Another fairly long hiatus in my young blogging career has been occupied by some continued adventures of personally epic proportions...
With the Fall term coming to a close in Sevilla a few days before Christmas, I was fortunate enough to spend the holidays with my amazing relatives in London. As I've been keen to travel around the UK more and tour the many attractions that can be found outside London, I was thrilled when we spent a few days after Christmas in Cornwall, a region in southwest England home to some beautiful scenery that depicts the richness of English history, a subject that I find fascinating. I was later able to spend New Years with my cousin in Brighton, a vibrant college town and travel destination on the southern English coast that I found similar to San Francisco in many ways, notably the landscape and lifestyle.
Maybe the biggest benefit of having a base in London, next to exploring one of the globe's great cities and being spoiled by family, is having the world's largest airport system at your disposal and being able to find competitive prices across 6 international airports in order to travel to exciting destinations that are far tougher to reach from many other places, like Florida and Sevilla. Aware of my advantage as always, I knew I wanted to make a January trip to somewhere new on the cheap and Berlin emerged as my choice.
Just 22 years removed from German reunification, Berlin has arisen from an infamous 20th Century, that notably made it a center of Hitler's Nazi Germany and Cold War affairs, and has lately caught the world's interest as a major travel destination, so I was excited to have 6 days to get to know this buzzing New Berlin while examining the notorious scenes of years past.
While wandering around the city, I found it most fascinating and unique to experience the mixed atmosphere Berlin exudes stemming from Soviet control in the former Eastern half (where my hostel was) with American, British, and French occupation of the former Western half and how fast it's currently developing for the future, with an immense amount of building projects present throughout the city. I kept thinking that I'd love to come back to Berlin a few years down the road with friends or family to see how it's progressing.
My time in the German capital was characterized by trekking around town Jason Bourne-style for a good 8-10 hours each day, meeting new friends at my hostel (as this was another solo trip), putting my one semester of learning German at UF to use, and trying to stay warm in the 20 degrees and snowing weather. When flights cost $40 roundtrip and accommodation $5/night it's tough to be mad at the weather or anything else and Berlin really impressed me and became one of my new favorite cities. I highly recommend all other no-income nomads and European travelers looking for a fun town with lots to see and do for cheap to make the trip to Berlin, perhaps in summer if you'd rather have a beer outside like myself.
With my Berlin exploits behind me, I returned to my Spanish host family in Sevilla (same family from Fall) almost 2 weeks ago and am now getting adjusted to the new Spring semester, playing tour guide to the new hordes of international students, happily being mistaken for Spanish at times (until one hears my accent), and am entering my 8th month in Europe.
While I undoubtedly miss my friends and family back home and wish they were here to share these experiences with me, I'm thrilled to have settled into my life overseas and even happier that I chose to study abroad for a full year. Having another semester here gives me more time to explore and learn about Sevilla, travel to other alluring Spanish cities that I knew little about before living here (like Santander, San Sebastian, and Santiago de Compostela), and enhance my personal ambitions of traveling, working, and living abroad in the future.
Besides, theres no time for homesickness when I ONLY have 4 months left here....and when your biggest stresses in life are deciding where to go out and what new place to travel to on your 4 day weekends, you better hold onto and enjoy that lifestyle!
As always, I've uploaded the obnoxious amount of pictures I've taken to Facebook in order to fully illustrate my travels from December and January and to capture small parts of what these amazing places have to offer!
Good luck to everyone in the start of 2013 and Go Gators!!!
With the Fall term coming to a close in Sevilla a few days before Christmas, I was fortunate enough to spend the holidays with my amazing relatives in London. As I've been keen to travel around the UK more and tour the many attractions that can be found outside London, I was thrilled when we spent a few days after Christmas in Cornwall, a region in southwest England home to some beautiful scenery that depicts the richness of English history, a subject that I find fascinating. I was later able to spend New Years with my cousin in Brighton, a vibrant college town and travel destination on the southern English coast that I found similar to San Francisco in many ways, notably the landscape and lifestyle.
Maybe the biggest benefit of having a base in London, next to exploring one of the globe's great cities and being spoiled by family, is having the world's largest airport system at your disposal and being able to find competitive prices across 6 international airports in order to travel to exciting destinations that are far tougher to reach from many other places, like Florida and Sevilla. Aware of my advantage as always, I knew I wanted to make a January trip to somewhere new on the cheap and Berlin emerged as my choice.
Just 22 years removed from German reunification, Berlin has arisen from an infamous 20th Century, that notably made it a center of Hitler's Nazi Germany and Cold War affairs, and has lately caught the world's interest as a major travel destination, so I was excited to have 6 days to get to know this buzzing New Berlin while examining the notorious scenes of years past.
While wandering around the city, I found it most fascinating and unique to experience the mixed atmosphere Berlin exudes stemming from Soviet control in the former Eastern half (where my hostel was) with American, British, and French occupation of the former Western half and how fast it's currently developing for the future, with an immense amount of building projects present throughout the city. I kept thinking that I'd love to come back to Berlin a few years down the road with friends or family to see how it's progressing.
My time in the German capital was characterized by trekking around town Jason Bourne-style for a good 8-10 hours each day, meeting new friends at my hostel (as this was another solo trip), putting my one semester of learning German at UF to use, and trying to stay warm in the 20 degrees and snowing weather. When flights cost $40 roundtrip and accommodation $5/night it's tough to be mad at the weather or anything else and Berlin really impressed me and became one of my new favorite cities. I highly recommend all other no-income nomads and European travelers looking for a fun town with lots to see and do for cheap to make the trip to Berlin, perhaps in summer if you'd rather have a beer outside like myself.
With my Berlin exploits behind me, I returned to my Spanish host family in Sevilla (same family from Fall) almost 2 weeks ago and am now getting adjusted to the new Spring semester, playing tour guide to the new hordes of international students, happily being mistaken for Spanish at times (until one hears my accent), and am entering my 8th month in Europe.
While I undoubtedly miss my friends and family back home and wish they were here to share these experiences with me, I'm thrilled to have settled into my life overseas and even happier that I chose to study abroad for a full year. Having another semester here gives me more time to explore and learn about Sevilla, travel to other alluring Spanish cities that I knew little about before living here (like Santander, San Sebastian, and Santiago de Compostela), and enhance my personal ambitions of traveling, working, and living abroad in the future.
Besides, theres no time for homesickness when I ONLY have 4 months left here....and when your biggest stresses in life are deciding where to go out and what new place to travel to on your 4 day weekends, you better hold onto and enjoy that lifestyle!
As always, I've uploaded the obnoxious amount of pictures I've taken to Facebook in order to fully illustrate my travels from December and January and to capture small parts of what these amazing places have to offer!
Good luck to everyone in the start of 2013 and Go Gators!!!
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