The Problem With Student Travel Companies in Florence

I will never forget waking up that first morning.  It was my Fall Break during my semester abroad and I was travelling with my roommate Jenny.  We were in a hotel outside of Barcelona and had arrived very late the night before.  For both of us, it was really the first time we had traveled on our own and we didn't know anything except that we had flights and some accommodations booked for the next ten nights: it was going to be a long trip and I would be lying if I said that I wasn't a little bit worried.

The next day, after dealing with the sudden appearance of pink eye (unpleasant, but, in the end, fine), we found a cute restaurant, on recommendation from someone at our hostel, and both ordered food, without really knowing what we were ordering.  Between us, we spoke an embarrassingly small amount of Spanish and, to admit something really embarrassing, I did not even know Catalan was a language until we landed in Barcelona...  I cringe a little bit writing that, but I remind myself that this is why we travel, to learn things that we didn't know before.

So, Jenny takes a bite of her mystery sandwich and discovered quickly that her sandwich contained walnuts.

"Erin, I have something to tell you," she said.

"Okay...."

"I'm allergic to walnuts."

My heart dropped a little, "maybe you should stop eating then...."

"I can't, it's sooooo good."

As it turned out, her allergy was not severe and we survived to eat many fantastic meals and went back to that place three times and every time ordered a mystery meal and every time we left full and satisfied. (The restaurant was called La Bascula--vegetarian, which is not common in Spain & lots of organic/natural things!)

Jenny and I, 3 years ago in Ireland--savoring some time in the English-speaking world!

Being in Barcelona is like being on top of the world!!!

The point of this long, self-involved story is that we were clueless!!!  Completely clueless!!  But we made it through those ten days and we learned so much about ourselves, each other and, above all, the world!  We both learned a little bit about reading maps, argued and got stressed out when we got lost, stumbled through two languages (how surprised was I when I found out upon my return to Florence that I had been asking for "a bedtime story" instead of "the check" at every meal we ate in Spain!  Or when I booked bus tickets out of the wrong Valencia, Spain!).  When our skills as navigators and linguists failed us (which was often), we compensated with curiosity and sincere smiles--and had some help from locals along the way!  I often tell people that I learned more in those ten days than I everything I learned combined in my life until that point and, in retrospect, I wouldn't trade all the awkwardness or stressful moments for any other experience.

Which is exactly why it makes me so sad when I see students increasingly choosing to travel through companies rather than planning their own trips.  There are at least a half dozen companies in Florence that specialize in planning trips for students, but they all provide more or less the same experience:  for what you pay them, they will bundle your accommodations, provide you with a guide, maybe include some food and (joy of joys!) put you on a bus with fifty other American students (or more!) and shuttle you all around Europe.

And students tell me:

"It's so easy!"

"It's so comfortable!"

"They did everything for us!"

"They made sure we didn't stay in a bad hotel!"

The problem I have with these companies is not that they don't fulfill their promises--based on what I've heard, they do a great job of shuttling students around Europe, making them comfortable and taking them from site to site in Europe's most beautiful, historic cities.

In fact, the problem I have with these companies is that they do exactly what they say they do--they make everything so effortless and in doing so insulate students, in a bus full of Americans, from learning about the world around them and from truly experiencing the culture of the place they are in.  They take away the uncertainty and the frustration of travelling but in doing so, I would argue, they also take away the sense of curiosity and adventure.

I've spoken with people who traveled through Europe in the age before the internet and they have told me about what it was like, arriving in a city, suitcase in hand and literally searching through a phone book to find a place to sleep at night.  The truth is, travelling on your own is not that hard anymore.  There are dozens of travel sites and booking sites on the internet that provide dozens of reviews and information on attractions and accommodations. There is a huge selection of guidebooks for any of the major European destinations available in bookstores, both at home and abroad, and even on your device of choice (Anyone who has ever traveled with me knows that I LOVE guidebooks, and on the last few trips I have taken, I took my guide books with me via the Kindle app on my ipod!  All the fun of a guide book without having to lug around a huge book!  Miraculous!!!).

