supposed to voluntarily hurl myself into all that thin air, when every instinct was screaming to back up - very quickly - onto safer ground? I gulped.

Not a bad jump, actually. I was terrified I wasn't
going to get far enough from the platform.
Photo credit: AJ Hackett Bungy

The reset camera flashed, and the operator, thoroughly unimpressed by the feat of sheer insanity he was about to witness, began to count down from five. Much, much faster than I thought he should be counting. Jittery thoughts rushed through my brain. How am I supposed to do this? Who in their right mind is actually capable of jumping off a ledge? This is freaking terrifying. As he reached "three," one thing became clear: If I don't go when he says "one," I'm never going to get off of this thing.

I took a deep breath, braced myself and, as he finished the countdown ("...one. Bungy!"), threw myself forward, arms outstretched.

There was a split second of weightlessness, of absolute freedom, and then I abruptly realized that my stomach was still on the ledge, while the rest of me was hurtling downward, much too quickly.

The water of the Kawarau River, rushing up at me, was a gorgeous color and I stretched my hands toward it, not wanting to miss my shot to dip my fingers in. Except, I realized, my brain still moving at warp speed, that a whole lot more than my hands was about to get wet. I quickly clamped my mouth, open from shrieking on the way down, tightly shut, but didn't manage to get my eyes closed before I was submerged in that gorgeous blue, the color forever imprinted on my brain as it swirled around me.

I surfaced almost before I'd had a chance to register the freezing temperature of the water and bounced around like a yo-yo (somehow also managing to spin myself around in dizzying circles) until the retrieval raft got close enough to reel me in. I lay on the bottom as they untangled me and floated us to the stairs, laughing as I stared back up at the bridge.

Soaking wet, but safely down.
Photo credit: AJ Hackett Bung

I waited partway up the stairs to watch Ryan, the British guy who'd been on the same bus and behind me in line on the bridge, jump. Still shaking, we laughed our way back up to the viewing platform, comparing notes. He'd asked to get dunked and, somehow, was only wet to mid-torso, while I was soaked to mid-thigh. Someone must have misheard or miscalculated something somewhere! But it had been an adventure, and I had done it. (Although what that said about my sanity, I wasn't quite sure.)

Safely back on my own two feet! (With crazy hair, courtesy of my
impromptu dunking.)

Safely back on the viewing platform, I watched some of the other jumpers and was very glad I hadn't taken the time to do so before jumping myself - it was positively terrifying to watch. Waiting for the bus back into town, we all swapped photos and brandished our "Bungy Jumper" t-shirts. My head was starting to ache, but I put it down to the cold water and too much post-jump shivering, which was more in reaction to the jump than the temperature of the water.

Back at the hostel, I told my "accidental dunking" story and called my parents to let them know I'd survived my last crazy stunt of the trip, before making my way back to my room. I'd braced my pack at the foot of my bunk, against a full-length mirror; glancing into it as I pulled out dry clothes, I gasped. No wonder I had a headache, the skin underneath my left eye was swollen and the lid was starting to bruise! Since I hadn't asked to be dunked, I hadn't tucked my chin the way you're supposed to and my face had slapped the water as I went in, giving me my first-ever black eye.

Despite the black eye (which I walked around feeling self-conscious about for the following week), I'm glad I took the plunge, so to speak. Bungy-jumping was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that I have no desire to repeat but definitely wouldn't have wanted to miss. And it's certainly the most extreme - and unique - travel misadventure I've ever had. After all, how many people do you know who've been punched in the face by a river?

The hand-over-the-mouth, what-was-I-thinking?! moment when I first look down is priceless. (Also evidence that I had completely forgotten I'd bought a photo/video package with my booking. Oops.)

Video credit: AJ Hackett Bungy

Saturday Snapshot: The Joy of Freefall

2012-03-10T11:45:00.000+11:00

Being spun in 360s, at 120mph, by the photographer holding onto my hand.
Photo credit: Skydive Abel Tasman photographer, Evan

I am not an adrenaline junky. Sure, I've been set bouncing off the ceiling by a runner's high and shrieked at the top of my lungs on a few roller coasters, but I've never been the type to do anything in search of an adrenaline rush. So when I planned a tandem skydive from 16,500 feet and a 43-meter (~141 feet) bungy jump into my trip to New Zealand at the end of last year, it was more because I was curious about the experiences than because I was in search of a thrill.

Each of these experiences deserves its own post (with video!) down the road, but they had something in common that blew me away: freefall. I don't know what I expected freefall to be like but "amazing" wasn't a word I expected to use after the fact. So it surprised me when I did, over and over and over again.

Freefalling out of a plane and freefalling after hurling yourself off a ledge are two very different sensations but - for me, anyway - they both involved an element of pure, undiluted joy that took me completely by surprise. You can see it on my face in the photo above: we were less than 15 seconds out of the plane, hurtling toward the ground twice as fast as a car on a highway, spinning in the air over the very northern edge of New Zealand's South Island...and I couldn't have been happier. For 75 seconds, I was soaring above the earth (plummeting toward it, actually, but it felt more like flying), air rushing past my face and roaring in my ears. Few things have ever felt so wonderful.

Bungy-jumping is both much faster and, in my opinion, much scarier than sky-diving, but you still get just a split second of that soaring sensation before you realize you've left your stomach on the platform and are now hurtling downward at a worrisome rate of speed. The picture below captures that instant, and I love being able to look at it and remember what it felt like to be caught between earth and sky, seemingly weightless, just for a few moments.

Just after launching myself off the bungy platform at Kawarau Bridge, right before gravity set in.
Photo credit: AJ Hackett Bungy

Swimming with the Dusky Dolphins of Kaikoura

2011-12-13T14:55:00.000+11:00

The Dusky Dolphins of Kaikoura

The horn sounds, you slip into the water, lower your head and are stunned by the effort it takes to breathe. Two layers of 7mm-thick neoprene, plus the flap of the wetsuit hood, combined with a water temperature of about 50°F and the unnatural feel of breathing through a tube is something of a shock to the system. You force yourself to calm down, slow your breathing and start kicking away from the boat.

Within about a minute, your body has adjusted and you're breathing more or less normally again, so you start making noise, as instructed; since Michael Bublé's "Haven't Met You Yet" is the first thing that comes to mind, you sing it into your snorkel (or rather, you sing the notes and leave the words at "doo doo doo de da doo doo doo," since trying to sing the actual lyrics would be completely incomprehensible with a hollow piece of rubber and plastic in your mouth).

Less than sixty seconds later, a sleek arc in shades of grey bullets past and it's all you can do to keep your singing from turning into a squeal of excitement. You sing a bit louder and the grey bullet comes back. You follow it and suddenly you're swimming in a tight circle in the chilly South Pacific, trying to keep pace with a curious Dusky Dolphin who's come to investigate this unfamiliar squawking.

This is what a Dolphin Encounter with Encounter Kaikoura is all about and it is, in a word, amazing.

Part of Kaikoura's coastline and a pair of dolphins.

Before you ever set foot on a boat, Encounter Kaikoura is very clear about what its Dolphin Encounter is meant to be: an opportunity to interact with wild animals in their own environment, on their terms. Tracy, the tour leader and Pete, the bus driver and boat captain, know the habits of Kaikoura's Dusky Dolphins and know both where to look and what to look for, but it's made very clear that this isn't a Sea World exhibit and nothing is guaranteed, although every effort to get you into the water and interacting with dolphins will be made.

Since I was heading over toward Abel Tasman National Park the same day, I opted for the 5:30am tour, a summer-only option. It's a great time of day, Tracy told us, because the dolphins are heading back toward land after a night of hunting and like to get together and socialize, which means they're usually grouped into fairly large pods. We started seeing dolphins swimming and leaping within about 10 minutes of leaving Kaikoura's South Bay, all heading in the same direction. Roughly 10 minutes later, we were all lined up along the back of the boat, hoods, masks and snorkels in place, ready to slip into the water at Pete’s signal.


Several of the dolphins swimming in front of the boat on the way back to shore.

Keeping track of time underwater is never easy, but I’d estimate I spent about 45 minutes in the water, and I was rarely out of the company of at least one dolphin for more than a minute at a time. The visibility was terrible (the dolphins were virtually invisible until they were less than five meters away, startling a laugh out of me more than once when they suddenly appeared in front of, next to or beneath me), the water was freezing, the thick wetsuits and hoods were horribly awkward…and I couldn’t stop smiling.

After the first several minutes, I started to notice the dolphins’ individual markings and recognized one in particular that kept coming back – he or she had a starburst-shaped marking or scar just in front of his or her blowhole and seemed to like Sara Bareilles’ “King of Anything.” I repeated the same four or five songs throughout my time in the water and within a few lines of starting that one, I’d usually find myself swimming in human-paced circles with the dolphin with the starburst marking.

One of the mother and calf pairs that came to see the humans.

Some of the dolphins were both more interested in and more sensitive to humans than others and would swim slowly enough that I could keep up for a bit, while others would bullet past, whirl in a circle so quick that I couldn’t finish half of one in the same time, then zoom back out to sea. Tracy told us later that there had been something like 200 in the whole pod, but they mostly swam in pairs or groups of half a dozen or so.

Several times, I found myself in the midst of half a dozen dolphins at once, swimming in a circle of flashing grey and silver as I did my best to keep singing, rather than break into delighted laughter. I even circled briefly with a mother and a calf no more than three months old, feeling vaguely like a zoo exhibit but ecstatic at the sight of the baby, not quite yet as graceful as its mother.

The dolphins are incredibly playful and liked to leap alongside the boat.

Every moment was a dream come true. The dolphins were enchanting – wild, but willing to share their habitat and fearlessly curious of the strange, awkward creatures who’d descended into their world. They kept slightly less than an arm’s length away, watching us with wise eyes. I’ve never experienced anything like it, and I’ll relive the beauty of the memories for the rest of my life, always with just a little disbelief that I really did once swim with dolphins.

Saturday Snapshot: Sunrise in the Outback

2011-11-26T23:45:00.000+11:00

Sunrise at Uluru-Kata Tjuta Park, 15 June 2011

Sunrise has been vying for position as my favorite time of day since I was 17. On a spring trip to France in our junior year of high school, two friends and I decided that getting up to watch the sun rise over the Baie des Anges in Nice was the perfect way to celebrate our first full day in the country. Neglecting to consider how much further north than Southern California France is, we arrived on the beach shortly after 5am, nearly two hours before sunrise. We walked the length of the Promenade des Anglais and continued partway around the headland at the eastern end of the bay. I snapped pictures of every infinitesimal lightening of the eastern sky. Jet-lagged and sleepy-eyed, we yawned, more than once. In the end, it was worth every chilly moment. Not because the sunrise itself was a particularly spectacular one, but because it just felt like the perfect way to have started the day and our time in France.

In the nine and a half years since that April morning, I've watched sunrises from planes to various destinations, on my way to class during Washington, DC winters and while sitting on the steps of a stone library at Angkor Wat. I spent nearly three of those years seeing four or five sunrises a week as I put in the necessary miles to keep up my marathon training. Watching the sun sneak above the horizon as I paced along, puffing out fog into the frozen winter landscape or inhaling what felt like half a river from air weighted with summer humidity, came to be a comfortable part of my routine. I can't remember a day that's started with the sun that turned out to be a bad one.

With grad school keeping me up later and homework eating up a lot of the time I used to use for running, I've fallen out of the habit of watching the sunrise this year but didn't think much of it until my trip to the Northern Territory this June.

My tour left Alice Springs shortly after 6am on June 14th - which meant it was still dark, since June is winter here in Australia. It doesn't take long to leave the town of Alice Springs behind and move into empty Outback, which was where we were when the sun began to peek over the horizon. The ghostly shapes of scrub brush and the occasional desert oak became clearer and color seeped into the landscape by degrees. By the time we stopped at our first roadhouse of the day, my breath had caught in my throat a dozen times at the beauty of the Outback at dawn. The early morning air seemed gilded around the edges, rays of sunlight dancing over the red earth and teasing out depths of color that seemed impossible in the full light of day. I soaked in as much of the scenery as I could, feeling more peaceful than I had in weeks.

At Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park the next day, we watched the sun rise over both Uluru and the "many heads" of the Kata Tjuta. Sunset at Uluru the night before had been a great experience, but it was watching streams of light flow across the horizon, pouring color back into the landscape and glinting off the frost that had formed during the night that took my breath away. Watching the silhouettes of the Kata Tjuta lighten as the sun crept higher into the sky, I couldn't help but smile.

I had one more Outback sunrise that week, watching the early morning light break over the top of Kings Canyon as we made our way up the Rim Walk's "Heart Attack Hill," then chase the shadows from the trail. As the canyon walls absorbed the first of the sun's rays and reflected them back in rich shades of red and brown, I paused to catch my breath in the slowly warming air, drawing in the feeling that's what I love best about sunrise: the twin sensations of peace and possibility that accompany the start of each new day.

Color seeping back into the landscape as the sun creeps up to illuminate the "many heads" of the Kata Tjuta.

Wandering Angkor Wat

2011-09-29T13:40:00.000+10:00

I dragged myself out of bed well before dawn, blearily noting the silence outside my window. It seemed even the neighboring rooster, who'd spent more than an hour crowing the previous afternoon, was still asleep. I, however, had better things to do: this was my day to visit Angkor Wat.

In addition to being a reliable driver, Mr. Thorn
was a good sport and agreed to pose for me.

After a hurried breakfast, I greeted Mr. Thorn, who'd picked me up at the Siem Reap airport the day before, hopped in the back of his tuk-tuk and off we went. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply as we tore down dirt roads in the dark. The pre-dawn air was lovely, the omnipresent Cambodian dust tamped down by an overnight rain and the sweltering heat of the Southeast Asian sun still an hour or two beyond the horizon.

The noisy confusion and fluorescent lights at the entrance to Angkor Archaeological Park jolted me halfway back to reality as I purchased my ticket, and I climbed back into the tuk-tuk a little more alert. I watched the fog that hovered above the surface of the moat running parallel to the road, guiding us toward the entrance to Angkor Wat itself as the nighttime shadows began to lift, nudged back by the first fingers of dawn creeping over the landscape.

The sun peeking through a momentary
break in the clouds over Angkor Wat.

Wading through the masses of tourists and salespeople, I eventually settled down on the steps of one of the libraries that flank the main causeway, watching light slowly seep into the sky around Angkor's unmistakable triple silhouette. A bank of clouds from the night's rain lingered, hovering above and behind the temple, and it quickly became apparent that it wasn't going to clear before the sun was well into the sky. The photographers around me grumbled about missing a typically stunning Angkor Wat sunrise but I was oddly unperturbed, content to absorb the feeling of being nearly 9,000 miles from home, standing in the midst of a complex ordered built by a 12th-century king.

As the sun crept higher in the sky and deeper into the cloud bank, I made my way into the enclosure around the temple itself, marveling at the beauty of the bas-relief devatas guarding it and their apsara cousins, seemingly poised to begin a dance. After a climb up dauntingly steep steps with a railing so rickety I felt safer not holding onto it, I wandered one of the towers as the sun burned through the remaining clouds, sending hazy light spreading over the city surrounding the temple as sunbeams found their way through gaps in the sandstone to dance over the carvings lining the tower corridors.

A trio of apsaras at the base of one of the towers, with another tower at left.

The view from the stairs up to one of the towers (complete with rickety railing!)

Sunlight slowly seeping into the tower corridors.

The view over one of the tower balconies, with the Angkor balloon just visible among the treetops.

The South Gate entrance to Angkor Thom and
the Bayon. The statues lining the road are
fascinating - gods on the left, asuras (demons)
on the right.

I could happily have spent all morning in that one small corner of the 150-some-odd square mile complex that is the archaeological park, but I eventually pulled myself away to find Mr. Thorn and make our way to Angkor Thom and the Bayon.

The Bayon was perhaps my favorite of the sites I visited at Angkor, although it was also the most crowded. The serene smiles of the huge faces carved into the stone make for a peaceful setting, and I curled up in as quiet a spot as I could find to write some postcards before moving onto Angkor Thom city itself.

The Terrace of the Elephants, the South Gate entrance and parts of the Preah Pithu Group aside, Angkor Thom city itself was my least favorite part of the day and didn't have as much of an impact on me as the other sites I visited, but I'm still glad I took some time to wander through one of the major sites in the archaeological park.

One of the side corridors leading off from the main entryway
into the Bayon.

One of the Bayon's many face towers.

My favorite of the face towers - I wrote my postcards sitting near this guy.

When I arrived at Ta Prohm, the last site I visited, I felt as if I had stepped into some sort of Eden. The shade from the surrounding jungle and the cool morning air retained by the stone protected most of the complex from the sweltering midday heat. Despite being another of Angkor's most popular sites and full of camera-wielding tourists, Ta Prohm seemed to instill a sense of awe in most of its visitors and the hush that filled the temple was a welcome change from the chaos of Angkor Thom. With its crumbling corridors and overgrown doorways, it was easy to wander Ta Prohm wrapped in a sense of solitude, absorbing the feeling of peace that seemed to float through the air. As I climbed back into Mr. Thorn's tuk-tuk, I faced backward to watch first the temple and then the jungle treetops for as long as I could before turning around to watch the dusty road as we headed back to the vibrant, noisy reality of Siem Reap.

The last photo I got before my camera battery died, taken by a kind French couple who waited for or asked numerous other tourists to step out of one side or the other of the frame to get the perfect shot.

N.B.: My camera battery gave up its battle with the Cambodian heat not long after I arrived at the Bayon, which is why there are no photos of Angkor Thom city or Ta Prohm. (Advice: take a spare or two! This was the only place on my Thailand-Cambodia trip that I could have used one.) I was a little disappointed not to be able to photograph Ta Prohm for myself, but there's no lack of stunning photos of nearly every part of Angkor Archaeological Park available in books, prints and online. One thing that surprised me a little was the lack of English-speaking tourists, at least that I heard. The few fellow tourists I spoke with, either to take their photo or ask them to take mine, were French-speaking, although most tourists I encountered in nearby Siem Reap were native English speakers.

While planning this trip, I debated for a long time over whether or not to include this small piece of Cambodia and Angkor Wat on my itinerary, since it meant a harried beginning to my trip, but I'm very glad I decided to go. Thai temples are lovely, but I got a lot more out of my day among the stones at Angkor than I did my afternoon amidst the opulence of Bangkok's Wat Phra Kaew.

How Southeast Asia Broke My Internal Thermostat

2011-08-08T23:45:00.000+10:00

It didn't actually rain the afternoon this was taken, so I'm
assuming that's mostly smog in the sky behind Wat Phra Kaew's
impressive ornamentation, not clouds - either way, it did a great job
of keeping Bangkok predictably hot and sticky.

I am not a hot weather person. Growing up in the temperate climate of Southern California, I was spoiled by summers that maxed out at about 27ºC and winters where temperatures of less than 10ºC were shocking. After an uncomfortable season or two on the U.S.' East Coast in college, I adapted to winters involving below-freezing temperatures without much trouble. I even, to some degree, learned to enjoy the cold that made spring seem all the sweeter once it finally arrived. Extreme heat, however, I stayed as far away from as possible. If I had a choice between bundling into a coat and baking in a tank top, I'd almost always choose the former - or the latter with a heavy dose of air-conditioning.

So while planning my April jaunt to Southeast Asia earlier this year, I expected to be pretty darn uncomfortable throughout the majority of my trip. April is the region's hottest month, meaning there are few places where the high is likely to be below 30ºC (or, really, more like 33°) and nighttime lows don't bring much relief.

On the evening of my arrival, I stepped out of Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport shortly after 11pm and, rather than the cool ocean breeze I'd left behind in Sydney, felt the sticky Thai heat creep under my skin. After spending five summers in swampy Washington, DC, I'm no stranger to the unpleasant combination of intense heat and sky-high humidity, but there's a pervasiveness to the Thai atmosphere that's unlike anything I'd experienced before: the air has weight, substance and pushes back against your every movement. Slow down, it says, you're not going anywhere in a hurry, so just relax and go with the flow. Mai pen rai - no worries! (The only thing in the entire country that seems to be immune to this is Bangkok traffic.)

By the time I got into the taxi that would take me to my hostel near Siam Square, every inch of my skin was coated with a fine sheen of sweat that felt like it had been there since the day I was born. I walked into my hostel room and whimpered when I saw the request not to set the thermostat any lower than 23ºC - as hot as I was, 20º sounded like it might, possibly, after several hours, be cool enough. But I'd come to Southeast Asia wanting to experience it as it is (as much as possible for a blonde-haired, blue-eyed farang), so I set the thermostat for the prescribed 23º and eventually cooled off enough to fall asleep.

In sticky Bangkok, it's the little things - like
a 20-baht fan and a cold Diet Coke - that keep
you comfortable.

I split the next day between the overwhelming sprawl of Chatuchak Weekend Market and Wat Phra Kaew, home of the Emerald Buddha, and realized a couple of hours in that, oddly enough, the heat wasn't that bad. It was still sweltering and the lack of a breeze made it more so, but at some point it had stopped bothering me. Maybe it was that I'd slowed my pace to a leisurely stroll or that I'd purchased a hand-held fan from a vendor at Chatuchak for 20 baht (quite possibly the best roughly 65 cents I've ever spent) that helped stir the air around my face. Whatever it was, by the end of the day I was pleased to conclude that, while 36°C with 95% humidity would never make my list of favorite weather conditions, neither was it going to bother me too much for the next two weeks. (In the interest of full disclosure: I still spent the day covered in sweat and gulping copious amounts of water, but I wasn't unhappy about it. Although knowing I had an air-conditioned hostel to go back to at the end of the day might have helped with that.)

It wasn't yet 8am, but the heat was enough to
have already drained half my battery. (At least,
I assume it was the heat and not the repeated
attempts at getting a photo with both me and
Angkor Wat in it...)

Several days later I had crossed the border into Cambodia, where the intensity of the sun made Bangkok look like a nice, shady park in comparison. To me, Siem Reap didn't feel as sticky as Bangkok had, but it was several degrees hotter and lacked Bangkok's thick smog to cut the beating of the sun's rays. The clearest indication of the difference came during my one and only day at Angkor Wat. Throughout my time in Thailand, as long as I charged my camera battery each night, I didn't have a problem; in Cambodia, the heat was so intense that my battery started sputtering three hours after I arrived at Angkor and died less than an hour after that. (Angkor Wat tip: Take extra camera batteries!) I spent the little time I had in Siem Reap sweaty and flushed, but - just like in Bangkok - didn't really care.

After Siem Reap, I headed back into Thailand, this time North to Chiang Mai, where the first day of Songkran was winding down as I arrived. For those of you who are unfamiliar with your Theravada Buddhist holidays, Songkran is the Thai festival that celebrates the Lunar New Year in mid-April. The rituals surrounding the New Year have to do with the bathing of living spaces, Buddha images and monks and making merit or paying tribute to elders...but for all intents and purposes, what it's really become is a nation-wide water fight lasting from one to three days (or more!), depending on where you are. And, as most of the travel blogosphere will tell you, Chiang Mai is the place to be for Songkran.

Songkran-enforced cool. I think I've left
water parks drier than this. (If you're not
seeing any wet spots, it's because there
aren't any dry ones!)

What does all of this Songkran business have to do with the heat, you ask? Well, when I say water fight, I mean an all-out assault with water guns, hoses, buckets and bowls, being sprayed, thrown at or dumped on you by everyone on the street, from children barely big enough to walk to their grandparents. Let's just say that, whatever the weather, it's not hard to stay cool during Songkran, especially if you happen to be in Chiang Mai. (It's also a ridiculous amount of fun, but that's for another post.)

