LLWorldTour

I was recently nominated by the Trip Base Travel Blog to possibly be a part of their E-book on best kept travel secrets.

They are compiling this amazing list from travelers near and far of great travel tips, lesser known destinations, and hidden gem restaurants or hotels. Of course, as with any list like this, any ‘gem’ will no longer be so secret. But, alas, that is the way of today’s information age, I suppose.

So here goes. Here are three of my best kept travel secrets…soon to be not so secret anymore. You can also see more of my own tips here and soon here on my ‘Ever-Expanding Tips’ page.

1. Destination: Bozcaada Island, Turkey (pronounced: bose-jah-dah)

This tiny island off the west coast of Turkey is one of only two inhabited Turkish islands in the Aegean amidst a sea of Greek Isles. It is a dry, yellow-hued scrubby little island with picturesque wine vineyards blanketing its sunny slopes. It has a charming cobblestoned main village that is filled with mostly locals and thankfully really isn’t a big stop on the tourist trail. The main industries are fishing, tourism, and wine production. The population is mostly Turkish but there are still about 30 ethnic Greeks living here.

It’s a great escape from Istanbul and just ‘off the beaten path’ enough to be an island of mostly vacationing locals and not the hordes of tourists going to the other islands in the Aegean Sea. Gorgeous blue waters, tasty local fare & wine, and lots of sun. Ah, the simple life.

2. Travel Tip: Most Credit Cards (including highly publicized ‘travel’ card, American Express) charge you a fee if you charge something in a different currency. I use Capitol One which (at the time of this writing) does NOT charge a fee or percentage. What’s in your wallet?!

3. Great, off-the-beaten-path Hotel: Inn-Berlin

This small hotel in hip Berlin is shiny, bright, modern, and spotless, and its owners, Ralph and Yvonne, are extremely friendly and helpful.

The rooms are bright and clean, and all have fluffy down comforters encased in colorful duvets. The style is Ikea-minimal with clean lines. Rooms have cool and whimsical murals on their walls, and most importantly, they all come with their very own good-luck gnomes!

The Inn-Berlin is located a bit north of central Berlin, but the trip to most of the city’s main districts can be made in just fifteen minutes on either the U-Bahn or S-Bahn.

**As requested my Trip Base…I now tag and nominate these five bloggers to share their best travel secrets on their blogs: 360 in 356, Lives of Wander, Killing Batteries, Ms Traveling Pants, Travel Betty.

There is no way I could just be a tourist in the world for 2 ½ years.  I knew I had to mix it up to prevent boredom and burnout. I craved variety in my everyday life, so why would my life on the road be any different? Yes, of course, the constant change of scenery, culture, and people was variety in and of itself, but I knew I couldn’t just keep showing up in a new town each week and essentially continue to ‘walk around the world for a year.’  I needed to do, ya know, stuff. I needed to immerse myself somehow in society and feel like a part of it.  To start this process, I did different things like a Spanish Immersion program in Costa Rica (Spanish lessons in the morning and yes, surfing lessons in the afternoon) or a two-week, several-hundred mile bicycle trip down the length of Vietnam. But I needed even more structure. I needed…a job (cue shrieking horror music).

Now, just the sheer fact that I decided to blog about my trip and also write travel articles to be published elsewhere means that I was already working. I was trying to make time each week to sit and just write – a very hard thing to do when you are sitting in Rome or Cairo or Hong Kong and there are so many things around you vying for your attention.

Besides my new ‘day job’ as travel writer and photographer, I landed a few other actual jobs around the world.

