Michelle's homecoming February 2013.

After a 9 month deployment, we welcome Michelle home! 

Christmas 2012

Christmas in Germany is pure magic on it’s own. Combine that with my brother arriving into Germany from Georgia on Christmas morning- and it is just perfect. For weeks, I have been planning and waiting for my brother to arrive and for Christmas. Like it does eventually every year, Christmas finally arrived. Christmas Eve Paul drove me to Frankfurt- about 3.5 hours from where we live- I can almost hear the collective “wow, nice job Paul” from my family reading this. We had a fun drive and arrived in to Weisbaden on Christmas eve so we wouldn’t have to make the 3.5 hour drive to pick Jeremy up from his 7:45AM arrival time flight Christmas morning.

All went smoothly and we picked Jeremy up at the airport and headed back to Graff. Jeremy slept the whole 3.5 hour drive as he got no sleep on the plane. We got back around 2 and I began preparing Christmas dinner. My good friend Britny and I planned Christmas dinner together for Jeremy, Paul, her husband Michael and I. We split up the cooking so neither of us had too much to handle. We made a Christmas dinner that would make any momma proud. It wasn’t a traditional Christmas, but for a Christmas away from family, it was more than perfect. We’ve made a little family of friends here and I am so thankful for that. Jeremy managed to stay awake for dinner and festivities and I enjoyed bringing him into my world here. 

My dad's here! My dad's here! My dad's here!

Through an amazing sequence of random circumstances, my dad was able to make a trip to Germany through an awesome organization called  The Foundation for Hospital Art.  He went a few places in Germany before making his way over to me at my home. We only got a few days with each other but we made the most of it! we got to paint with wounded warriors, go to a soccer game at the Allianz arena in Munich and do some sight seeing there! I loved sharing a bit of Europe with my dad and of course seeing him even for a few days after so long away was wonderful! 

Christmas markets!

Last weekend, December 1st-2nd, my friends and I had a double date christmas market weekend! Christmas markets are a huge deal here in Germany and last the whole month of December. They have stalls offering hand made ornaments and things like that, awesome food, and gluhwein- which is "mulled wine" or hot wine - and its fantastic, and helps keep you warm! we went to Nurnberg christmas market on Saturday the 1st. It is the biggest in Germany and the most famous in the world, so it had to be done, but it was not a favorite. It was lovely, but extremely over-crowded. We couldn't see any of the stalls or enjoy any of it because the whole market was essentially a mosh pit of asians and over weight tourists. It was a nice day and i'm glad I checked it off the list but I wouldn't go back. 

The next day, Sunday, we decided to go to Guteneck christmas market - which I have heard wonderful things about from friends here. It was about an hour away from where we live and the drive was beautiful with all the snow on the trees- its a winter wonderland over here! This christmas market is mideval themed and at the base of a castle. Many people were dressed in Mideval attire, and It was not crowded at all. It was the best day ever. I want to live there. As you will see in these photos- we had way too much fun. The boys rode camels!

Back to Budapest.

Budapest. I have been avoiding writing this because of the enormity of the topic. Budapest is the softest place in my heart. In the summers of 2006 and 2007 I spent weeks there teaching children's english camps and I was changed in every way. I met people who became a part of who I am, and learned who I am and who I want to be. Those two summers began the adventure I am continuing now. It is difficult to put into words what happened those summers, but I know I was deeply changed, I became something new. 

During my first trip to Budapest in 2006 I met a beautiful girl named Edina. We quickly became close friends and shared a few weeks of incredible healing and restoration that created a strong bond. Saying goodbye to her at the end was tearful and heartbreaking. The next summer was just as wonderful and even more difficult to say goodbye. 

In the years since, I have thought of Budapest, my time there, and Edina so very often. The memories are ingrained in my heart and I am who I am now because of these trips. When I was given the opportunity to live in Germany, the first thing I did after I immediately said yes was google maps how far to Budapest from Germany. It took me longer to get there than I expected, but I made it back. 