One thing I did notice about my reaction to the heat while I was in Chiang Mai was that I was no longer wishing I could set the air-conditioning down to 20°, as I had that first night in Bangkok. In fact, I often found myself setting it at 25°, or even shutting it off altogether. The same was true when I reached Koh Lanta, one of the Southern islands on the Andaman Sea side. The humidity there was especially brutal, so I kept the air-conditioning on at night to cut through it and set the fan on low to keep the air moving around the bed and blow the few mosquitoes that found their way into my bungalow away, but I found myself setting the thermostat to 25° or higher and still needing to bundle into my sweater to sleep. What was happening to me?!

Back in Sydney, I arrived toward the end of April to find that it had been raining for a week and would continue for most of the next. It wasn't particularly cold, but I was freezing. I wore layers of sweats and two pairs of socks. I huddled in bed at night, shivering until I warmed up enough to fall asleep. I drank copious amounts of tea and coffee, clutching at the mug until every remnant of warmth had faded. When the temperature dropped to 15° at night - a temperature I had greeted with a sigh of relief in Tasmania when my visit coincided with Sydney's 40°+ February heat wave - I whimpered and briefly considered adding a third pair of socks. After a month of this, I decided it was official: Thailand and Cambodia had smashed my internal thermostat to pieces. In two weeks of steamy weather, Southeast Asia had not only overridden my lifelong aversion to temperatures above 24° degrees, it had me longing for them.

While I've gotten a bit better in the three months since my return (read: I don't start staring wistfully at the heater until it drops to 22°, rather than 25°), I still find myself craving heat at temperatures I used to think were ideal and sighing in relief when I step into the bright Sydney sun, rather than looking for a patch of shade. I imagine that I'll continue to shift back toward "normal" until I'm once again grumbling at 30° temperatures, but it may be a while. Or maybe I should just head back to Thailand or Siem Reap...at this point, I'm getting kind of sick of wearing two pairs of socks.

My 7 Links

2011-07-21T10:20:00.005+10:00

Thanks to Marsha's kind nomination on Single Occupancy Blog, Diary of a Wandering Student is back in action after a much-too-long hiatus (due to a combination of end-of-semester insanity and extreme post-finals laziness) with my post for Tripbase.com's My 7 Links Project. The project asks nominated bloggers to take a look back at old posts and highlight seven in various categories.

I was expecting this to be difficult since, with a blog less than a year old, I thought I wouldn't have much to choose from for some of the categories, but it turned out that choosing between some of my favorite posts that I'd forgotten about was harder! At any rate, here goes...

My most beautiful post | Profiles in Transit: Antonio

I was torn between three posts in this category, the other two because they feature what I consider to be some of my best photography, but my heart was wrapped up in this post long before I wrote it and I'm proud of how I was able to capture the beauty of a few moments with a stranger in words, not images. This is one post I was completely satisfied with when I re-read it after posting, which was a relief, since I was incredibly nervous about finding the right words to express a beautiful experience.

My most popular post | A Bug Called Bilingualism

In terms of actual hits, my post about Antonio is my most popular, since it was re-tweeted by Lonely Planet (that was a great feeling!), among others, but this one was a big success for a three-weeks-live blog and got me really excited about how many people out there are as interested as I am in the crazy experience that is immersing yourself in a foreign language and the culture that goes with it.

My most controversial post | Americans in Florence: Obnoxious vs. Incognito

I haven't written any posts that have turned out to be what I'd call controversial - not surprising, since I'm a pretty can't-we-all-get-along type - but I was worried that this one might be. I was concerned that some might read it as bashing my fellow Americans travelers, when it was intended instead to highlight how radically different travelers from the same country can be and how it can impact their experiences abroad. Fortunately, no one I heard from took it the wrong way and the general opinion seemed to be that we all have compatriots who fit certain unflattering travel stereotypes that make us cringe.

My most helpful post | A Table for One?

Apparently I need to write more posts aimed at being helpful, because this was a tough one to figure out! I hope my post about my first solo travel experience encouraged a few people to take the leap and give solo travel a try, or at least start thinking about it, because the fact that not having any friends or relatives who want to take a particular trip with me doesn't mean I can't travel has been one of the best discoveries of my life.

A post whose success surprised me | Getting Hustled in NYC

This post was intended to highlight an (I'd like to think) rare moment of out-of-town stupidity and the importance of paying attention to your instincts, but the comments really took off and I was pleasantly surprised by how many new faces chimed in supportively. It just goes to show that unpleasant people like the hustler featured in the post are the exception and kind, friendly ones are the norm!

A post I feel didn't get the attention it deserved | Why travel?

This post had a higher than usual ratio of comments to page hits, but I felt like it never really got the exposure it should have, maybe because it was posted shortly before Christmas and New Year's. It's a post I love, because I feel like I was really able to capture what travel means to me: the okay-this-is-a-little-scary moments, the thrill of stepping into the unknown and, above all else, the sheer joy of exploring somewhere new.

The post I'm most proud of | A Whirlwind Romance in Cambodia

This isn't my best-written post, my funniest, my most touching or my most popular, but it is one that I'm very proud of. Why? Because, if I'd visited Cambodia even just five years ago, I would never have written it. Five years ago, I was barely beginning to scratch the surface of solo travel and, while I might have taken a solo trip to Southeast Asia if the opportunity had presented itself, I would have been much too busy worrying about everything that could go wrong to let myself see or fully appreciate the beauty the region has to offer. Before I left in April, I knew I would be comfortable traveling through Thailand and Cambodia by myself, but I didn't expect to view my time in Cambodia as much more than an interesting learning experience. The fact that I've become comfortable enough as a traveler, solo or not, to relax and let myself fall in love with a country so radically different from my own is something that makes me incredibly happy. Which is why the fact that I was able to write this post makes me proud.

Sharing the My 7 Links love. Wow, travel blog community, you've been busy. My 7 Links has spread like wildfire around the blogosphere! Only two bloggers I know haven't been nominated yet, so their links - a wonderful soon-to-be-expat blog by my friend Alyssa and a mouth-watering foodie blog by my friend Leran - are below, so take a look! If you haven't yet been nominated and want to be, shoot me a tweet - I have three nominations left!

From Freeways to Fjords

Foodventures!

Profiles in Transit: Pau Thom

2011-05-31T23:00:00.000+10:00

Siem Reap, Cambodia

"Hey lady, where you from?" echoed off the buildings on either side of the narrow alleyway as I turned down it and two boys no more than ten years old fell into step with me. Used to the rhythm of this exchange after two days in Siem Reap, I said "The U.S. - California" and kept walking, knowing they'd keep pace.

Sure enough, the boy who'd greeted me rattled off President Obama's name, the U.S. and California capital cities, (former) Governor Schwarzeneggar's name and even a couple of quotes from the Terminator movies. I laughed and kept walking.

"Hey lady, I remember you, I talked to you yesterday!" the boy said, unexpectedly. I stopped and looked at him, then smiled. "You're right, I remember you too!"

"So today you buy my postcards, eh? Yesterday no, but today yes?" I looked at the cards but realized I had bought the same set the day before outside Angkor Wat's Ta Prohm, from a girl no more than five years old who broke my heart when she said she hoped I would buy her postcards because she wanted to go to school.

"I'm sorry, I already have these ones," I said, feeling regretful and wondering if I should buy a second set - I genuinely liked this kid.

After a brief pause, he said, "I'm still hungry today, maybe you could buy me some food instead?" My heart cracked again and, after my own brief pause to consider the idea, I said, "Sure, what do you want to eat?"

"This way, I'll show you," he said, leading me down another alley and making me momentarily consider the potential folly of following a stranger - even a friendly, juvenile one - through the streets of a Southeast Asian city I didn't know particularly well.

"My name is Pau Thom," he said, practically skipping as his friend and I walked alongside, "what's yours?"

"Jessalyn," I answered, pronouncing it slowly.

The Siem Reap alleyway Pau led me down
(which, consequently, I'd taken a photo of an
hour earlier) in search of his favorite chicken amok.

"Jessalyn," he repeated (more accurately than most Americans, to be honest) "Okay, now I remember your name and we can play! I remember you when you go back to California."

I laughed and restrained the urge to rumple his hair as I would have done to my niece. "And I'll remember you whenever I think about Siem Reap."

We grinned at each other as we crossed a street and approached a small restaurant with tarps pieced together serving as a roof and a plastic-coated menu sitting on a rickety pedestal outside. Pau flipped through it, then pointed to a chicken amok dish. "That's what I want to eat."

"Okay," I said and asked the waitress to bring him an order of the dish, along with a Coke when he said that was what he wanted to drink. Pau's friend slipped away before I could ask what he wanted, but Pau got settled at a table and I paid the waitress for his meal (which cost all of $3.00, U.S.). He looked small and more than a little lost at the four-person table by himself, completely out of his element - happy about it in some ways, since he was clearly hungry, but not quite sure what to do with himself while he waited for his meal. I wanted to sit and keep him company but was already past the time I should have been heading back to my guesthouse to finish packing and head to the airport, so instead I told him I had to leave. He gave me his crooked, sunny smile and waved, "Bye, Jessalyn-California!"

I smiled and waved back, murmuring "Bye Pau," knowing I was leaving a little piece of my heart behind as I walked away, but glad to carry the memory of that crooked smile and sunny disposition with me as I moved on.

There are hundreds of children in the same position as Pau on the streets of Siem Reap and Angkor Wat, not to mention thousands throughout the rest of Cambodia. Some of them are bitter after years of watching foreigners come and go who are never hungry and don't lack for anything; most of them are resigned; and some of them, like Pau, are cheerful despite the hardships they face and, whether they know it or not, bring smiles to the faces of the people they interact with every day. Some people may question my decision to buy Pau a meal and that's fine - for me, it was a way to help that didn't involve simply handing over money (which, once I'd declined to buy his postcards, he didn't ask for anyway), since that's something I try not to do. Pau made my day significantly brighter and I hope that I was able to do the same for him in some measure.

My one regret is that I didn't get a picture of that cheerful, charmingly crooked smile of his. I'm still painfully shy when it comes to asking people I meet while traveling if I can take their picture and, while it doesn't affect my memories, it does have an impact on the degree to which I can share those memories with you. Hopefully by the next time I meet someone like Pau, I'll have overcome my shyness enough to ask if I can take a quick snapshot to remember them by.

A Whirlwind Romance in Cambodia

2011-05-10T22:00:00.000+10:00

I didn't expect to fall in love during my not quite three days in Cambodia. I planned to see what I could of Angkor Wat in such a short time, browse some local markets and head on to Chiang Mai with no regrets. But then my flight from Bangkok started its descent, I caught my first glimpse of the Cambodian countryside and my grasp on my no-nonsense, let's-see-the-sights-and-move-on mentality slipped. Why didn't anyone tell me Cambodia's beautiful? I wondered. Variations on that same thought played through my mind on repeat every moment I was there and long after my feet had left Cambodian soil.

My first glimpses of Siem Reap were full of
dust and intense heat from the back of a
tuk-tuk - and were absolutely enchanting.

The tuk-tuk ride from Siem Reap International Airport to my guesthouse was windy, dusty and brutally hot - and I loved every moment of it. I couldn't stop the smile that kept stealing over my face as I looked around, watching the motorbikes that zipped past, the farmers working in fields and rice paddies near the road and the multi-colored houses and shops that lined the streets. Most of the big hotels looked ridiculously out of place - I've never been more pleased that my budget doesn't run to luxury accommodation.

Mr. Thorn, my tuk-tuk driver, pulled up in front of a pretty, peach-colored building and I walked into the charm of Hotel 89's lobby.

After arranging for my visit to Angkor Wat the next day with the front desk, then making myself at home in a room that was comfortable and welcoming (and air-conditioned!) at only USD $15 per night, I wandered toward Pub Street and the center of Siem Reap.

The quality of light in Cambodia is unlike anything I've seen
anywhere else in the world, and it adds to the lush beauty of
the countryside in a way that's completely captivating.