1. Barrista and sandwich maker at a café in Melbourne
2. TV producer and reporter in Chile
3. Private business English tutor in Istanbul
4. Media proofreader in Istanbul
5. Actress in American Feature film in Istanbul
6. Research Assistant at the University of Cologne helping conduct an International survey on Airline/Airport Relationships
7. Writer and proofreader at publishing company in Berlin
8. Publicist for English Immersion company in Madrid
9. Extra in Hollywood
10. Pet Sitter around the world (Istanbul, LA, Chicago)

But many have asked me how did I find all these jobs? Did I look before I went on my trip?  The simple answer is no.  I simply arrived in a new place with the random idea that I could maybe find work there. In Australia, I spoke the language (sort of), so it seemed like a natural place to find a job other than teaching English. In Turkey, it’s all about connections and once I met one person…the ball just started rolling.  Besides that, I used persistence, word-of-mouth, and friends’ connections and a lot of smiles.

So, on this adventure, I worked all over and found it to be another great way to “go local.”  I lived in one place for an extended amount of time. I had a place to live. I took public transport (or a bicycle in Melbourne) to work. I had a schedule. I had a paycheck (well, cash). I truly felt like part of the fabric of society. And I actually gained some new skills, but most importantly I made real friends.

To hear more about my working around the world, listen to this podcast interview I did for Chris Christensen at the Amateur Traveler.

Amateur Traveler Episode 194 – Work and Travel Around the World

It’s an interesting time in America and the rest of the world. Being abroad during this election season, is giving me a different perspective. Your first thought may be I’m missing something. But the US elections are huge news everywhere and just as important to the rest of the world as they are to us. Thankfully though I’m not inundated by media and lip-flapping pundits here-perhaps because most of it is French so I just can’t understand it anyway, nor do I normally have a TV.

Absentee Ballot

While in Berlin, I went to www.votefromaborad.org and was able to print out my absentee ballot application and a ‘write-in ballot’ and mail it in. The process was mostly painless, except that once I mailed that and they received it a couple weeks later, I then actually had to fill out a second more ‘official ballot’ that they emailed to me and then I could fax that from France to the NJ elections office (oh yeah, I’m voting in NJ where my current permanent address is at dad’s and NJ is inching a bit closer to becoming a swing state) and then had to mail them the hard copy. Thankfully there are no chads on my ballot–hanging, dimpled, or otherwise. So the process is either really accurate and careful OR I just voted three times.

One day I was hanging out at a café in Berlin called St. Oberhotz where a large number of laptopers and expats seem to hang out downing coffees and sucking in the free wifi all day. There was a guy sitting at a hightop table near the door with a small sign affixed to a clipboard that read: US Voters – Help. This expat American voluntary sat here once a week and helped overseas Americans register to vote and find the necessary links to be able to fill out their absentee ballot. I told him I had already sent my ballot in, but he continued to look up the name and phone number for me of the woman I should call at the NJ elections office to confirm she’d received my ballot.

Then a few weeks later I found myself in Paris joining a fellow expat New Yorker I’d met through Couchsurfing, at a ‘Democrats Abroad’ debate party. Since most of Europe is 7 hours ahead of New York, it’s hard to watch the debates here unless you want to tune into the BBC or CNN International at 4am. So the following night they scheduled an event for the many expats living in Paris who wanted to watch the Obama/McCain town hall faceoff. It was held in a lovely cinema-style screening room in Paris’ Cine-Aqua, a sort of Aquarium.

Proud to be American

I am more proud than ever to be voting in this election. During my travels over the last two years, I’ve gone from criticizing my own country, to defending it, and back again. It’s hard to be the one “American” in the room trying to explain all the aspects of being American-many of which I have come to appreciate more while away-but something else I just can’t do. I am American, but I am certainly not a spokesperson for all Americans or the United States government.
I am proud of where I come from and very lucky in many ways. But I think this is something hard to even appreciate when it’s all you know. It’s actually the foreigners that sometimes make me more aware of how fortunate I am to be free and have so many opportunities in my grasp. That being said, since I have never really lived in another country, how can I say the US is the best one? How do I know that growing up in France or Sweden wouldn’t provide the same opportunities or perhaps even more? I can’t say this. Who can – unless they’ve actually done it. Unfortunately, in today’s world, being an “American” has become complex and comes with many stereotypes and stigmas. I want to be proud to be an American because, of course, I love my country. But this does not have to mean I love everything.

