After waking up at the crack of dawn, which if you know me, is one of the worst things in the world considering I'm NOT a morning person, meaning I will probably kill you if you're the first person I see -- we left Germany and headed to Zurich, Switzerland, the most expensive city in the worrlllldddd.
On our way there, we stopped at THE MOST adorable island in on the border of Germany and Austria, called Lindeau. If you've never seen perfection, then ladies and gentlemen prepare to be amazed.
On our way there, we stopped at THE MOST adorable island in on the border of Germany and Austria, called Lindeau. If you've never seen perfection, then ladies and gentlemen prepare to be amazed.
Perfect, flawless, gorgeous, mind blowing...and whatever adjective you care to throw out there. Right?
We had about four hours to do whatever our hearts desired before meeting up to finish our journey to Switzerland. So we went on an exploration! First, we ventured up to the top of the light-house.
a Virginia Woolf quote popped into my head, and it was absolutely perfect. Before leaving for my trip, I may or may not have hit a few rough spots in all different aspects of my life including a crisis of being young while I'm young but still wanting to grow up, a little heart-break warfare as John Mayer would call it, a crazy awakening at how blessed I am to call my bestfriend MY BESTFRIEND (love you Karmina) and how she's got my back like a sweater, the fact that I would be so lost without my family, and the re-realization that Christ is so much bigger than my "problems". So many emotions, right? Haha what can I say? I'm a girl.
But anyways, this quote said this:
“For now she need not think of anybody. She could be herself, by herself. And that was what now she often felt the need of - to think; well not even to think. To be silent; to be alone. All the being and the doing, expansive, glittering, vocal, evaporated; and one shrunk, with a sense of solemnity, to being oneself, a wedge-shaped core of darkness, something invisible to others... and this self having shed its attachments was free for the strangest adventures.”Just sit on that for a moment if you will. I know for a fact I'm not the only crazy human being our there who deals with a bunch of random emotions all the time and you never know what to say or do or how to even deal -- do you kind of just ignore it. Until it starts grieving your heart. (Now is the time to turn on Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield and put it on repeat until you finish reading this blog)
Well folks, I'm here to tell you that traveling (among other things), kind of fixes that for me. Whatever your safe haven may be, find it, and keep it close. Remember that YOU are the only one who can regret things in your life and YOU are the only one who feels what you feel and YOU hold the joy in your life that was given to you by Christ (which joy is not an emotion, happiness is) and YOU need to stop letting the world take away your joy, because it didn't give it to you!! Christ did!! Find your safe heaven, feel free! Be joyful and REJOICE in all things, even if that means blocking the world out and saying, "Screw you social media, phone, iMessage and everything else" and just being by yourself . I promise, it's soothing. BUT ANYHOW.
We continued to explore and I made this really cool friend who had no head and was reading a newspaper. Wait, what? Haha yeah, you heard me. And you're about to see it.
My friends and I then enjoyed delicious Panini's, WAFFLES for dessert (which really made me miss my dad's breakfast) and some wine before heading back to our bus.
We had about four hours to do whatever our hearts desired before meeting up to finish our journey to Switzerland. So we went on an exploration! First, we ventured up to the top of the light-house.
a Virginia Woolf quote popped into my head, and it was absolutely perfect. Before leaving for my trip, I may or may not have hit a few rough spots in all different aspects of my life including a crisis of being young while I'm young but still wanting to grow up, a little heart-break warfare as John Mayer would call it, a crazy awakening at how blessed I am to call my bestfriend MY BESTFRIEND (love you Karmina) and how she's got my back like a sweater, the fact that I would be so lost without my family, and the re-realization that Christ is so much bigger than my "problems". So many emotions, right? Haha what can I say? I'm a girl.
But anyways, this quote said this:
“For now she need not think of anybody. She could be herself, by herself. And that was what now she often felt the need of - to think; well not even to think. To be silent; to be alone. All the being and the doing, expansive, glittering, vocal, evaporated; and one shrunk, with a sense of solemnity, to being oneself, a wedge-shaped core of darkness, something invisible to others... and this self having shed its attachments was free for the strangest adventures.”Just sit on that for a moment if you will. I know for a fact I'm not the only crazy human being our there who deals with a bunch of random emotions all the time and you never know what to say or do or how to even deal -- do you kind of just ignore it. Until it starts grieving your heart. (Now is the time to turn on Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield and put it on repeat until you finish reading this blog)
Well folks, I'm here to tell you that traveling (among other things), kind of fixes that for me. Whatever your safe haven may be, find it, and keep it close. Remember that YOU are the only one who can regret things in your life and YOU are the only one who feels what you feel and YOU hold the joy in your life that was given to you by Christ (which joy is not an emotion, happiness is) and YOU need to stop letting the world take away your joy, because it didn't give it to you!! Christ did!! Find your safe heaven, feel free! Be joyful and REJOICE in all things, even if that means blocking the world out and saying, "Screw you social media, phone, iMessage and everything else" and just being by yourself . I promise, it's soothing. BUT ANYHOW.