With every step, I was more enchanted. I'd never before been in a place where all of the action on the street seemed to take place so completely at the same level. Sure, I was (sometimes) on a sidewalk, but motorbike drivers grinned at me as they went flying past my elbow, local occupants of tuk-tuks looked at me with curiosity and the cars quickly made it clear that the idea of pedestrian right-of-way definitely does not exist in Siem Reap and that if I wanted to cross, I had better saunter partway (and not at an intersection - who uses those?), wait in the middle of the street for them to drive past and then continue on my way, like everyone else.

After a souvenir stop at fair trade merchant Rajana and a dinner of delicious tofu amok and Angkor Beer at Pub Street's Le Tigre du Papier, I wound my way back through town, sharing a stricken look and then a laugh with a moto driver who happened to speed past just as I was catching my balance after tripping over a crack in the sidewalk.

Angkor is a vast subject unto itself (and will have its own post somewhere down the road!), but I can tell you that I loved it and that it only deepened my appreciation for the region and the Cambodian people.

Life in Cambodia may not be easy, but it's
as vibrant as its street traffic.

I don't want to give the impression that Siem Reap is all rainbows and butterflies - it's very far from it. Landmine victims hobble down the street on what's left of their legs, begging for money or food; children who should be in school fall into step with you, asking where you're from and repeating a litany of facts they've had drilled into them about your country or state, trying to convince you to buy a set of postcards; both poor standards of living and abject poverty are evident everywhere you look.

But the strength of spirit of the Cambodian people is equally evident. They may have nothing more to offer than a smile and a joke, but they're unfailingly generous with those. Their sunny cheer, as they call out "Hey lay-dee, need a tuk-tuk?" from across the street or offer directions when you're looking particularly lost, is incomparable and blends with their country's mesmerizing quality of light and colorful culture to form a national charm that's impossible to hold out against.

I flew into Cambodia expecting a couple days' worth of history lessons. I flew out with an entirely unanticipated love of the country and deep respect for its people that will keep me ready to jump at any chance to go back.

A Whirlwind Tour: Ready, Set, Go!

2011-04-10T10:00:00.001+10:00

I arrived at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport
last night.
Photo Credit: JoeDuck, Creative Commons

Oh boy. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Ridiculous, but as of noon yesterday, this was what had been going through my head pretty much non-stop for the previous 48 hours, since my last class before April break (fall break, down here in Australia) ended on Thursday afternoon. I felt like a little kid on Christmas Eve, or on the day before a trip to Disneyland: I couldn't think about anything else and felt like I was revving in neutral, burning off excited energy by bouncing around in my seat. Why all the hyperactivity?

I landed in Thailand last night.

Just typing that sentence sets off another round of internal squeals of excitement. We have a little more than two weeks off, which I'll be spending in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Koh Lanta, with a couple of days across the Cambodian border in Siem Reap and at Angkor Wat. It's going to be a bit of a whirlwind, especially at first, since I'll be going somewhere new about every two days, but I didn't want to regret not fitting in the trip to Angkor. I'll have a little longer in Chiang Mai and nearly a week in Koh Lanta, where - if the weather cooperates - I'm hoping to get my dive certification.

When I was growing up, I was so enamoured of France and then of Europe in general that I had very little interest in Asia. Not to mention, as a young teenager the idea of going somewhere that seemed so utterly foreign was more terrifying than exciting. But, on a whim my sophomore year of college, I picked up a compilation of travelers' stories about Thailand and my interest began to grow. By the time I returned to the States from my year in France, Southeast Asia was firmly on my travel wishlist - for some time in the hazy future.

Choosing an Australian postgraduate program turned my world upside in more ways than one. Oceania and Asia, which had been filed under "someday" in my travel plans, jumped to the top of the list overnight and I discovered an enthusiasm and anticipation for Southeast Asia in particular that were far stronger than I had realized.

With a larger-than-usual tax return due to having paid most of the costs of my first year of grad school in early 2010 and a two-week break scheduled for April, visions of Thai street food and markets began to dance in my head and I started to look at fares from Sydney to Bangkok. When I started to plan out possible itineraries, I surprised myself again when I realized that I already knew exactly what I wanted this first trip to Asia to include: Bangkok, Chiang Mai, dive certification at one of the southern beaches and a jaunt into Cambodia to visit Angkor Wat - if I could work out the timing to fit it all in.

After some agonizing about whether to include Angkor and destination-hop every few days for the first part of my trip or to leave it out and spend more time exploring Chiang Mai and southern Thailand, I decided to include a few days in Cambodia. I know myself well enough to be sure that coming so close to such a major site without going to see it would drive me crazy.

I arrived in Bangkok late last night and, after a few hours' sleep, am ready to dive in. First up: Chatuchak Weekend Market, followed by some temple time.

So it's Bangkok, Siem Reap, Chiang Mai, Koh Lanta and me for the next two weeks: ready, set...go!

Upside Down and 17 Hours Ahead

2011-04-05T22:30:00.001+10:00

Three of Sydney's cultural icons in one shot!
Photo credit: S Baker, Creative Commons

I wasn't sure what to expect in terms of culture shock in Australia. I didn't expect it to be particularly shocking, both because Australia is a developed, English-speaking country, like the U.S., and because for me it's generally reverse culture shock that really trips me up. So, while I didn't expect moving to Australia to throw me too much off my stride, I was curious to see just what differences would stand out.

After two months, I'm feeling pretty at home in Sydney (despite my dad's ongoing assertions that I'm upside down - thanks, Dad), but there's a random assortment of little things that are just different enough to remind me that I'm on the other side of the world. Here are some of the highlights:

Everything is on the left. Having spent a few days in London, I wasn't a total stranger to the idea of cars with right-side drive and traffic on the left-hand side of the road but somehow the fact that the same rule might apply to things like sidewalks completely escaped me. After screeching to a halt at the foot of an escalator in Melbourne's Tullamarine Airport and blearily wondering why the right-hand escalator was the down escalator from the floor above, common sense pierced the veil of jet lag and I figured it out. It took a few days in Tasmania to really get walking on the left into my head, but I eventually got it. (It's not as noticeable in Sydney, where the number of residents and tourists from other countries sometimes makes it a walk-where-there's-space free-for-all.) For the past couple of weeks, I've started to look to the right first when crossing the street, rather than looking left and quickly whipping my head right, sincerely hoping I'm not about to get flattened by an oncoming car. (This is one habit I expect to have issues with back in the States!)

The local lingo isn't that far from American English, but it's enough to throw me completely off sometimes if I'm not paying close attention. Things like "Any cash out?" (instead of "cash back"), "ta" for "thanks" (although that's another one that doesn't seem as common in international Sydney) and "How're you going?" ("How am I what...? Ohh...I'm doing well, how are you?") are just different enough from what we say in the U.S. to occasionally give me pause. (Then there's Australian vs. American terminology and spelling when it comes to writing papers, but that's another story.)

Australia is expensive. Crazy expensive. $2.80 per banana expensive (granted, they're not always quite that bad). I ignored the first couple of high grocery bills, figuring it was just the necessity of stocking up on basic household goods like laundry soap and pantry staples that was making them so high, but as I've gotten more used to seeing prices in kilos, grams and liters I've realized that, no, it's just really expensive. My grocery bills are about double (if not closer to triple, depending on what I buy in the way of produce) what they were in Washington, DC. And it isn't just food that's expensive - books are the first place I noticed the price difference, and it was a huge shock. A popular new release can easily cost $50, with more "normal" paperback prices ranging from $20-$25. I asked for a Kindle for Christmas to help keep books from eating up most of my luggage allowance but once I arrived, I was even happier to have one!

One of my ongoing fascinations with Australia is its outlook on energy usage. It was in the high 80s and very humid when I arrived and I groaned when I walked into my apartment and realized there was no air-conditioning. From what I've seen, it's par for the course here and even larger buildings have coolings systems that are regulated much differently from the U.S. Rather than have the air-conditioning running at all times throughout an entire academic building, as we do in the States, each classroom has its own controls, the most common of which involve turning the a/c system on and having it automatically shut off after three hours. Hallways, as far as I've seen, are never air-conditioned. There were only a few days in February that were really uncomfortable and I've gotten used to making the most of cross-breezes and fans, rather than relying on central air. Considering that Sydney is just about as hot and humid as Washington, DC (although it does usually cool off more at night), where a lack of air-conditioning is viewed as an unacceptable, completely unlivable state of affairs, it's an interesting contrast.

Not the prettiest picture, but still pretty cool:
since that little switch to the left of the outlet
isn't turned on, no power is being used, despite
the number of things plugged in.

Then there are Australia's electrical outlets. (I know, this technically belongs under the last bullet point, but they're just so cool that they deserve their own.) I was baffled by the switches on the outlet plate covers when I first arrived, but ignored them. After plugging in a fan and wanting to cry when it wouldn't turn on and get the air moving in my room, I flicked the switch next to the outlet just to see what happened and - ta-da! - the fan started whirring. You can shut off power to every single electrical outlet in Australia when it's not in use. How cool is that?! Not only does it help keep the electricity bill down, but it stops the slow leak of electricity through appliances that aren't in use, without the hassle of unplugging them. Green and practical!

The Australian government is serious about cracking down on skin cancer. Unfortunately, given its location and climate, it's probably not surprising that Australia has the highest incidence of skin cancer of any country in the world. (I can't sit in the sun for more than about twenty minutes without sunscreen on without risking a burn - so I'm going through a lot of sunscreen!) The government is tackling the problem by inundating the media with PSAs and publicity campaigns, promoting slogans like "Slip, Slop, Slap" (slip on a shirt, slop on some sunscreen, slap on a hat) and "There's nothing cool about a tan." This actually reminds me a lot of the anti-smoking campaign the California government launched when I was a kid that was, over time, pretty amazingly effective. Fingers crossed the same will be true in Australia.

This Tasmanian kangaroo's favorite thing about Australia?
Tourists who feed him (her?)!

The wildlife! I have yet to see a kangaroo outside of a conservation park, but even the everyday wildlife is pretty impressive! The spiders are enormous (yikes) and all over the place at this time of year, but the birds more than make up for them. (Well, most of the time. No number of encounters with cool birds could make up for the morning last month when I woke up just in time to see a large, leggy black spider start crawling toward my bed across the ceiling. Great for my reflexes, not so good for my nerves.) The day I arrived, I saw what looked like a cockatoo fly past my window but thought it must be the jet lag. The next morning, I realized that, no, there actually were cockatoos flying around - lots of them. It turns out they're about as omnipresent in suburban Sydney as pigeons are in Central Park. Ibis and green parrots are pretty common too, not to mention some of the most mournful sounding ravens I've ever heard. There are also some birds with beautiful calls that I haven't been able to identify yet, but I love listening to them.

Despite being 15 to 17 hours ahead of most of my friends and family, between Skype, Facebook, Twitter, ready access to my email inbox (which I didn't have the last time I lived abroad) and the many parallels between Australian and American lifestyles, I usually don't feel all that far from home. But it wouldn't be an adventure abroad without some cultural quirks, and I enjoy taking note of them. What are some of your favorite quirks from your travels?

Australian Adventures: One Month In

2011-03-02T23:05:00.002+11:00

Predictably, I petted my first one of these guys
before I'd been here a week.

Somehow, a month has gone by since I arrived in Sydney. A month ago Sunday, to be exact, since I started hearing "no worries" six times an hour and blinking in confusion at everyday expressions like "How're you going?" and "D'you want cash out?" It feels like I've been here both much longer and much less than a month. Longer because I've already done so much and I feel settled in; less because how could I possibly have been gone a whole month already?!

I didn't quite know what to expect from Australia. I'm a foreigner, but one who shares the same native language, albeit with a different national bent. I'm a student, but an international one whose studies take place at least half the time in a language native neither to this country nor to my own. And I'm a traveler, looking forward to learning the ins and outs of this country that is my temporary home. Where would I fit in, in Australia, on campus, in class, I wondered? Australia, with its laid-back sense of welcome, seems to say "fit in wherever you like, mate!"