Just please vote.

Berlin is a city on the move. It is one of those rare places that grabs you, takes hold, and never lets you go. You can’t help but love a city that looks back and acknowledges its (undisputedly awful) past with great reflection, no more denial, and respect for the tragic events that either took place or were rooted here. And at the same time Berliners are not just looking toward the future, but sprinting toward it with progressive thought, bold ideas, and striking architecture.

City of Neighborhoods

I tend to like cities that are big and thriving, but made up of smaller, friendlier neighborhoods where one can build a life and a community. Berlin has this. For a more local, neighborhood-feel you can stay in the hip, leafy ‘hoods of Prenzlauer Berg or Kreuzberg (pronounced kroitz-berg).  P’berg is situated in the heart of what was East Berlin. This area had become rundown and filled with squatters after the fall of the wall. Yesterday’s bohemian, alternative-artist types have morphed into today’s hipster pierced parents pushing prams around the quaint, refurbished blocks past innumerable cafes and independent boutiques. During an afternoon stroll around Kollwitzplatz, you can stop in for a latte and a quiche slice at the Anna Blume Café and enjoy sidewalk seating under the awning while watching the young urbanites walk on by. For a younger vibe, head just a few blocks over to Kastanienallee (say that three times fast) where actors, artists, and expats are often found at many of the cafes and bars.

Afterwards you can head north a few blocks to the Kulturbrauerei -a former beer brewery turned ‘culture brewery’ with a lively mixed use space of galleries, restaurants, and cinemas.  Also here you will find Berlin on Bike. They do a comprehensive and down to earth four-hour city tour – very worth the 17 Euro cost. Seeing the flat city on two wheels is a great way to get an overview of this sprawling town and much less ‘insulated’ than one of the many double-decker bus tours around. Besides watching out for cars, you will notice how bike-friendly Berlin is by all your fellow cyclists whizzing about. From your bike saddle, you will see the tourist musts:

• Alexanderplatz and the Fernsehturm (TV Tower)
• Hackescher Markt
• Berlin Dom and Museum Island
• Unter den Linden
• Potsdamer Platz and huge modern Sony Center complex
• Checkpoint Charlie
• The Berlin Wall
• The Reichstag and other modern government office buildings
• Brandenburg Gate
• The Holocaust Memorial
• The Tiergarten – Berlin’s huge, ‘Central Park’

Back in Prenzlauer Berg there are several choices for lodging. For something a bit more affordable I checked into the EastSeven Hostel – one of the nicest hostels I’ve ever stayed in. It’s a squeaky clean place with singles, doubles and dorms. There is a great backyard with tables and even a grill and a lounge and kitchen to use at your disposal.

The more arty bunch of today have left Prenzlauer Berg behind and are pushing the limits in Friedrichshain – around the grungy-turned-trendy Boxhagener Platzand in Kreuzberg – dining on tapas or Indian food on Bergmanstrasse or hanging out at the bars lining the Landwehrkanal (canal) during the balmy summer months until the wee hours.

If I lived here I would pick one of these neighborhoods to live in. And living here seems pretty easy – you can find a small one bedroom apartment for under 500 Euros. No wonder so many people are moving here Quentin Tarantino has flat here, Brad Pitt bought a place here (both are in town filming Quentin’s latest flick currently titled “Inglorious Bastards“, Even 80’s pop star Joe Jackson moved here. Now that says something. I think.  Berlin is one of the cheapest and coolest cities in Europe to live in…something I just might do.

The first time I traveled around the world, I really wasn’t running away from anything. It was more like I was running toward something – a dream; doing something I had always wanted to do, but just never could. But then a small window opened and I slipped out into the world and never looked back.

