Traveling Soul

Amongst a list of questions that I receive when traveling, on the top of that list is: How do you afford to travel at such a young age? This question is most asked by friends and peers back home. The truth is, it is not easy. My love for traveling started a couple of years ago when I went to Louisiana as part of a service trip put on by the university. Before that trip, I had never really left the Pacific Northwest. I was 19 years old and felt as if I could conquer the world without knowing it first. Then after that trip, I searched for other opportunities to travel and help others. The cost of traveling was an obvious burden until I found a program called Camp Adventur e. It was the perfect opportunity as a young and curious university student studying international relations. It helped me with traveling while working with children. Because of this program, I've had the opportunity to go to China and the following year to Germany. The program paid for both of my tickets and ev...

As most of you know by now, I am currently in Chile visiting Florent for a month during my summer break. I have started a Master's program at the University of Oregon through the Linguistics Department that focuses on Language pedagogy and language acquisition. It has been a fun and exciting new adventure, but as always, I am yearning to travel and move. In the airport of Amsterdam, on the way to Russia, I discovered that I had a month break after starting the first term of the Master's program. This of course, was the best news that I could receive at the time because I had not seen Florent in over 7 months. So after 2 months of intense studying and working, I bought a ticket to Chile and I have been here for over 2 weeks. Today I am going to blog about the greatest adventure that we just returned from: San Pedro de Atacama. San Pedro de Atacama, as the title suggests, is the driest desert in the world. We took an hour and a half flight from Santiago to San Pedro and then fr...

We landed from our 2 hour flight from Bogota to Leticia on Wednesday, June 7th. Our hostel (Anaira) had complimentary airport pickups and sure enough, waiting for us outside of the gate was a sign with my name on it (I had made the reservations). We quickly got acquainted in our rooms which were constructed on- they were making a door for the room. We listened to the different guide options for the jungle. We had 2 choices - stay in Leticia and go on day trips or spend 3 nights and 4 days in the jungle using military hammocks. As can be assumed, we chose the latter option. The rest of the day was spent relaxing and preparing for tomorrow. There were 2 other travelers who joined Hugh, Juspal and I. The three of us had been teaching in Tunja the previous month. Alice, a Canadian from the french part joined us, as well as Niklas from Germany. They were both traveling by themselves and while Alice was just ending her trip, Niklas was only beginning his. I opted out to not take any malar...

As I’m sitting in my bedroom, listening to the soft putter of the rain hitting against the roof, I stop to reflect on my weekend… but more than that, I think about the people that I have met on this journey in Colombia and how truly happy I feel no matter where I am. I have received numerous gestures of kindness whether it was someone simply giving me directions when I was lost or escorting me all the way to my hostel. I forget- for a brief second- all the injustices that this country has endured through and the many more that it continues to struggle through. This weekend was one for the books for sure! I left Friday morning for Zipaquira, but since there  are no direct buses from Tunja, I arrived in the Portal del Norte in Bogota which is the main site of the transmilenio in the North of Bogota. Once there, I was searching for another bus to Zipaquira and ended up walking in the wrong direction (for quite some time) but eventually realizing that I needed to be on the other s...

On Friday morning, I took a 3-hour bus ride to Bogota. Upon my arrival at the bus terminal, I asked the police for directions to my hostel which stated that I needed to take the Germania bus towards the centro. They took me inside to ask another officer who was speaking with a different woman.Coincidentally the woman was also heading in the same direction and she walked me to the right bus station. We chatted a bit and she warned me to not have my phone out in public (this would be the first of numerous warnings regarding possessions). After waiting for about 15 minutes, I caught the right bus and while on it, I asked the driver to please let me know when Carrera 4 was near. This proceeded him to ask me where I was from. Not long, the entire bus knew that I was foreign and that I needed help (the bus driver even asked a policewoman to escort me to my hostel). A stranger on the bus responded to the bus driver's request, claiming that he also needed to go to that area. He walked ...