That's one of the things I'm slowly realizing is a big part of what makes Australia so appealing: its unquestioning acceptance of whoever happens to show up. Sure, you have to certify that you're not a criminal and aren't trying to wipe out any of the native species to get through immigration but, once you're in, the welcome is universal. It isn't overpowering or over-eager, like a scene in a musical where every member of the cast is dancing with manic joy in the middle of the street; it's a casual "Hey, how're you going? Glad you could make it," that's extended to everyone from the man who's lived around the corner all his life to the tourist who arrived yesterday and is still fumbling with the currency.

Do I look relaxed yet?

Every single person I've met in the past month has emanated this casual acceptance and welcome. The cashier at the local Woolies (Woolworths, an Australian grocery store), who took in my bleary, jet-lagged confusion when she asked if I wanted cash out (that's cash back, for my fellow Americans) on my first evening here, put it together with my non-Aussie accent and welcomed me to the area with a smile. The waitress at Hobart's Retro Cafe who saw my Arizona driver's license as I pulled out my wallet, thought it was the coolest thing she'd seen all week and wanted my opinion on what Aussie English sounds like to American ears (charming, is the answer!). Not to mention the multiple bus drivers who have kindly advised me that the bus to my desired destination is the one that arrives on the opposite side of the street and haven't seemed at all put out at having stopped for a passenger who turned out not to be one.

The first country other than my own that I lived in long-term was France, for which I fell head-over-heels instantly, swept off my feet by the rich colors, textures, scents and sounds of everyday life, so different from what I grew up with in the U.S. Australia is more subtle - less intense, more easy-go-lucky and much less passionately opinionated - but no less convincing. Already, I find myself relaxing in a way I rarely did in the U.S., not just on the surface but right down to my bones. Despite the fact that classes are now in full swing, stress is becoming a distant memory. "No worries," which you can't help but hear every day in Australia, isn't just a phrase, it's a way of life, one that seeps into every pore and which, I have a feeling, may be impossible to get rid of once it's made its way into your system. Then again, why would you want to?

Saturday Snapshot: Cradle Mountain

2011-02-12T09:45:00.002+11:00

My first look at Cradle Mountain, from near the beginning of the Dove Lake Circuit.

I'm a sucker for national parks. Maybe it's having all but grown up in them, but plunk me down in a national park with plenty of trails to walk, night sky to stargaze at and wildlife to marvel over and I couldn't be happier. So when I heard from a couple of Aussies (Queenslanders) my parents and I met in Utah's Zion National Park in the U.S. this past September that Australia's island state of Tasmania is 40% national parks, I decided I had to get there.

Cradle Mountain and the pristine waters of Dove Lake.

Freycinet National Park with its charming bays and coastline was lovely and I'd have liked to spend more time in Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park, but it was Cradle Mountain - Lake St Clair National Park that made me feel like camping out forever might just be a viable life plan. Known for its six-day Overland Track that stretches from near Cradle Mountain to Lake St Clair itself, Cradle Mountain NP is a backpacker's dream, with trails ranging from easy but visually stunning walks to challenging climbs over rocks and crags to reach a view that could take your breath away.

Cradle Mountain hangs dramatically above the northern end of Dove Lake and the Dove Lake Circuit.

Tasmanians say that you can expect to see Cradle Mountain itself one day out of every three but, after my humbling drenching in Freycinet a few days before, the powers that be must have decided I deserved a treat, because I was lucky enough to get two days of crystal clear views.

Cradle Mountain from the opposite (northern) side, a shadowy backdrop behind the lovely greenery of Cradle Valley.

There are places in the park where you can't see the mountain at all and wonder where it's gone off to, then you come around a bend in a path or crest a small hill and it appears, striking against the sky and a rugged contrast to the Tasmanian rainforest below.

A morning at Cradle Mountain, with Dove Lake and its boat shed in the foreground.

If you ever get the chance to visit Tasmania, be sure to include Cradle Mountain - Lake St Clair National Park in your itinerary. There's a peace and quiet in the air, not to mention heart-stopping views, that absolutely should not be missed.

The Hiker With the Black Umbrella

2011-02-11T08:40:00.000+11:00

The crazy Tasmanian weather means you can go from this
beautiful sunshine over Freycinet National Park's lovely
Wineglass Bay to cranky thunderstorms in an hour or less.

You have got to be kidding me, I thought, looking up as the first raindrops hit the rocks around me. What had happened to the bright, sunny afternoon I'd been enjoying? I was in the second half of an 11km (not quite seven-mile) hike in Tasmania's Freycinet National Park with a friend and, with scrubby trees and wiry bushes leaving just enough trail to walk on, there was absolutely nowhere to go. I heaved a sigh and reached for my pack.

Before you start wondering just how much of a wuss I'd have to be in order to be that put out by a few drops of rain, let me tell you a little about family vacations when I was a kid: they usually involved a couple of weeks in national parks in the U.S. or western Canada and the one question my dad could always be counted on to ask before we left home and as we set out from our campsite each day was, "Do you have your parka?" (In Pinneo family lingo, "parka" means "waterproof jacket," not "big, heavy, snow-proof coat.") With much eye-rolling and face-making, I would say yes, grumpy that I had to lug such an unwieldy thing around all day, with little likelihood of actually needing to wear it. Parkas are ugly, I would complain. It's too big, I look stupid. Whenever I could possibly get away with leaving the thing behind, I did.

Clouds starting to gather near Wineglass Bay.

So it was a bit ironic that, prior to leaving for Australia, a waterproof jacket was on my to-buy list, since one of my first stops would be Tasmania, capital of unpredictable weather conditions. I found a few I liked online, but wanted to make my purchase in-store, since I wasn't sure of the sizing. No worries, I thought; since I would be spending a few days in Los Angeles before heading across the Pacific, I could just pop into an REI store and find what I wanted. Unfortunately, it turns out that REI stores in Southern California don't really carry Outdoor Research (OR) products, which was what I'd been looking at. There was a similar jacket by The North Face that could have worked, but it was a little heavier than I wanted for the Australian summer weather, and REI's own similar line was more expensive than OR's. So I decided I'd wait to buy a jacket until I got to Australia, either in Tasmania or once I was settled in Sydney. In the meantime, I'd just have to tough it out with an umbrella and hope for clear skies.

I had not, however, planned on ending up on a narrow Tasmanian hiking trail, in pouring rain, with nothing waterproof at hand except a black, travel-sized umbrella. If it had been just me and the usual hiking paraphernalia in my daypack, I would have kept on going and ignored the rain, no problem. I had a hat to keep water out of my eyes and it wasn't cold, by any means. But I had my Kindle and my iPod in my pack and no other way to protect them from the downpour, so, rolling my eyes at my own idiocy, I popped open the umbrella, hitched it over my shoulder so that it covered as much of my pack as possible and set off at as fast a clip as I could manage, eyes focused enviously on the water rolling off the hood of my friend's jacket.

The sky over an isthmus on the Freycinet Peninsula,
looking a little more foreboding just before the rain started.

The image of myself in my mind's eye as I hiked made me want to both laugh and bang my head against a wall. Hiking with an umbrella, I thought. Could I be any more ridiculous? The umbrella, wider than my shoulders and much less easy to maneuver, snagged on bushes and branches every few steps and I gritted my teeth as I continually yanked it free, trying to climb without bending over and exposing the bottom of my pack to the rain. The few hikers who passed us gave me puzzled looks and I smiled sheepishly, wishing I could disappear into the ground and take my absurdly out-of-place umbrella with me.

An hour or so later, my friend and I made it back to the carpark and scrambled into our tour's minibus to laughing applause. Soaked to the skin - this hadn't been any gentle shower but a steady downpour, complete with rolling thunder - we collapsed in our seats and I gratefully put away my umbrella, sure of three things: 1) I never wanted to hike with an umbrella again; 2) I was buying a waterproof jacket the minute I found a sporting goods store back in Sydney; 3) My dad was never going to let me live this down.

And there you have it: the day I became "the hiker with the black umbrella."

Snapshots: Inis Mór

2011-01-22T03:15:00.000+11:00

Standing on the deck of the ferry, I inhaled deeply, grinning at the smell of the sea air and the feel of the sun on my face. This was not the weather I had expected to find in the West of Ireland in April, but I wasn't about to complain. Nor was I at all tempted to go inside, despite the crisp sea breeze. I'd propped myself against the outside wall of the ferry's main cabin, where I was partially shielded from the wind, and leaned back to watch the largest of Ireland's Aran Islands approach on the horizon: Inis Mór.

The coast of Inis Mór, dotted with famine walls.

As we docked, I debated my transportation options for the day: minivan tour, bike rental or hoofing it. Having taken a bus tour of The Burren, the Cliffs of Moher and Aillwee Cave the day before, I wasn't about to sign on to be cooped up in another car for hours, and renting a bike felt like an unnecessary expense on such a gorgeous spring day, so I opted to walk.

Walking along Inis Mór's main road, outside Kilronan.

The spring sunshine had apparently addled my over-planner's brain, since I didn't actually know how far it was from the dock to Dún Aonghasa, the medieval cliff fort that I'd decided would be my target destination. This was completely out of character, but I was enjoying wandering around, drinking in the scenery, too much to care. (It also didn't dawn on me to question why I hadn't seen anyone else on foot until I'd been walking for about an hour.)

I wandered past ruins...

...past thatched-roof houses...

...past some of the hundreds of miles of famine walls on the island, built during the Great Famine of the 1840s for about half a penny per worker per day...

...past beaches and numerous cows....

Eventually, I started to wonder if I should have paid a little more attention to the length of the island that was probably noted somewhere in my guidebook - or asked someone how far Dún Aonghasa was from Kilronan. Since I'd spent about an hour and a half eating lunch and then shopping for an Aran sweater, mid-afternoon was rapidly approaching and I was starting to get a little worried about making it back to the dock for the 5pm ferry - the only one before the next day.

Finally, I could see what had to be the cliff fort up ahead (although it took me a while to realize that it was too tall to be another famine wall, and that the daylight coming through a section of it was probably a door):

I picked up the pace and stopped taking photos every five feet, intent on making it to Dún Aonghasa with enough time to explore a bit before I had to hurry back to the dock. I made it to the visitor center, paid my student entry fee (a very reasonable €1; €3 for non-student adults) and started up the trail to the fort at as fast a clip as I could manage.

The winding trail between the visitor center and the fort from near the top.

As I entered the outer enclosure of the fort itself, I looked around at the rock walls and well-trodden grass, trying to picture how it would have looked as a community. It was interesting, knowing that humans had been living in this area for more than 2,500 years, but it wasn't the impressive stronghold I'd been expecting.

Looking at the space inside the middle enclosure of the fort, from near the entrance to the inner enclosure.

Then I stepped into the center of Dún Aonghasa and immediately changed my mind. The sound of the sea, subdued in the larger, more open outer and middle areas of the fort, echoed off the rocks and sent wind whipping through the half-circle of the fort's inner enclosure. I stepped to the edge and had trouble catching my breath as I sat down to marvel at the view: between the power of the ocean crashing at the base of the island below, the unscalable cliff face rushing vertically to meet it and the beauty of the sun glancing off the water as far as I could see, I was dazzled.

Looking southeast along the coast. This side of Inis Mór is ceaselessly battered by the Atlantic Ocean; Kilronan and most of the settlements cluster around and spread out from the more sheltered bay at the island's northeast corner.

Looking the other direction along Inis Mór's southern coast.

I wanted to stay, soaking up the beauty and strength of the cliff fort for hours longer, but I was already going to have to run to catch the ferry, so I reluctantly made my way back down the trail, pausing just long enough to grin at the cows lying placidly in a small pasture near the visitor center.

I headed back down the road and tried not to panic when I saw that even the minivan tours were starting to head toward the dock. I didn't have anything with me except a bottle of water, my camera, a guidebook and the sweater I'd purchased after lunch, and I really didn't want to search out a hostel room when I had a cozy one, with things like my toothbrush and clean clothes in it, that I'd already paid for back in Galway.