Yes, booking things on your own can require a bit of actual thought on your part and maybe some advance planning, depending on how adventurous you are (although with Wifi beginning to appear everywhere, including on flights and trains, perhaps even less now than ever!), but it gives you the freedom to do what you want, to change your plans (or travel without any real plans!), and to experience some of those moments of frustration and stress and clueless-ness that humble us and help us grow, as travelers and as humans, as well as leading us to moments when discover something extraordinary or meet remarkable people, both locals and fellow travelers.

I know that not everyone will agree with me on this, and this post may be controversial.  But I would like to start a conversation more than anything.  Of course, I have to recognize the fact that not everyone is looking to get the same things out of their travel experiences as I am.

I often use a quote by St. Augustine, "the world is book and those who do not travel read only the first page."  The kind of travel that I am advocating for is not measured so much by the number of pages read as by the experience of reading.  Did we really understand what we were reading?  Or did we just skim to find the main idea?  Did we savor the moments of poetry and of challenge in the text?  Did we actually learn something?  Can we think critically about it all or is it just a blur of photos on our Facebook pages?

There are some risks in planning a trip for yourself, not so much risks as in putting yourself in physical peril (especially in Europe, come on!), but risks that you will have moments when you will be pushed out of your comfort zone.  Not only is this a possibility, but something that I promise and hope for.  Because when you find yourself outside of your comfort zone, you are at risk of learning and of growing and seeing things differently.  It's a bit of a leap of faith, but one that I wish more students would take.

Wanderings

Today I was walking to work and I saw some people talking excitedly, looking up and pointing.  What are they looking at? I asked myself.  They seemed so enthralled that I couldn't resist turning around to see what had captured their attention.  And I saw Florence's cathedral and Brunelleschi's dome, surrounded by tourists and caricature artists and people taking photos....but nothing was out of place.  So I looked back at the people again, to see if maybe I had misjudged where they were looking.  But I looked at their eyes and saw that they were still just as excited and pointing just as clearly.  Seriously, what are they looking at?  Their eyes were fixed directly on the cupola, but the more that I looked, the more I could not understand what they were looking at.  Is there a bird up there?  Something that I'm missing?  My eyes were searching for something, anything.

Then it hit me.

Oh.

They were not looking at something on or near the dome, they were just looking at....the dome itself. Brunelleschi's dome, one of the great miracles in the history of architecture, arguably one of the greatest achievements of the human mind...ever.  It was the biggest dome in the world when it was built in the fifteenth century.  Even when Michelangelo built a bigger dome, the dome of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, he noted that his creation could be "as big, but never as beautiful."

And so it has happened that this amazing piece of living, breathing history, that I imagine even Michelangelo paused to admire as he walked by, has become such a part of my daily routine that I could not even see it.  I had not even realized the extent to which I was rushing through that morning until that moment.  It reminded me of how important it is to stop, and take a deep breath, especially when I feel that I do not have time to do so and appreciate what I have right in front of me...

***

Walking in the most tourist-filled streets of Florence is something like walking through the entire world condensed into a few blocks.  More than anything, I listen for all the different languages.  Maybe I hear someone speaking German and someone speaking Swedish and someone speaking Japanese and someone speaking a language I could not even recognize if your life depended on it...all at the same time.

And I'm always tickled, to hear sounds that are so thoroughly foreign.  Above all, I love languages that are so different from anything that I know that I can not even separate individual words or sentences.  And sounds pass through my head and I can't even wrap my mind around the fact that those sounds, which to me sound totally random, actually mean something, actually mean a lot, when passing through someone else's mind.

And I remember what Italian sounded like before I could understand it.  Before I even understood the rhythm.  I remember sitting in my dorm room, doing speaking exercises during my first semester  of college and feeling the soft vibration that the words left on my tongue.  And how it lingered for a moment, even when I stopped speaking.  It was delightful.  How I wished, in those moments, that the feeling never had to go away!

I wonder, when I hear these other languages, what kind of feeling they leave on your tongue or on your lips.  And if I might someday roll Hungarian or Polish or Chinese around in my mouth, what those words would feel like, what they would taste like.