Over thanksgiving I took a train from Nurnberg-Budapest. The train ride was long but not too bad. I arrived into Budapest to Edina and her new husband Andras singing and playing the guitar for me, and my heart was home. Over the three days I got to spend there I became re-aquatinted with the city and spent some precious time with my sweet friend catching up on the past 6 years of our lives -including her marriage to Andras- who gets the thumbs up from me. I got to watch Edina and Andras lead worship at their baptist youth group church on the Saturday night before I returned "home" to Germany. The trip was refreshing and awakening for me, and there were no tearful goodbyes this time around because I will be back in Budapest in a month with my brother over Christmas! 

A few of the girls in the group with Edina- Budapest 2006 

Edina and I 2007 (top) then 2012 (bottom)

Andras!

Can't wait to be back in just a few weeks! 

"Alone"

Friend: what are you up to this weekend?
Me: oh, I’m just going to Cinque Terre, no big deal.
Friend: WOW! Awesome! Who are you going with?
Me: myself.
Friend: oh. Really? I’m sorry, well…. try to have fun anyway!

I have had this conversation what seems like hundreds of times with friends, family, and complete strangers. I don’t want to sound like I’m bashing the people that can’t understand that I love to travel alone. I didn’t understand it fully until very recently. Just two years ago if I wanted to go to the beach and none of my friends could go, I’d just stay home. Heck, if I wanted to go to target and none of my friends could go I would stay home. But something profound has happened since I moved 4,721 miles away from everyone I have ever known or loved.

The first few trips I took by myself I dreaded it a little bit. Not the actual trip but the going alone. It sounded so depressing and sad and I would even try to hide the fact that I was traveling alone because I thought it made me look like a loser. But the amount of satisfaction and pride I had in myself after my first weekend trip is indescribable. In my next few trips alone I began to realize that i enjoyed my time alone. I enjoyed being able to go where I wanted to go when I wanted to, and see what I wanted to see when I wanted to see it. I would find myself at dinner alone smiling to myself realizing that I’m legitimately having fun.

In my time alone, I fell in love with countless cities and myself. I have met incredible people whom I would never have met had I been traveling in a group. After a few trips with friends here, I even noted that while I do love having friends and family to travel with, I almost prefer going alone. It’s a completely different travel experience.

What I am trying to say here is don’t for a second feel bad for me. I don’t travel “alone”. I travel. I wander. I get lost in the beauty of cities, towns and landscapes with a huge smile on my face. I am never alone. I meet fellow wanderers and hear stories of far away places. I learn from them and they learn from me. Occasionally, we swap contact information and keep in touch, sometimes even see each other again. But sometimes, I spend the whole day with someone and at the end we hug and wish each other well, never to meet again.

Being from Atlanta, I have always had the tendency to avoid strangers at all costs, either for my safety, or just to avoid awkwardness. It is understandable, because in the states, strangers are scary. They have the possibility to either hurt you or at the very least just be very unkind, simply because you too are a stranger. So when I first began traveling in Europe and strangers would talk to me, my instinct was to avoid eye contact and be rude until they went away. Then at some point I realized that as a culture, people here don’t have any interest in hurting others. Their crime rates are ridiculously low. The most common crime is theft, and even then, it is never their intention to physically harm the person they are stealing from. When I realized all of this, my world opened in a big way.

Here, as travelers, we’re already in a club together. Our shared heart for adventure has brought us to beautiful places and to each other. Its as if we all have an agreement to greet other travelers with kindness, because we know each person we meet on the road has a story, and something to teach us.

So, please, don’t feel bad for me, or think I’m missing a thing. 

Adventure is out there.

"The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea."

Karen von Blixen-Finecke

I've had an itch to go to the beach since... well, since I got back from the beach a few months ago. I'm departing today to go to Cinque Terre, Italy and hike through the 5 villages. I am all packed and ready. I'm just waiting until it's time to go. As i was just sitting on my bedroom floor smiling at my packed traveler's backpack like a child on christmas morning waiting to rip open the first present, it occurred to me that this may be one of my favorite parts of travel. The few hours before it begins when I'm packed and ready to go. When I know where I'm going but I'm not sure what adventures await me. Anything could happen. This could be the most incredible trip of my life. I could meet new friends, share stories from the road, bond over a shared intoxication with new places and things, have all the pasta, tiramisu, and wine i want and still lose weight.  Or I could fall off a cliff, get food poisoning, sit next to a 400lb european man that hasn't showered in 3 weeks for 9 hours on a train. Its all up in the air and that's a beautiful thing.