I passed a small café just as a tour was coming out of it to get back in their minivan and seized the opportunity. I waved at the driver and dashed across the road. I explained my predicament and asked if he had any room - at that point, I was happy to pay for a seat in any vehicle faster than my legs going in the right direction - or if he knew of any taxi or bus service on the island. His tour had one seat open, so he told me to go ahead and hop in. I thanked him profusely and did so, asking how much the tour was. He was kind enough to only charge me €5, although I'm sure the full price was at least twice that.

Thanks to the driver's willingness to pick up idiot tourists who hadn't quite paid enough attention to planning their day, I made it to the dock with time to spare and was able to sit and watch the ferry come in.

Inis Mór is a place I'd like to get back to and spend more time exploring. There are footpaths and bike-able roads all over the island, which it turns out I only covered about half of that afternoon (~7km, or ~4.3mi, as opposed to the 14km+ of the island's full length). I'd also like to go back to Dún Aonghasa when I don't have to leave in a rush. And although this lapse in over-planning and exercise in winging it was probably good for me, and I certainly enjoyed the day, I've been careful to calculate times and distances in similar situations since!

Americans in Florence: Obnoxious vs. Incognito

2011-01-13T06:30:00.001+11:00

No logos or flags here!

Like many travelers, I do my best to blend in on the road. I don't actively hide the fact that I'm American and if anyone asks where I'm from, I'll tell them (although I'll probably make them guess first), but neither do I advertise my nationality. I don't wear shorts or hoodies in Europe, I don't wear American flags or baseball caps emblazoned with the logo of a U.S. sports team, political organization or school and I certainly don't wave my passport around. I speak as much of the local language or dialect as I can and try to learn the customs out of respect for the people who live by them, not to mention in hopes of leaving a positive impression behind for the foreign visitors, including my fellow Americans, who arrive after me. So when I see Americans doing exactly the opposite, flaunting their nationality, completely ignoring local customs and speaking - loudly - in American-accented English, it never fails to make me grit my teeth in frustration.

I ran into one such group of Americans in the middle of fall break during my year abroad. Four of us had traveled together to Florence for several days and we were splitting up - two of us heading to London and the other two further south in Italy - the next morning. We'd had a wonderful time in Florence and wanted to celebrate our last night en vacances together with a nice dinner, so we found a place in the heart of the city and sat down, rubbing our hands together in greedy anticipation of more delicious Italian cuisine.

I went to Florence to see things like Il Duomo, not to hear
tourists arguing with each other at the top of their lungs.

Since the four of us were all enrolled in the same study abroad program, one that required its students to speak French 100% of the time, we had decided at the beginning of our trip not to fall out of practice on vacation. ("Practice" aside, we'd learned during recent parental visits that our various regional accents in English made it nearly impossible for any of us to complete a sentence without at least one of the other three bursting into a fit of laughter. With friendships formed in French, we just sounded too strange to one another in English to make it practical.) I felt far less visible as a French tourist than I ever had as an American, and I was enjoying it.

The table of girls seated behind us at the restaurant, however, clearly had no such reservations. They chattered away in English, much more loudly than was necessary, and my friends and I rolled our eyes at each other and wondered why Americans so often seemed unaware of the volume of their voices in comparison to the people around them. Did we do that when we spoke English, we wondered? What was it in American DNA that demanded our conversations be loud enough for everyone around us to hear?

Street art, Firenze-style! (And no one can knock this one
against the wall...)

As we talked, the painting that hung over our table began to rock against the wall at random intervals. We looked up in confusion and realized that it stretched the length of the wall our table was against, meaning it also hung above the table of the girls behind us. One of them had the back of her shoulder leaned against the bottom edge of the frame and every time she moved, so did the entire ten-foot-long painting, to which she and her friends were apparently oblivious. We tsked under our breath and went on with our conversation, but finally one of my friends seated against the wall couldn't take the constant nudging of the painting anymore. After a quick consultation, during which we decided the girl seemed the type to tell another American student to mind her own business, my friend turned around and said, in a heavily French-accented voice, "Excuse me, ze painting? It moves."

The girl gave her such a disgusted look that I nearly burst out laughing, but my friend returned her glare levelly and the girl finally shifted her shoulder away from the wall, then turned and started muttering - not quietly - with her friends about what a pain the French people behind them were. We snickered under our breath and dug into our dinner.

Just for the humor quotient, those few moments in Florence remain one of my favorite memories of that trip, but the memory of the dichotomy between two tables of American girls keeps me mindful of my actions and my attitude whenever I'm traveling. Whether I'm speaking another language and not obviously American to anyone but customs agents or revealing my nationality with the pronunciation of every word out of my mouth, I'm conscious of doing whatever I can to blend in and respect the local culture.

Certainly not all, or even most, Americans are as oblivious to their surroundings or as rude to the people around them as those girls were, but the reputation Americans have as obnoxious tourists in much of the world is due to those like them. The poor attitudes and lack of respect of that minority have painted the rest of us with the same brush and overcoming the negative impressions they've left behind can be challenging. That's why, whenever anyone asks my advice about traveling, manners, following local customs and paying attention to your surroundings are at the top of my list. As an "obnoxious American," I'd never get anything like a real look at what life is like around the world - and that's too much a part of the reason I travel to miss.

Embracing Travel Panic

2011-01-05T15:48:00.001+11:00

Photo credit: Krysten_N, Creative Commons

I'm having one of those rare days of travel panic, when something in my brain wants to freak out and I can't quite find the right button to push to calm it down and turn off the nerves. I keep telling myself that I'm going to be in Australia for a solid two months, if not longer, before I head anywhere else, and there's no essential I could possibly forget that I can't get in Sydney, for heaven's sake, but today it just isn't working. I'm good at tamping down panic and pushing past nerves when I can't get rid of them, but they're still there and after 12 hours of feeling them bounce around in my head and my stomach, they're starting to drive me a little nuts.

Between the two browsers I use, there are 39 tabs open on my screen right now, since my usual go-to method of dealing with travel panic is to flood it out by reading up (again) on where I'm going. Five deal with travel logistics, from one on AAA's site about International Driving Permits (good news: only $15 through AAA!) to my obsessive monitoring of the price of short-hop flights between Sydney and Hobart. One is my daily check of the Aussie-USD exchange rate, which got slightly less of a wince today, since it's back down to parity after a painful jump to USD$1.02 last week. One is Amazon.com's comprehensive list of content available for the Kindle in the U.S., sorted with lowest price ($0.00) first, which I'm slowly making my way through, loading up my new Kindle before I take off (not that I can't continue to do that from anywhere in the world). Ten are blog posts that have caught my eye throughout the day that I'm slowly making my way through, and three are news sites, two of them Australian.

The other 19? Gadgets, gizmos and travel "essentials" that I'm still debating the necessity of buying before I leave for Sydney, three weeks from today. Looking at those pages makes me think about where in my luggage I would stow those things, which then leads me down into the death spiral of packing panic. How am I going to fit my life into 70 pounds, plus carry-ons? My pack needs to be totally ready to head to Tasmania less than 48 hours after I land in Australia, with any non-Tassie trip items easily accessible so I can pull them out and dump them in a drawer until I get back to Sydney. Did I order the right kind of travel laundry soap? How cold is it actually going to be during the winter? Oh yikes, I'm arriving in the middle of beach season and I'm pasty and I hate swimsuits. Okay, getting off track here...

All of this is compounded by the fact that I just spent a large chunk of my savings to pay my rent in Australia for the entire year, and that I've been chasing my tail trying to get a Capital One credit card, with its coveted no foreign transaction fees guarantee, for three weeks. The card, for which I had to send yards of paperwork proving I actually live at the address I claim to inhabit (because the postal service delivers all mail in my tiny town to the post office, not to individual residences, making my permanent mailing address a P.O. Box, which credit card companies can't accept, thank you so much, Patriot Act), was supposed to arrive yesterday, at the latest. It didn't, nor did it arrive today, which set those travel panic nerves simmering again as I spent twenty minutes on the phone with Capital One this afternoon to get that card canceled and a new one issued.

Then the service through which I made my travel arrangements emailed to tell me that I had been switched to a different flight between Melbourne and Sydney after my initial flight from Los Angeles to Melbourne. For the fifth time in the three and a half months since I bought my ticket.

Photo credit: Issac Z. Schlueter, Creative Commons

After that, I gave up. Embrace the panic, I thought. You know you'll get past it and get back to pure excitement eventually; maybe letting the panic have its way is the quickest route through it. So I did. I embraced the panic, flipping back and forth between two nearly identical external hard drives I'm considering and obsessing, for the umpty-billionth time, over packing cubes versus compression sacks and whether or not I should invest in a new daypack (because they obviously don't have those in Australia).

I was hip-deep in reviews of travel sheets (because the 500 I've read in the past two months certainly weren't enough) when I overheard my mom on the phone, outlining the first few weeks of my trip for one of her friends. As she talked about my plans to spend a week in Tasmania, then hang out in Sydney for a few days before grad school orientation and treat myself to a Michael Bublé concert the night before my 26th birthday, I looked up from my laptop. She mentioned that my housing was already taken care of through the end of the year, so I could move right into an apartment, and how nice it was that "with all of this Twittering and blogging and Facebook and everything" I was already looking forward to meeting so many of the people I've been talking to in Australia.

With that, the travel panic nerves unknotted and the vague headache that had been plaguing me all day was gone. I remembered that I'm about to go live in Australia, widely believed to be one of the coolest countries on earth, for two whole years! And that, thanks to all of you who read this blog and put up with my yammering on Twitter and Facebook, I'm actually heading there already looking forward to meeting some people who know the country and its customs a lot better than I do, who've made me feel welcome months before my feet will hit Australian soil. Suddenly my world was bright and shiny again, and I couldn't help but smile. (Of course, 20 minutes later, my mom and I were flipping back and forth between some of those same 39 web pages, figuring out what she wants to give me as an early birthday gift before I leave. But we were laughing while we did it!)

So from now on, whenever that travel panic grabs hold, I'm going to embrace it and let myself freak out over the five million unknown things I'm convinced I'm forgetting and obsess about the thirty thousand details I've already taken care of. All the while trusting that, when the time is right, some little ray of sunshine will pierce the foreboding gloom cast by my nerves and send me back to Happy Traveler Land with a smile on my face, excited for the adventures that lie ahead.

Tales from a Hostel Bunk: Vienna

2011-01-01T08:40:00.001+11:00

Paris' Gare du Nord: pretty, but very cold
after dark in February, mostly due to a large
surplus of windows and open doors.
Photo credit: Evan Bench/austinevan

February 2006, Vienna, Austria. Yanking my suitcase over a crack in the pavement, I exchanged a look with my friend as we neared the address of our hostel for the next few days. Maybe it was the hours of waiting at Paris' freezing Gare du Nord late the evening before or the long overnight train ride to Vienna, but the neighborhood didn't seem particularly welcoming and I was starting to wonder what we'd gotten ourselves into. Neither of us had ever stayed at a hostel before and, though we'd taken the precaution of booking a female-only room, I was nervous. What if it was awful? What if our roommates were mean, or wanted to party at 3am or poked through our things?

The image in my mind's eye of the unknown hostel took on a dark, sinister quality and by the time we'd found the building, the next few nights had begun to seem like the rest of my life. Then we stepped into Wombat's The City Hostel - "The Base" and I started to relax. In a lobby furnished with a bright red phone booth straight off of a London street corner and a reception desk that looks more like it should be setting up adventure tours than handing out room keys, it's difficult to be nervous about your surroundings. And once you talk to the friendly staff (who further endear themselves by handing you a voucher for a drink at the basement Wombar), glance at the spacious, colorful breakfast room and arrive in front of a bright blue door decorated with a fiercely pink sign declaring the room beyond it a "Pink Wing" (female-only room), it's all but impossible not to feel at home.

