Summer Break

Hello readers, apologies that it has been a while - too long a while, in fact, since the previous update.

I have graduated from Amherst and am currently typing this post from London's Heathrow Airport, in what marks as a conclusion to my (almost) two months' worth of summer vacation in California, Hawaii, and Europe. I unfortunately am in no mood to be terribly reflective - thus let this post be a summary of my graduation trip and my first ever adventure in Europe.

Fast-forwarding to the Europe trip, I took a red-eye from JFK to Paris' Charles De Gaulle Airport on June 21st. We then rented a Mercedes-Benz and drove to Dijon and Lourdes (France), before flying from Toulouse to Madrid and Seville (Spain). We made time to drive to Sagres (Portugal) before my sister and I flew from Madrid to Zurich (Switzerland). I finally went on to fly into Schipol (Netherlands). I had the opportunity to visit Leiden, Amsterdam, and Rotterdam before catching a flight to London today, July 7th. I am grateful to have spent a total of 17 days in the Schengen territory.

A few takeaways:

The travels has been exhausting but immensely rewarding at the same time. Sure, it may not have been life-changing (I have yet to discover my purpose in life..?) but I have felt inspired and challenged with the exposure of different cultures through my travels. From getting lost in the Louvre, slowly sipping Tinto de Verano paried with Hamon Ibericos, to marveling at the jubilant lights of Amsterdam, I understand why travelers around the world continuously strive to visit the continent.

Unsurprisingly, traveling has made me much more interested and motivated in the quest to master more foreign languages. I started my trip by visiting France and Spain, two out of the very few countries in EU where English does not get you too far. My younger brother is studying Spanish in Seville, thus we happily let him do most of the translating/guiding during the Spanish stretch of the trip. However, in France, especially in Dijon, his Spanish is as useless as my Japanese. Nonetheless, we somehow got by! I also had the pleasure to sit down next to an amicable, Rolex-bearing Spanish senor during my flight to Zurich. He was headed to Geneva for a pharmaceutical conference, and happily chatted me up as we drank the airline's complimentary red wine. He spoke rudimentary English, but he was really well-traveled and happy, and we somehow could get our points across and understand each other pretty well! Now I'll begin my new chapter aspiring to improve my Japanese and traveling more - hopefully picking up a Romance language at some point in the future.

I am also grateful to be able to spend a substantial amount of time with my parents and two siblings. With my work in New York that starts next week, I'm not sure when exactly I will next be home, or see my family. Thus it was great catching up and relaxing with my folks. I'm pretty sure I bored them with my push to visit a lot of the art/historical sites such as the Louvre, the garden of Versailles, or Amsterdam's Rijkt Museum, but its always nice to have some family time. The best family time I had, however, was in Hawaii together with my younger brother. We skydived, ate Hawaiian pork, and drove through the island singing along to aloha music.

May I always be inspired to travel!