I am at a beach in Karpathos Greece. Sitting on my rented beach chair, with my calloused feet hanging over the side. The tiny gold pebbles chip away at the poor paint job on my toes- an attempt to cover up six months of travel dust. Overhead hangs a blue sky, exactly the type you would imagine present in Greece, and in front of me the Aegean waves rejoice that they have met their destiny ashore. Griff says something about being in a Corona commercial and I laugh lamely, as all of my strength- even to speak- has been pulled [View Full Entry]

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This entry is a continuation of "More Than S'mores and Kumbaya", a journal that I kept during our week at a camp for Romanian orphans. Before reading this entry, please make sure to read what preceds. WEDNESDAY For some reason the day seemed really long which ıs odd because I managed to keep myself busy for most of ıt. I have gotten to know the Amerıcan Team a lıttle better and I just love them. The team ranges ın age and personality but every sıngle one of them ıs so genuine and fun. The highlight of the day was probably craft [View Full Entry]

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I was goıng to wrıte about our week at a kıd's camp in Romania, a la "Hello Mudda, Hello Fadda". The entry was already started ın my mınd- ıt was goıng to be a sort of letter home full of the funny thıngs kıds do and say. It was goıng to capitalize on the campy aspects of our experience, thıngs lıke bunk beds and funny food... but then I realızed that the beds we were sleepıng ın were much nıcer than most of the beds we have been sleepıng ın the past fıve months and the kıtchen was a mıl [View Full Entry]

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Today I have a date with a man whose kiss is so tender, that he has made himself known all over the world. His kiss is so passionate that none can come close to its beauty- though many have tried. I have donned my only skirt and smoothed my lips with gloss. I am ready for his kiss. I am ready to see the art of Gustav Klimt. It was Griff's suggestion- who would have thought? We had not planned to enter Austria because it is one of the most expensive countries in Europe at the moment. (You should see how [View Full Entry]

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Our last moments in Spain were spent waiting out our time between the bus drop-off in Madrid and our plane to Prague. We sat at a park across from the Prado Museum and watched a middle aged man with red-rimmed glasses eating a broken coconut like a chipmunk. After every few mouth-fulls he would let out a chuckle that made his shoulders shake. We watched him from a park bench in a small central park where we were waiting for our beloved Starbucks to open. Before he took his seat on the rim of a fountain, he had fixed his [View Full Entry]

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Mandy and I first came into Peru on a colorfully panited and smelling bus from Bolivia. Puno was the first city we were stopping at, and the place we were going to use as a base to explore a few islands in Lake Titikaka. This place immediately began to form our imppression of Peru. There was amazing things to see here, but we needed to be much more careful as travelers. With little effort we figured out that there was a very heated presidential race going on, with the final elections occuring just three days after we were to leave. [View Full Entry]

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----Please note that the photos in this entry are extremely poor. Our camera was being repaired and we used a disposable, which obviously had problems as well. I think they will do the job though, and it will give you a better idea of the poor lighting conditions that the doctors were working under....read on... During my pre-teenyears, I was what some would call...well...homely. (My parents just read that and gasped, as they believed that I was nothing but beautiful.) Well, okay then, I was a "beautiful" awkwardly tall, uncoordinated, ruddy-haired, moon-faced girl, with very, ver [View Full Entry]

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The other night while sharing a Cusqueña with Mandy over dinner in Cusco, I began to go on and on about the political affairs of Bolivia. Then, it may have been the elevation, but Mandy convinced me that I should give some kind of a political update on the countries that we visit. I don’t know how well this will work for every country, but after spending six weeks in Bolivia, I have more first hand political experiences and opinions then I ever thought possible. I understand that my political views may differ from some of you who read this, [View Full Entry]

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We woke for the sunrise, but it wasn't the sun that we wanted to see, it was what the sun was illuminating. With our backs to the heat, we watched the city awaken. The cold dark stones slowly warmed into a living city. The slabs of rocks evolved into living rooms, bedrooms, an empire. Silence was broken only by the waking birds and the grazing llamas eating their breakfast of grass grown in ancient soil. Were we really here? Were we really a part of this morning's moment in a place so well-known and so well-preserved? Taking photos at times such [View Full Entry]

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"Her name was Lola. She was a showgirl..." Ahhhh! How I love Barry Manilow, writer of the songs that make the young girls sing! My sister and I used to sing this tune often, especially when we both were serving our time as waitresses in a Seattle based, Bolivian restaurant called none other than, "Copacabana". After delivering thousands of plates filled with "Pollo Saltado" and clarifying countless times that a Bolivian "empanada" is nothing at all like a Mexican, "enchilada" (I can still see the look of confusion on many a customer’s face after delivering the meat-filled pastry instead [View Full Entry]

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