The Riesenrad, a Vienna landmark since its 1897 construction.

Our "Pink Wing" was a four-bed room. One of the other two women was also American, spending several months touring Europe, and the other was an Australian winding down two years of traveling the world with a base and a part-time nursing job in Britain. The four of us found that we had quite a bit in common and within an hour were heading out in search of dinner, with our Australian roommate - who spoke German - leading the way. It was a fun evening, with conversation ranging from favorite places visited to languages spoken to the plastic content in Australian money. And the neighborhood turned out to be quiet, rather than creepy.

The next afternoon, after a day of chilly sightseeing and lots of coffee, we followed our Australian roommate's directions back from central Vienna - straight up Mariahilfer Straße back to the neighborhood where the hostel was located - with no problem.

One of Vienna's tributes to Mozart, in the
Burggarten, which I would have loved to see in
the spring, with the flowers planted in the treble
clef in bloom.

Vienna wasn't entirely what I had expected and, although it's home to some beautiful fine arts, I didn't feel much of a connection to the city or its people, which was unusual for me. I enjoyed seeing Mozarthaus Vienna, drooling at the display of grand pianos behind the window of Steinway-Haus, having a cultural excuse to drink coffee and eat pastries and wandering through the vast and impressive Oberes Belvedere, but the feeling of a temporary home, of instant connection to the culture and the people that I'd grown used to in traveling through France, Italy and England was missing. (The one significant connection I felt in Vienna was when I saw Gustav Klimt's painting, Der Kuss, in the Oberes Belvedere, and was able to spend as long as I wanted standing in front of it, absorbing the emotion and the incredible combination of colors and patterns in the painting.) Without the genuinely warm and welcoming atmosphere of the hostel to go back to every evening, the whole experience might have felt rather soulless.

Instead, I had friends - old and new - to eat dinner with, write postcards and debate literature and politics with in the Wombar downstairs in the evening and eat breakfast with in the morning before braving the bone-chilling February weather. Wombat's The City Hostel - "The Base" in Vienna is one of my two favorites out of all the hostels I've stayed at, and I feel very lucky to have had my first visit to a hostel be in such a clean, well-run, comfortable and welcoming one, with people who showed me what a great experience a hostel stay can be.

Wombat's The City Hostel - "The Base" is an easy ~2km walk or a short subway ride from Vienna's city center. Rooms range from private doubles and triples to six beds, and female-only rooms are available. Each room has its own ensuite bathroom with shower, and bed linens, luggage storage and in-room lockers are provided free of charge. The hostel is open 24 hours, with no lockout or curfew, and there are both pay-as-you-go computers with internet access and free WLAN connections available. What my friend and I were most amused by was the vending machine in the lobby that sold everything from t-shirts to condoms. There's also a coffee vending machine that makes warming up on chilly days much more pleasant! I don't remember what we paid, but room rates seem to have stayed very reasonable, currently ranging from €12,00 to €20,00 per person per night for a four- or six-bed room, depending on the season.

Why travel?

2010-12-22T04:30:00.002+11:00

Angels Landing from the valley floor,
Zion National Park, Utah, USA

To people who haven't been bitten by the travel bug, the desire to fly, drive, walk or sit on a train for hours just to go look at streets, buildings, trees and people in a different city, state or country can seem baffling. Why go all that distance to spend time outside your comfort zone, around people you may not be able to understand, in a place where it may not be safe to drink the water or eat certain types of food and where you're not unlikely to get lost at least once a day? Why sit on a rattling bus overnight, or trek through bug-infested forests up to altitudes that make you light-headed? Why bother with all the hassle and headaches of traveling, when you could stay comfortably at home?

If you asked 50 travel junkies those questions, you'd likely get 50 different answers, but I'd be willing to bet that most of them wouldn't be all that different from mine, at least in spirit: Because, in getting lost, you'll stumble over people and experiences you didn't know were missing from your life. Because finding a way to communicate with people who live a world away from where you grew up shows you just how how much you have in common, despite the differences in your lifestyles and looks - and because those differences can open your eyes to new ways of doing things, or make you better appreciate your own life. Because beauty - in architecture, in nature, in people - is worth seeking out. And because nothing is more exhilarating than stepping over the edge of your comfort zone and free-falling into as-yet unknown experiences.

Les arènes: Inside the Roman amphitheatre,
Arles, France.

Travel can be terrifying. If you venture away from home often enough, there will inevitably be moments when you want nothing more than to be back where things are simple and figuring out how to interact with the people around you without offending anyone or making a mockery of yourself doesn't take every ounce of brainpower you have. You will likely get sick or hurt at inopportune moments, be scorned by locals who think you should have stayed at your home and well away from theirs, and wonder, once you're past the point of no return on some adventurous outing that required you to sign away the operator's liability for your life, what the hell you were thinking.

Those moments, however, are few and far between and almost always make you laugh at some point down the line. Most of the time, travel is wonderful. You can admire the colors in a national park and wonder just how long it took for such beauty to be carved out of the earth. You can stand at the Pont du Gard or the Roman amphitheatre in Arles and marvel at how such huge constructs have stood for so long without mortar. You can take a walk or a hike and wonder about the thousands of other feet that have been there - who they belonged to, what those people saw, their reasons for coming. You can exchange a smile with someone who was raised in a culture radically different from yours and treasure a brief conversation that you'll never forget. Or you can sit, at a café, on a park bench, on a curb, and watch the world go by, with all its similarities to and differences from the world you know.

Looking back down the path to Inis Mór's
Dún Aonghasa, toward the Irish Sea.

As long as you mind your manners and respect local customs, there's no wrong way to travel. Whatever it is that you're looking for, whatever your reasons for going, as long as you're satisfied with what you see, do and experience, you're traveling the "right" way. For some, that "right" way means setting out on an epic adventure without an end date, while for others it's a long weekend close to home or a week a short flight away.

Travel is personal, with a lot of self-discovery wrapped up in any trip, but whether you travel alone, with friends or with a group, it's also something to be shared. Each new memory you make expands your view of the world and every experience you have can be helpful to the people around you, those you already know and those you have yet to meet.

So, why travel? Pick a reason, there are hundreds. I think a more difficult question to answer is "Why not travel?" I can't think of a single answer that isn't outweighed by the benefits of travel and the discoveries it yields. Can you?

Getting Hustled in NYC

2010-12-18T05:20:00.001+11:00

Um, I'd like to keep that in my wallet, please.
Creative Commons, TheTruthAbout

In general, I think I'm a pretty good judge of character and - essential to a traveler, especially a woman who often travels alone - I pride myself on trusting my gut. So far (knock on wood) I've been lucky enough and smart enough to avoid any trouble while traveling abroad. But my ego took a huge blow this fall when I got hustled in New York City.

I was only in New York for about 36 hours, just long enough to eat some pizza, people-watch in Times Square and along Broadway, help out at the gala event for work that was the reason I was there, grab some bagels and head back down the Turnpike to our office in Washington, DC.

When I walked into the gala venue, I was in a great mood. I hadn't been in a major city in going on three months, and I was riding the high of the energy boost I always get the moment I arrive in a city I love. I've been tele-commuting since May, so it had been a while since I'd seen my co-workers and seeing friendly faces I'd missed was another rush. I spent the evening working at the registration table, talking literature and nerve-wracking visa applications with the Polish woman working the coat check for the catering company in between checking in guests.

It was about an hour into the event when a man hurried over to the table, set down his glass of wine and asked if I had any change; he had to go pay for parking and he didn't have any small bills. I'm usually terrible at carrying cash and all I had was the single bill I had tucked into my purse, just in case. "Sorry," I said, "all I have is a $20." Talking so fast that I could barely keep up (and that's saying something: I'm from Southern California, where I grew up talking so fast that my dad would often shake his head and tell me to slow down during family dinner conversation), the man said that was fine, he was just short and needed to pay ASAP, so he'd run to the ATM on his way back from the garage to pay me back. He tossed in the name of one of my organization's board members, saying he was a friend. I was uncomfortable and wished I'd kept my mouth shut about the $20, but told myself I was being ridiculous - he was a guest who needed to borrow some cash, that was all. I pulled out the $20, handed it to him and watched him keep up the same frantic pace as he headed out the front door, tossing a "Thanks" over his shoulder.

About twenty minutes later, my gut was telling me that this guy was not coming back, and I was berating myself for breaking so many of my own rules about dealing with strangers:

Listen to your instincts, not the person's appearance. The guy was wearing a suit and tie, so my brain said, "Honey, look at him, it's fine," even while my instincts were screaming "Bad news!"
He used a nickname for the board member he claimed to know that I'd never heard him called by. It had the intended affect of making me think the guy just knew our board member better than I did, even while it set off alarm bells in the back of my head.
When someone's talking very quickly and not quite making eye contact, they're not up to anything good. Based on this guy's behavior, I'd say that rule #1 in the Hustler's Handbook is "Never stop talking, never stop moving, or it'll give them a chance to think."
Do NOT tell people that you have cash. My automatic response to people on the street who ask me, specifically, for money is "I'm sorry, I don't have any change." (Which is usually true, but that's beside the point.) This is where broken rule #1 came in, which, combined with the fact that I was surrounded by hundreds of people, many of whom I knew, made me feel safe enough to confess that I didn't have what I thought he was looking for in a little too much detail.
He wasn't consistent about what he wanted. First, he needed change. Then, when I didn't have change, he was short. Alarm bells clanging all over the place, and I still let myself be blinded by #1 and steam-rolled by #3.

An hour later, I was furious with myself. $20 wouldn't have bought me much, but it was enough to make a difference in my budget for the week. At the end of the event, I told my co-workers what had happened, struggling to look at it as a lesson well-learned at a time when the loss of $20 didn't leave me desperate - but it still stung. It turned out that one of the cater-waiters had also been hustled, and our bookkeeper was kind enough to reimburse both of us and consider it part of the expense of the event.

I was very grateful to have the $20 back in my purse, but was still upset with myself for being such an uncharacteristically easy mark. (And, really, at an event that costs hundreds of dollars per ticket, who hustles the event and catering staff?! Probably someone who knows that New York society is too smart to fall for their lines...) But I've learned an important lesson, with injury to nothing but my ego: even in what you consider a comfort zone, don't let your guard down completely and always trust your gut.

The Secret of Life

2010-12-14T04:15:00.001+11:00

As individual as each of us is, as much as we insist on making our own way and living our own lives, we always have preconceptions of what's "normal" based on the opinions of the people around us and the status quo as we were growing up.

College graduation, May 2007.
For me, this moment felt like
a given, but that isn't the
case for everyone.

In my hometown, an affluent beach suburb that prides itself on the quality of its schools and the achievements of its students, going to college isn't a question for most people. There, a college education is perceived by most as a necessity, a stepping stone to adulthood and a life of purpose, whatever that purpose may be. I never questioned that I would go to college, and the fact that neither marriage nor children were part of my plan until, at the very least, a few years after I had finished that bachelor's degree seemed like the most normal thing in the world.

So when I was asked last week what my "secret" is for being 25, unmarried, fairly well-traveled and about to start my graduate work, my first reaction was to blink in surprise, speechless. But I don't have a secret, I thought. Isn't that pretty normal? With the possible exception of the well-traveled part for some, I don't think my situation is all that different, on the surface, from that of a lot of 25-year-olds around the world.

Then I started to put the question into context: I'm not in an urban area anymore - in fact, I'm a three-hour drive from any major city. This part of Arizona, which my parents moved to when I was a sophomore in college, is rural, much of it is far from affluent and many of the schools struggle to get a decent percentage of their students successfully through the state-mandated testing. Some of the kids who grow up here do go on to one of the state's public colleges, but for many of the people who live here, a college degree may as well be the moon. And most people are married and starting families by their early 20s. In my seven months here so far, I haven't met or heard of anyone else my age who isn't married.