We continued to explore and I made this really cool friend who had no head and was reading a newspaper. Wait, what? Haha yeah, you heard me. And you're about to see it.
My friends and I then enjoyed delicious Panini's, WAFFLES for dessert (which really made me miss my dad's breakfast) and some wine before heading back to our bus.
We loaded up and headed out to our next destination. Which, just in case I forgot to tell you, was a cheese tasting in Switzerland. Yep cheese. Just FYI, I. Love. Cheese. So, so much,so this was perfect! We went to a cheese factory, where we got to see the entire process of cheese being made, and then prepared to age on a shelf.
If you just tried to count how many rolls of cheese there are, I'm laughing at you. Because I tried counting them in person, and was off by about ohhh a good 3000. Clearly, math isn't my strong spot.
Anyways, the cheese tasting was great and the view we had of the beautiful green hills was breath taking! The Sound of Music did not lie when they said that the hills were alive, despite the fact that that movie was in Austria, but that is besides the point. Haha you follow me?
Simply phenomenal. You should definitely add this to your bucket list.
So we made it to Zurich, Switzerland where the nine of us (students) after much debate, decided to have dinner together.
The funny story about our dinner, was that we knew there was a Spaghetti Factory somewhere around the square, but we all argued and decided that we would not eat pasta until we arrived in Italy. So, we walked around, for THE LONGEST time, while all of our stomachs sang the "I'm hungry, rawr rawr" song, until we finally decided on a place that looked pretty local that was MY LAST NAMEl. Haha, they key word though was "loca"l...
As we sat at the table, the grumpy old lady came to take our order, and started yelling at us in GERMAN. This woman, did not speak a lick of English, Spanish...French...Italian...or any other language I could understand. So we began to order. Wanna know what the ENTIRE table ordered? Spaghetti. Yep, spaghetti. Why? Because we couldn't read the menu. Then you have, yours truly, who decided to order some type of meat. Which, upon delivery, I saw that it was a pigs thigh...wrapped in tongue. I followed the "if it looks like chicken then it probably tastes like chicken" in order to help get me through the chewy taste of it.
After dinner, we walked the streets and the alleys just to get a feel for what Zurich was really like. It was enchanting, mysterious,quiet, yet homey. In other words, it was perfect.
Anyways, the cheese tasting was great and the view we had of the beautiful green hills was breath taking! The Sound of Music did not lie when they said that the hills were alive, despite the fact that that movie was in Austria, but that is besides the point. Haha you follow me?
Simply phenomenal. You should definitely add this to your bucket list.
So we made it to Zurich, Switzerland where the nine of us (students) after much debate, decided to have dinner together.
The funny story about our dinner, was that we knew there was a Spaghetti Factory somewhere around the square, but we all argued and decided that we would not eat pasta until we arrived in Italy. So, we walked around, for THE LONGEST time, while all of our stomachs sang the "I'm hungry, rawr rawr" song, until we finally decided on a place that looked pretty local that was MY LAST NAMEl. Haha, they key word though was "loca"l...
As we sat at the table, the grumpy old lady came to take our order, and started yelling at us in GERMAN. This woman, did not speak a lick of English, Spanish...French...Italian...or any other language I could understand. So we began to order. Wanna know what the ENTIRE table ordered? Spaghetti. Yep, spaghetti. Why? Because we couldn't read the menu. Then you have, yours truly, who decided to order some type of meat. Which, upon delivery, I saw that it was a pigs thigh...wrapped in tongue. I followed the "if it looks like chicken then it probably tastes like chicken" in order to help get me through the chewy taste of it.
After dinner, we walked the streets and the alleys just to get a feel for what Zurich was really like. It was enchanting, mysterious,quiet, yet homey. In other words, it was perfect.
If you've never taken a walk while you're on vacation to a place you don't know, try it next time. You don't know what wondrous place is waiting for you to find it and enjoy it. These are the kinds of things that make the hair on my arm stand up, and encourage me to be adventurous, daring, and to really reach inside of me and find that part of me that's ready to start a revolution. A revolution to be great, to make change in the world, to be fearless, take risks, laugh at every moment and love like you've never loved before. A revolution that's a promise to you, to never give up, and to always keep reaching higher and to never settle: because like Ghandi once said, "You must be the change you want to see in the world." Like my friend Lo used to tell me, "You can't ever let somebody tell you what to do or how to live your life. DO YOU, and live fiercely. And when life doesn't work out sometimes, you just gotta take the punches and roll with it."
And once you find that spark of revolution, it only grows inside of you, leading you to the greatest, most surreal, and strangest adventures you'll ever have.
Until next time,
Xoxo
Ana
And once you find that spark of revolution, it only grows inside of you, leading you to the greatest, most surreal, and strangest adventures you'll ever have.
Until next time,
Xoxo
Ana