I think of how my life has been enriched by learning a new language.  How I have come to better understand a culture and a people, through the language and how, like one of those beautiful, antique keys, it has opened some special doors.

And suddenly, I want to know all the languages that the people around me are speaking, all at once!  Why couldn't I know every language in the world in a single instant?  But the very thought makes me dizzy.

Because I know that knowledge like this comes slowly and with effort.  Learning a language is like building a relationship, it takes time and patience and is, honestly, a bit messy.  Nothing meaningful can be achieved in a single moment.  It is the months of learning, the countless mistakes and the reaching beyond your comfort zone that make learning a language a meaningful experience, that make any experience meaningful, really.  And I wouldn't have it any other way.

So, I continue to walk on, quietly delighting in fragments of other people's conversations that I will never understand.

Simply Put

It's not enough simply to travel, to physically move your body from one place to another.  You have to learn, be open and unafraid to change.  You have to think about where you are and how your actions affect the economy and the future of each place as if it were your home because, at the end of the day, as a part of the Earth, that place is your home.

It's not enough simply to take photos in front of things if you don't understand them and what they are and what they mean.  If the number of "likes" on your Facebook page is ever-growing, but your mind fails to expand, you're doing it wrong.  Because that, my friends, is called ego-boosting and the remarkable thing about travel is that it does the opposite of boosting your ego.  It forces you to reckon with a world so much greater than you are and assaults you with the realization that you are but a small piece in this incredible, dynamic jigsaw puzzle of a planet.  

It's not enough simply to stay in your comfort zone.  It's a scary thing to admit: you might end up in an uncomfortable situation or an unfamiliar place.  You might have to stop and ask directions from an actual human when your technology fails you.  Most daunting of all, you might end up changed--seeing the world in a different way and questioning all your beliefs.  You might find that while exploring parts of the world you have never seen before, you will also have to confront parts of your own mind that you have never seen before.  In fact, the thoughts and ideas that once gave you peace will become a source of friction.  And you will be forced to grow.

But if you want to be a true citizen of the world, that's a risk you're going to have to be willing to take.  Anything less is just tourism.

Lost and Found in Budapest

 I have been putting off writing about Budapest for a few weeks because, honestly, I am still trying to process it, even a month later (that and the fact that every spare second of my life has been filled with job applications--if you have any sweet connections, please let me know!!).  For me, it was a delightfully paradoxical city: ridiculously manageable for a traveler yet impossible to fully comprehend.  The streets are just breathing with a history that's as complex as that of any city I've ever visited.  You might see the remnants of a once powerful monarchy, Art Nouveau elegance and totally modern buildings all within the same block.  The food is simple, but the flavors complex (did I mention that I had sour cream on pretty much everything?  No complaints here!).  The opulent wealth of times gone by coexists with a former Soviet austerity which mingles with a forward-and-outward-looking present.  And the result is startling, eclectic, cosmopolitan and wonderful.

Somehow, this picture perfectly sums up my sense of Budapest as a city.
Beautiful architecture adorns what is now the Gucci store,
but notice the bus that it is probably older than I am.

Goulash!  It's so yummy!  Simple ingredients, but with a little kick!

And did I mention the language?  What a lovely puzzle to be solved!  According to my tour guide, it's one of the five hardest languages in the world to learn, yet the second most logical, after Latin! (although some people might argue that ranking languages based on difficulty is a worthless, subjective idea and I tend to agree).

As a lover of all things linguistic (and moreover a total nerd) I couldn't really ask for a more fascinating language than Hungarian.  There are up to eighteen different noun cases (How many of you stumbled through Latin's five?) and compound words that can go forever.  Better yet, Hungarian is related only to Estonian and Finnish and even those two languages are more like third cousins a couple times removed than close family!!  Consider that Hungarian is not an Indo-European language, which means that Hindi, Persian, Italian and English are more closely related to each other than any of them is to Hungarian!

Franz Liszt, one of many famous Hungarians.  The "sz" sounds in
Hungarian is like the "s" sound in English, thus we say his name
like "List."