The man who asked my "secret" for living my life as I have has two young daughters, whom he wants to see get their degrees and explore the world; he and his wife are planning a family vacation overseas when they're a little older. In this area, as in a lot of the U.S., making a trip like that is a big deal and I was touched by this man's concern for his daughters' future and his desire to show them that a life that is "the norm" for this area isn't their only option.

After my initial surprise at his question, I started to think about what pushed me to study and travel as much as I could. Yes, some of my motivation for getting my degree was because it was expected, but I was genuinely interested in the subjects I chose to study and I enjoyed spending time on them, years of sleep deprivation aside. Studying abroad was something I felt compelled to do, if time and money allowed, and I don't regret a moment of it, despite the fact that it made my last year of college extremely hectic. When I started my bachelor's degree, I didn't think much about grad school, but as my interests have developed, it's become clear that the path I hope to follow into the future will be more accessible with a Masters degree - and I'm lucky enough to be able to work toward that new goal while indulging my love of travel. So it seems that having a passion for something - or several things - and the drive to pursue it is my "secret."

While the ideas of normality that each of us grow up with will never entirely fade, they don't define our lives unless we let them. (And one sure way to blow any idea of "normal" out of the water is to travel and see how different life is for people around the world.) I think Caecus got it right when he said, "Each man is the architect of his own fate." I believe that, and, though the path I'm following may be influenced by other people and may change direction, I will always be the one making the decision to change course or continue straight ahead - no one else can decide my life's direction for me. What's your secret to living the life you want?

No dreams allowed?

2010-12-07T07:15:00.002+11:00

No dreams allowed?
(Image from Fibonnaci,
Wikimedia Commons)

Most travelers know that, while their next trip often occupies 75% or more of their brainpower, traveling isn't for everyone. Even among travel lovers, sometimes you meet people who have no interest in going to a certain type of destination - for some people, anything outside of Europe or North America isn't worth their time; for others, anything on the beaten path is a place they have no interest in visiting. Most travel lovers embrace their common ground, whether or not they share many dream destinations. But what happens when someone thinks your dreams are wrong?

I don't have a lot of patience for people who criticize the dreams of others to begin with - after all, dreams are personal and usually have nothing to do with the person disparaging them - but it can be especially frustrating when the person who wants to tell you why you're nuts is someone you care about. When someone I meet in passing thinks I'm crazy for wanting to visit Rwanda, Thailand or Antarctica, it's easy to shrug it off, smile and say "to each her own." But when people I love are adamant that I shouldn't travel to certain places, or that I shouldn't travel alone so much, it hurts on multiple levels: that they don't think I can keep myself safe, that they're more concerned about their own preconceptions about a region than they are about my desire to connect with the people and the history there, and that they're so set on talking me out of going that they won't let me share my excitement about the possibilities ahead of me.

Alone in a new city (Prague) - and loving it!
Be happy for me.

It may seem to the people who discourage me from going somewhere or doing something I'm excited about that they're only demonstrating concern for my well-being, but to me it feels like a kick in the face. Whether traveling solo or with friends, I'm not inexperienced at this, nor am I careless or cavalier about...well, anything. I'm meticulous to the point of neurosis about planning (just ask anyone who's traveled with me!) and I have good instincts that I make a point of following. Why can't they leave worrying about logistics and safety to me and be happy that I'm following my dreams?

It's even more frustrating when the criticism comes from people who love to travel themselves and are no strangers to venturing off the beaten path. I'd love to hear about their experiences in places similar to the ones I want to visit and compare notes on the best seasons to go, great local guides and foods or activities not to be missed, but instead I'm treated to a lengthy monologue about why I should avoid certain countries, cities or even entire regions of the world. I'm left to conclude that they don't think I deserve the same right to choose my own path that they've enjoyed, that they think I'm incapable of taking care of myself or that they think because I often travel solo, I'd be better off staying home.

Arguments about travel don't benefit anyone, so my new plan is this: I'm still happy to talk to anyone who will listen about my travel plans, but I'm keeping a mental list of people who really don't want to hear about my plans to venture off the beaten path (or even to explore slightly-less-well-trod sections of it). That way, I'll remember who's more interested in telling me why I shouldn't go than in being excited about my travels, and I can steer any travel-related conversation to areas and activities I know they're comfortable with. I'm happy to hear recommendations for great reefs to snorkel or dive, challenging hikes to take and beautiful beaches to explore, and I certainly don't mind someone expressing concern for me once in a while, but I'm not interested in being told repeatedly why I shouldn't go to a particular country or in having my dreams excoriated - especially by people who aren't really interested in hearing about them anyway.

So from now on, I'll be focusing on planning my adventures, sharing them with the people I care about who want to hear about them and avoiding the headache - on both sides - of arguing about specific pieces of my plans with those who don't. Knowing that list of people is necessary hurts, but it will help keep things less frustrating for everyone, and will let me keep my eye on the ball rather than being distracted by arguments that leave everyone involved distressed. And knowing that the people not on that list support my dreams - and sometimes share them! - and will be happy to get a postcard saying I'm having a great time, no matter where it's from, never fails to make me smile.

What are your tricks for dealing with people who argue with your dreams?

A Tale of Two Visas

2010-12-01T04:15:00.000+11:00

Creative Commons, Damian613

One thing about the French: they love their bureaucracy. Cinema passes, library cards and bus passes each require a passport-sized photo to verify, each time you use them, that you are actually the individual to whom each card was issued. Opening a checking account requires documentation proving that you live at the address you claim is your residence and, if you aren't the primary occupant of record, a letter from that person is necessary, along with documentation that they are, in fact, the primary occupant of record.

When I went to the French embassy in Washington during the summer of 2005 to obtain my student visa (for which one must apply in person), I was carrying approximately a pound of paperwork. In addition to my passport - in good condition, with at least two blank pages at the back - the requested photocopies of the appropriate pages and various other forms of official identification, I also had documentation of my enrollment at GW, documentation of my acceptance into my study abroad program, documentation from my parents that they had sufficient funds ($600/month was the minimum amount, I believe) to support me for the duration of my stay in France, proof of my flight itinerary, documentation from my study abroad program that I would have a legitimate place to live during my time in France, two passport-sized photos and a credit card for the visa application fee, although I no longer remember what it was - less than $150, possibly less than $100.

I walked out ninety minutes or so later, the proud bearer of a pretty French short-stay visa that took up a full page in my passport. I was a little confused as to why I had been issued a short-stay visa, since I was going to be in the country for approximately eight months, which did not, in fact, qualify as "short," but I was confident that someone would explain it to me before it expired on October 30th.

Official logo of the French Republic,
via Wikimedia Commons

Among the handful of students in my program planning to stay in France for a full year of study, rumors circulated about what was involved in securing a titre de séjour (long-stay visa). We determined that some type of medical visit was involved, and were assured that we would receive official notification of what was required and when. Sure enough, in late October, I received a letter notifying me of a medical visit in Marseille in November. I was assured that my fears of being deported because my short-stay visa actually expired at the end of October were groundless.

I made my way to the appointed office at the appropriate time on the designated day and moved from one waiting area to the next with several of my fellow students and a lot of people who looked like they were probably trying to renew their permanent resident status. My eyes were checked, my weight noted. (I can confirm that French women really don't get fat: after two months of feeling like I was consuming more food than I'd ever eaten in my life, it turned out I'd lost ten pounds.)

I was escorted to another waiting area, then called into one of three small cubicles built into one wall of the room. A woman explained that I was to remove all clothing and any jewelry from the waist up and wait to be called again for my spine x-ray, then left me to my own devices in the cubicle. I took a deep breath and expelled it - what was becoming my standard method for dealing with situations my self-conscious American brain found dauntingly immodest - then hung my clothes on the hooks provided and stashed my jewelry in my pockets. My name was called from the side of the cubicle opposite the one I'd entered - by a man's voice. I rolled my eyes at myself, took another deep breath and let it out as I stepped into the x-ray room. The doctor, or x-ray technician, or whatever he was, was relatively young and reached out to shake my hand with a smile. I bit the tip of my tongue to keep the slightly hysterical laughter in my head at bay and managed a polite greeting. Five minutes later, I was safely back in my sweater and headed back to the bus station.

Once my x-ray had been declared to show I was healthy (I assume they were looking for evidence of tuberculosis in my lungs), I was instructed to proceed to a government office, conveniently in Aix-en-Provence this time, to secure my visa. The man at the little office window on the street took my paperwork and passport, handed the passport back half a minute later, indicated I was to sign the long-stay visa, stamped and initialed it and waved me on my way with hardly a word. Despite the fact that it was November, my new visa - another colorful full-page seal - was dated October 1st, and gave me leave to stay in France through September 30th of the following year. I breathed a sigh of relief, glad to be done with the process.

Australian Coat of Arms;
public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Obtaining my student visa for Australia was a completely different experience.

I first tried to apply this past July, wanting to get the AUS$515 payment out of the way as quickly as possible, before my credit card got too bogged down with all the other necessities of my move. I filled out the application - online, no consulate visit necessary! - but came up with an error message when I submitted it, since I was more than four months away from my projected arrival date. Oops.

I shied away from applying in late October, when I was within four months of my departure for Australia, because the exchange rate was awful for the U.S. dollar. I finally bit the bullet on Thanksgiving - last Thursday - because the Aussie had dropped back below USD$1 and I didn't want to delay too long, in case there was a problem. I provided my background information and eCoE (electronic confirmation of enrolment), certified that I'm generally a good, law-abiding person and cringed as I hit "submit" to authorize the AUS$550 charge to my credit card (apparently the cost of a student visa increased some time between July and November).

On November 26th, the day after Thanksgiving, I woke up to an email advising me that my visa had been approved, effective immediately, and that I was welcome to stay in Australia until three months after the end of my degree program. I blinked, and read it again. That was easy. Not only am I set, visa-wise, for the duration of my Masters program, but I have permission to work as soon as my classes begin in February. I don't even have to use a page of my passport, since my visa is stored online.

In summary: French student visas are pretty and cheap compared to the Australian equivalent, but Australian student visas are a better deal all around. They're significantly more expensive but allow you to work 20 hours a week while school is in session and as many hours per week as you like during school breaks, while you can't work at all on a student visa in France; you don't have to trek to the nearest consulate, as you do for a French visa; and the first visa you get for Australia is the only one you need for the duration of your studies, while France requires some hopping around in-country, after your studies have begun, before guaranteeing you can stay. My credit card is still whimpering, but the ease of the application process for my Australian student visa and the prospect of being able to work down under are going a long way toward keeping me optimistic about the whole process.

Look out, Australia, I'll be there in two months!

Saturday Snapshot: Get Lost in the Crowd

2010-11-28T04:35:00.001+11:00

Call me crazy, but I love crowds. Not the shoulder-to-shoulder, shuffling-an-inch-at-a-time, can't-breathe-without-inhaling-your-neighbor's-hair kind of crowd, but the kind you find in most big cities, that pulses with the energy of everyone in it, pushes you to walk a little faster and says "Okay, what are we going to do today?"

That energy is one of the first things I notice about a city and, if one doesn't have a distinct feeling all its own, it's a good indication that I'm probably not going to like it much - not a problem for London, the location of this week's Saturday Snapshot.

This photo was taken from the steps of The National Gallery, overlooking Trafalgar Square, in late October 2005, when I was visiting London with a friend during the second half of our October break. We were only there for a few days and had slightly different to-see lists, so we decided to spend most of this day separately. Predictably, I spent a lot of it wandering the city streets, soaking up the atmosphere. After two months in relatively small Aix-en-Provence, being back in the rush and bustle of a large capital city with crowds of people on the streets felt like being a kid in a candy store. Everywhere I looked, there were interesting things to see: people, stores, taxis, landmarks, other tourists.

It was mid-afternoon by the time I reached Trafalgar Square and I was starting to drag a little, probably because I'm prone to forgetting lunch when I'm exploring a new place. I wandered through the square, then joined the crowd on the steps of the museum and just sat for a while, people-watching and snapping photos, happy to be part of the crowd.