That was two years ago now. Starting October 2006, I left the comforts of my well-appointed home in Chicago and traveled, literally, around the world – staying with friends, meeting strangers who became friends, and having the time of my life. Fifteen months later, I returned to the US. For eight months I bopped between coasts from New York City to Chicago to Los Angeles and back to New York again. And now I actually think I am running away – away from having to ‘root’ myself in an ordinary life; away from having to make a decision about where to live; away from having to work full time again; away from having to pay actual bills and away from the reality of the fact that eventually I will have to give up this vagabond lifestyle and someday buy a bed of my own again.   Or maybe I figure I should just keep traveling until I just can’t stand it anymore. But I think that is highly unlikely.

I am sitting in seat 21D on a Swiss Air flight headed to Europe.  This time around it didn’t seem as monumental leaving the US and all; sort of anti-climatic actually.  No goodbye parties. No big farewells. No major life changes.  I just hopped the subway to JFK in New York City and blew a kiss goodbye to one of my favorite cities.

And soon I will be in Berlin, perhaps my favorite city from my last trip. I am returning for several meetings/interviews for some possible freelance opportunities. Then I will be heading to France and Italy for a few months. I’ve been to these popular destinations a few times before, but not on my last trip. Paris was the first city I had ever set foot in in Europe more than 10 years ago and it had me at ‘bon jour.’ And Italy, oh Italia, I’ve been three times and am anxious to return to see if I still love it like I did every time I was there in the past.

Then I’m not sure where my wanderings will take me. As any traveler knows, my list has not gotten any shorter. In fact the more you travel, the longer it gets. This trip is currently looking something like this:

• Berlin
• France (Paris, Normandy, Lyon, Swiss Border towns, Provence, Bordeaux ?)
• Italy (some of these: Turino, Verona, Assisi, Gubio, Orevieto, Bologna, Perugia, Arezzo, Lucca, Roma, Sicily)
• Malta
• Cyprus ?
• Egypt
• Israel
• Jordan
• Istanbul
• St. Petersburg
• The Baltics (Latvia, Lithuania)
• Denmark
• and eventually back to Berlin and Paris again.

As always, if you know anyone - friend, family, animal, mineral – in any of these locales, please let me know. I would really appreciate it. I love to meet new people and have new friends when I get to a new town.

Unlike the last trip, this time I do have a return ticket. For two reasons: one, I’m taking advantage of all my racked up frequent flyer miles and flying for free to and from Europe therefore needing to book an actual roundtrip ticket and, two, I have a ‘save the date’ in New Jersey in the Spring.  I will return home for my father’s wedding. After thirty odd years of bachelorhood, dear old dad is tying the knot and my tiny family is getting just a bit bigger. Mazel Tov!

I only spent a few days in Amsterdam, a bicycle-crazy (Holland’s 16 million people own 16 million bikes), live and let live place where all things in moderation are legal, first with my friend Mark and then with some friends I’d met in Turkey.

Then I returned to Germany to spend a week in Cologne with my friends Claudia and Sascha. Thanks to Sascha, I ended up working in the Economics Department at the University of Cologne for a few days helping on an international research study surveying the relationship between airlines and their hub airports. It was a lot of phone calling, but fun considering I’d been to many of the places I was calling. The hardest part wasn’t convincing the people to be a part of the study, but just to get someone, anyone to answer the phone—in some small places like Cyprus no one would ever answer the phone at all–I’m sure the weather was just too nice to be indoors. In the US, someone would always answer, but it was some android automated person–‘Roberta robot’ and she always made it difficult for me to get transferred to an actual human.

One night Claudia took me to a party at a friend of hers. It was fun, once again, to not be a tourist and hang out with locals at a regular house party. Here I met a very good-looking Eastern European guy (who will remain anonymous) who I naturally flirted with, but he literally spoke three words of English and my ‘insert Eastern European language here’ is non-existent. So what do you in a case like this? Use the language of love, of course. We emailed a bit afterwards and I found his English translations not only hilarious, but oddly profound as well. Enjoy.

>—–Original Message—–
>Sent: Monday, October 08, 2007 9:19 PM
>To: Lisa Lubin
>Subject: Re: Guten Abend
hi like goes you it? You know who writes. thank you.