So how did the Hungarians wind up with such a completely bizarre language?  They are descendants of a group of people that migrated to the area that is now Hungary from today's Mongolia, the Magyar people.  (Mistakenly thought to be the Huns by some of their neighbors, hence we have the name "Hungary" in English).  In fact, that is only the beginning of a history that would see the Hungarians mix with Slavic people from the surrounding countries and conquered by the Turks and then incorporated into the empire of the Hapsburgs. (Obviously, this is the history of an entire country and their linguistics in two paragraphs and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt, I'm not claiming to have covered everything here!)

The many cafes around Budapest make it feel like a very "European" capital.
This elegant cafe is on the top floor of the Alexandra bookstore!

Perhaps the highlight of my time there, was seeing Puccini's Madama Butterfly at the opera house.  Advised by friends who had visited Budapest before, I went to the box office an hour before the show to see if I could get some cheap tickets.  After a confused conversation with a woman at the ticket office, I paid for my ticket, having absolutely no idea what I had just purchased.  

To my surprise, I returned an hour later, ascended the stair case, and opened a door, as indicated by my ticket, to a beautiful private box that was almost in the center of the theater!!  

Hastily and much embarrassed, I closed the door...surely my 13 Euro ticket was not for one of the best seats in the house.  

So imagine my surprise when I asked the attendant, only to have her lead me back to the very same door!!!

I met a lovely student and fellow traveler from China and was delighted to enjoy the opera with him from our own private box.

This is my "ecstatic" face.

To recap, I stumbled into Puccini, a beautiful opera house, an accidental private box and a perfect glass of Hungarian red wine on the terrace at intermission.  This was one of those beautiful, magical moments (sometimes, I like to stop and hug them as they pass by) when I realized that of all the places in the universe I might have been, I was finding myself exactly where I was supposed to be.

Sometimes we forget how awkward and painful learning and living and travelling can be.  There are some moments that are less romantic than others.  Travelling alone in particular can be stressful and a bit scary, even in a big, safe, cosmopolitan city in Europe.  There are plenty of opportunities to make mistakes, get really lost, get frustrated, ask obvious questions, make yourself look like the stupidest person ever and feel lonely.  But, in retrospect, I see that these are also the moments when I was getting smarter, learning how to travel better and more gracefully and learning about myself.  And somehow, it was that stumbling around the city of Budapest (and, let's be honest, the entire continent of Europe) that led me to that seat in that opera house during that show.

And so I am issuing a challenge to myself, and to you, to make some mistakes, to get a little lost and to stumble around a bit, whether it is in a language with eighteen noun cases, a new place you've never visited or even in your own mind.

To quote my nineteenth-century soul mate, Henry David Thoreau (ten points if you saw that coming!): "Not till we are lost, in other words not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves..." 

Buon viaggio!

The Opera House at night!

The Last Minute of Intermission

The Parliament Building by night.

Rawwr!!

Stained glass in St. Matthias Church

I just really liked this painting.

#NoFilterRequired

For a long time, I have thought that Mother Nature and a solid camera could outdo the obsession with putting filters on every photograph.  Tuscany has seen a lot of rain these past few weeks and the beautiful Spring greens are more vibrant than I've ever seen.  Against the blue sky, it all just looks too good to be true, perfect!!  Filter that!! 

A Toast for Mom!

I'm proposing a toast

Chianti raised in hand

Across this great ocean

To sea and beach and sand

Where a lady I know

Is in her favorite place

Drinking margaritas 

A smile on her face

And I haven't said thank you

Not nearly enough

For loving and caring

Even when it was tough

She watched my first steps

Helped the first fall

And if I'm now crossing continents

It's to her I owe all.

With patience and love

She helped us to grow 

And the lessons in forgiveness

More than we'll ever know.

So here's to you, Mom

On this day of you

I could never say thanks 

For all the you do.

These words are my hugs

From so far away

I'm sending my love,

Happy Mother's Day!!

How can you thank the person who gave you the greatest gift of all, that is, the gift of life?  I'm so grateful to have the greatest Mom, someone who has always loved me, supported me and believed in me.  I miss you, Mom and I just wish that I could be sipping margaritas beach-side with you on this day, your day!

Cheers to all the Moms this Mother's Day!

At the Opera in Budapest