>——– Оригинално писмо ——–
>От: “Lisa Lubin” <llworldtour@yahoo.com>
>Относно: RE: Guten Abend
>Изпратено на: Сряда, 2007, Октомври 9 00:38:23 EEST
Hi!
How are you? (Wie Gehts???)
At first I thought this email was spam!!
I’m here in Cologne still. I’m staying near the University and start working there tomorrow. I am flying to Spain on Friday. I hope you can understand this email!
Lisa
Bis später!!

>—–Original Message—–
>Sent: Tuesday, October 09, 2007 9:19 AM
>To: Lisa Lubin
>Subject: Re: Guten Abend
>Hi Lisa, I let this translated over a machine, and I don’t know whether this
>got along something I wrote. I wish you much fun in Spain. Much fun with
>her/it works. Pay attention well to you.Greeting.

>——– Оригинално писмо ——–
>От: “Lisa Lubin” <llworldtour@yahoo.com>
>Относно: RE: Guten Abend
>Изпратено на: Сряда, 2007, Октомври 10 00:38:23 EEST
>———————————-
>Hi!! Funny translation!
>Too bad we can’t meet up for a beer or something…
>I’m around til Friday! I can teach you English!!!
>Lisa

> >Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 10:23 PM
> >To: Lisa Lubin
> >Subject: Re: RE: Guten Abend >
hi Lisa.As it go yourself it.I am kapput.today, was one exhausting
day.When you fly exactly on the Friday.I would undertake something gladly with you.
we will be able to get along badly, but you can teach me;)

>От: “Lisa Lubin” <llworldtour@yahoo.com>
> >Относно: RE: RE: Guten Abend
> >Изпратено на: Сряда, 2007, Октомври 10 23:52:04 EEST
> >———————————-
> >You are funny! You are Kapput! Me too–I worked at University Cologne today and have to tomorrow at 7am.
> >My flight on Friday is at 12:30pm. Tomorrow afternoon I am free…where are you? I will be walking around Koln.
> >Take care and keep smiling!
> >LL

>—–Original Message—–
>Sent: Thursday, October 11, 2007 12:21 AM
>To: Lisa Lubin
>Subject: Re: RE: RE: Guten Abend
Hi Lisa, you bring me to the laughter. I don’t know whether I will be nachmitag in Cologne tomorrow. Until 17 o’clock, I becomes befriend something for mine must take care of and then, I must give child-training afterward I have in the time of. Why you don’t give me your correct enamel-address:, like said I would meet you gladly I, however, doesn’t know whether I in the time of has.Hopefully you now and then write if we don’t find ourselves.Greeting

>——– Оригинално писмо ——–
>От: “Lisa Lubin” <llworldtour@yahoo.com>
>Относно: Guten Nacht
>Изпратено на: Четвъртък, 2007, Октомври 11 01:28:45 EEST
>———————————-
Your English is improving with every email!! I don’t have a phone or I’d give you the number…
PLUS what would we say since we don’t speak each other’s language.I think if we met…we may not be able to talk much!! The best way to reach me is email…or on skype.
>Guten Nacht.
>Xx,
>LL

—–Original Message—–
Sent: Thursday, October 11, 2007 12:55 AM
To: Lisa Lubin
Subject: Re: Guten Nacht
hmmm Madam, you are a funny medchen, the best we first-once write how you say since we cannot understand each other. I cannot forget your eyes.One finds oneself. Pay attention well to you and don’t forget to write. Send me the photos.
Later, if I can English, I tell you some matters:

—–Original Message—–
Sent: Thursday, October 11, 2007 7:55 AM
To: Lisa Lubin
Subject: Re: Guten Nacht
hi Lisa, as it goes you. If nothing can say to it. I don’t want to destroy your plans. You are a fascinating woman and very sexy.I hope that no one will read these enamels. Flige to Spain has your fun and if then improves itself my English we can ourselves in rests entertained. Until then, we write ourselves enamels and it will be much more more interesting if we find ourselves someday. Sleep well and pas well on you on.Good travels and much jokes with dei
—————————————————————–
Крайна цел – Да оцелееш!

So my little readers…it has been exactly one year since I embarked on this marvelous journey. I truly can not believe how fast it has gone. You may have noticed I am still gone…which means I am extending the one year plan to one year plus…more. I am still not sure when I will return. But I am in Spain now and am nearing the Atlantic Ocean which marks my circumnavigation of the globe (yep me…and Chris Columbus). I am not exactly sure what I will do when I look out across the sea towards America. Perhaps I will feel it is ready to come home…or perhaps I will wave, turn around and keep on traveling. I am trying to live for each day and not worry too much about this for now. But the ‘nearness’ to some kind of end has inevitably started to preoccupy my thoughts. Of course, with the passing of one year…I felt it necessary to take stock and make some all important lists.

As I travel, many are often asking me about the money I’ve spent traveling around the world for one year. As I’ve said before, it is much less than what most think. Staying in budget hotels, pensions, or hostels, and eating at tasty local, yet cheap, establishments makes a trip like this incredibly affordable. And, after one year, I’ve spent less than I had actually budgeted for.

So here’s a list of the money I’ve spent:

Moolah:

• USD
• Costa Rican Colonnes
• Ecuadorian US Dollars (yes, their official currency is the greenback)
• Chilean Peso
• Argentinean Peso
• New Zealand $
• Australian $
• Hong Kong $
• Vietnamese Dong (16,000 Dong=$1)
• Cambodia Riel
• Thai Bhat
• Singapore $
• Dubai Dirham
• Turkish Lira
• Romanian Lei
• Hungarian Forint
• Slovak Crown
• Czech Crown
• Polish Zloty
• Euro

A big theme to my trip is of course being ‘on the move.’ And besides walking, many things have ‘moved’ me over the course of a year. I am excited about all the ways I have managed to get myself around the planet.

Types of Transport

• Plane (100+ hours flying time on 26 different flights)
• Train (inside, and on top of)
• Bus
• Boat/Ferry
• Car (usually as a passenger–I’ve only driven twice now on my entire trip—once in Melbourne in a rental car challenging my ‘wrong side of the road’ driving skills, and once in Bistrita, Romania—getting to speed down the dusty village roads in my friend’s prize BMW.)
• SUV (used in the real sense)
• Tram
• Camel
• Snow Board (on sand)
• Bicycle
• Motorbike
• Tuk Tuk
• Cyclo
• Funicular (Quito, Istanbul, Zakapone)
• Subway/Metro
• Zipline

Other Odd Statistics:

• Glaciers: 4 (Cotopaxi, Pio XI, Grey Glacier, Perito Moreno)
• Volcanoes: 5 (Irazu, Arenal, Cotopaxi, Osorno, Galapagos)
• Caves: 6 Galapagos, Milodin–Chile, Halong Bay, Cu Chi Tunnels, Tinaztepe—Turkey, Wieliczka—Poland)

Things I’ve had to replace:

• Sunglasses—3x
• Umbrella—2x
• Hair Clips—2x
• Sandals—1x
• Jeans—1x
• Suitcase Wheels—1x
• Ipod—1x
• Toothbrush—1x
• Toe Ring—1x

Odd Foods I’ve Consumed (usually in very small quantities):

• Vegemite
• Kangaroo
• Cow penis
• Chicken intestine
• Chicken feet
• Chicken head (okay, I didn’t eat the whole thing—just a little nibble on the neck)
• Goat
• Orejas (pig ears…say what?)

And now…it’s time for some shameless self-promotion!! As this website racks up hits (nearly 40,000 to date), the phenomenon that is “LLWorldTour” has gotten some mentions in various spots all over the web and beyond.

Over the last few months I have been fortunate to be featured in the Chicago Daily Herald, The New Jersey Daily Record, and was recently named ‘the lost girl of the week’ on the popular travel site: The Lost Girls.

Check it out:

· The New Jersey Daily Record

· Chicago Daily Herald

· The Lost Girls

· GO Nomad Q&A with LL

· Jaunted–The Pop Culture Travel Guide

· Vacation Apprentice

· Navimag Ferry Website

Roaring down the autobahn at 200 kilometers per hour (125 mph) was only the beginning of my love affair with Germany. I met my good friend Mark in Berlin and loved it instantly. Berlin is a progressive, innovative, cultured European capital. Every thing in this metropolis is thought out and well-designed. And, of course, beer is plentiful and cheap.

Considering how much of it was destroyed in WWII, and following that, how it became an ‘island’ in a sea of communist East Germany and thus split in two for nearly thirty years by a big concrete wall, I guess they had a fairly clean slate to work with. Kind of like after the Chicago Fire of 1871, world famous architects (Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, Gehry, Libeskind, Jahn) descended on Germany in the last couple decades…especially after the iron curtain fell and the wall literally came down. The 100-mile “Anti-Fascist Protective Rampart,” as it was called by the East German government, was erected almost overnight in 1961 to stop the outward flow of people into West Berlin which had been divided into French, British, and American Sectors like the rest of West Germany (3 million poured out between 1949 and 1961). The Wall was 13-feet high, had a 16-foot tank ditch, a no-man’s-land that was 30 to 160 feet wide, and 300 watch towers. During its 28 years standing there were 1,693 cases when border guards fired, 3,221 arrests, and 5,043 documented successful escapes (565 of these were East German guards). In its progressive way of looking ahead but acknowledging the past, Berlin has laid down a double line of bricks all around the city marking the former site of the wall. Berlin has now taken the opportunity to reinvent itself and has done so in an amazing way.

Forget Singapore—Germany is an uber clean place with one notable exception—dog shit is everywhere. Not sure how or why the innovative and law enforcing Germans have not been able step up to the plate on this one and force their citizenry of dog owners to bag their pooch’s poop like we do in cities in the US.

There was a ton to see in Berlin, a city constantly changing with crane’s silhouettes in the sky as proof, from the reproduction of Checkpoint Charlie to the many green spaces and bike lanes to the haunting Holocaust Memorial and the oft-photographed Brandenburg Gate and so much in-between. I won’t bore you with all the details. Suffice it to say I would live in this city in a heartbeat. If I had to pick, I had two favorite and opposing neighborhoods. The first is Prenzlauer Berg in what once was bleak East Germany. It is now a cute leafy ‘neighborhoody’ village-like place full of young couples, an inordinate amount of strollers, and cute little boutiques and cafes. My other favorite place is the architecturally stunning skyscraper ‘times square’ sector known as Potsdamer Platz. It is dominated by the new and jaw-dropping Sony Center designed by German-born and Chicago’s own Helmut Jahn. This is the same man that did the controversial space-ship-like James Thompson Center in Chicago and the huge new Bangkok Airport. Like his other creations, the Sony Center is steel and glass everywhere you look done in a sleek sexy style that makes it hard not to stare upwards in awe. The striking glass atrium is topped by a cirque du soleil-like tent cover that hangs over an entertaining mix of several restaurants, shops, and cinemas.

And rounding out the whole ‘Ich Liebe Berlin’ (I love Berlin) experience was our hostel. Joining the list of some of my favorite sleeps on my trip had to be the brand spankin’ new Sleep-Inn. Run smoothly by a young Berlin couple, Yvonne and Ralph, it was spotless with fluffy new comforters and towels. Plus each room had all these fun whimsical touches like bright splashes of color here and there, murals on the walls and your own cuddly gnome in each room. You don’t know how much brand new pillows, sheets, and towels mean to this world traveler after sleeping on 87½ different beds, trains, chairs, floors, and couches throughout the year…where, hundreds or perhaps thousands, of other icky travelers had laid their own greasy heads. I liked it so much I went as far as offering to work there—something I hope to still pursue except for that pesky law forbidding non-EU citizens from working without a work permit. If I can only get them to treat this law as they do with their dog poop…I’ll be all set.

It was just another travel day for me on this big adventure. And like all ‘travel days’ (this is not what I call every day—just the days I go from one place to the next), I feel a bit of melancholy. On these days, not only does it mean schlepping my 20 kilogram (roughly 40 pounds) pack onto a bus to a train and/or onto a plane, it means leaving behind a new language I was getting comfortable with, leaving behind a new home I was settling into, and most of all leaving behind new friends I made and connected with.

I had returned to Romania for two weeks to a town where, when the shops run out of change, they just give you whatever they have lying around instead. ‘We owe you ten cents…here have this stale old candy instead.’ ‘Your change is thirty-three cents, but we’ve run out of coins, so you can have a couple squares of gum.’ At the drugstore, I bought some hair products and instead of change they gave me one black elastic hair band. Wow, thanks. This is quite a system…one that locals are pretty sick of. I think after a week you could go back into one of these stores, plunk down a fistful of gum and buy whatever you want and they shouldn’t complain.

After two weeks of relaxing and enjoying their company, I left Mona and Florin’s cozy apartment home in Northern Romania at three o’clock in the morning (oh joy) after a not-so-relaxing two hours of sleep. We arrived at the tiny, inconspicuous Transylvania Airport about two hours later. Through teary eyes we said our goodbyes (“Pa” and “La Revedere”) and I hugged Mona like a true old friend. I haven’t felt this sad painful tug of a farewell since I said goodbye to a man I had dated in the east.

I flew back to Budapest where I had been just a few weeks ago, accumulated more happy Hungarian stamps in my passport, bristled at the now familiar and yet so foreign sound of Hungarian—probably the one language I just outright decided not to deal with, and waited, and waited…about six hours for my Easy Jet flight to Germany.

I waited so long in the main part of the airport that I nearly missed my flight, being ignorant of how long the security check lines had become. I guess arriving bleary-eyed at 6am to a just waking airport had me in some kind of bubble that no crowds would form. I let out a few impatient breaths in the security line as the moms in front of me chose the last possible moment to collapse their baby strollers and take off their jackets (this can be quite frustrating—we wait on line for 30 minutes with all the time in the world to get yourself ‘defrocked’ and ready for that moment when you must drop your crap on the belt and walk through the metal detector). And one of the moms even handed her kid to the security man to hold as she organized herself. Oh, it was so cute and everyone got a nice little chuckle…but not when your plane is leaving in five minutes—let’s go lady!

I boarded the crowded, seat yourself budget flight and grabbed one of the last remaining aisle seats. Then it hit me. I was with a bunch of white, large, loud, and fun-loving Germans. No more mysterious Asian villages. No more exotic Muslim temples. And no more Eastern European backwardness or lingering Communist vibes. Hello Capitalism. Hello wide perfectly paved roads. Hello big cars and big people. Hello Ikea.

I was back in Western territory and not sure I liked it. Everything was clean. Everything was efficient. Everything was running smoothly. Wait—I’m a Virgo—of course I liked it. But perhaps, for the first time in my life, I missed the clutter; I missed the chaos; I missed the ‘Turkish/Romanian/Thai’ way of doing things.

But deep down I knew what I felt was just that old sadness of ‘transitions’ again. I knew in a day or two I would love it. I told myself: It’s a travel day. It’s a transition day. It’s a hurry-up-and-wait day. Just soak it all in and let in happen. So, now I must hop on the bus from the airport to the train station, to the bar where my good friend Claudia will pick me up in about four hours. It was almost exactly one year ago, she came with me to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport with red wine and snacks at three o’clock in the morning to bid me farewell on my journey around the world. We laughed and cried and I felt such an odd uncertainty of what lay ahead of me. There is no way to express the feeling of time flying—it’s unforgiving, never ending, and always seems to be going full speed ahead. And since I left my home one year ago, she has moved back to her homeland of Germany and now I was coming home to her.