The Start of Something Special

Valentine's Day

This is not normally a holiday that I pay any attention to.  I am, by far, the least romantic person I know.  Weirdly enough though, Valentine's Day has become my most favorite holiday!  Valentine's day is pretty significant to me, because it was on Valentine's Day a few years back that I can say my life was forever changed.

Hop in my time machine, cuz we're going back.  Waaaaay back!

The year is 2009.

Medeha and I are at a hotel in Atlanta, somewhere between drunk and hungover. We'd had a 14 hour layover in Washington D.C., and went bar hopping with my awesome cousin Beth. She'd dropped us back at the airport at the end of the night so we could catch our morning flight to Atlanta.  We barely made the flight.  I say barely, not because we were short on time.  But because we both passed out at the gate and the guys who said they'd wake us up didn't and we regained consciousness just as they were calling last call at the gate.  We get to Atlanta and find out that we've missed the only flight to Guatemala.  waaaah!  This is horrible!  We try to get the poor man working at the gate to change our flight, but the best he can do is get us a bunch of vouchers for free meals (hey, we'll take that!  there's a T.G.I.Fridays's at the Atlanta airport!)  and a night at the airport hotel.

So here we are, in a strange city, in a hotel room, not entirely sure how we got here, using food vouchers at the bar, intermittently crying and singing along to romantic songs on the clock radio.  What a shitty Valentine's Day.

You're probably thinking "Julia, this is the type of story that's usually told as an intro to one of those A &E intervention shows! Where are you going with this??"  Before you start calling up the Betty Ford Clinic, let me explain.

A few weeks earlier, Medeha came home from happy hour to tell me that she'd found some awesomely cheap tickets, so we should take a trip over our February break!

"But I'm planning on going home for that break."
"Let's make a deal.  If it's cheaper to go home, you go home.  If it's cheaper to go to Guatemala, we go to Guatemala."

I've always been one for fiscal responsibility, so immediately agreed.

New York, NY to Madison, Wi: $212
New York, NY to Guatemala City, Guatemala $186

In an already unstable country, a recent increase in instability and violence had caused airfare prices to plummet.  Had it been a safe place to go, I probably would not have taken the trip.  I'd never even heard of Guatemala.  I didn't have the slightest idea of where it was, or what language was spoken there.  I thought maybe it was an island, but wasn't sure.  (It's usually at this point in a story when my dad will ask, "Now, was this a five beer plan, or a six beer plan?")  It didn't matter that we didn't know anything about the country, we were determined to take a vacation!

So, we're en route to Guatemala, and it's taking sooooo long to get there!  We left Friday afternoon, flew to D.C., went out drinking, flew to Atlanta, ate ourselves into a solid food coma, and finally, on Sunday caught a flight to Guatemala City.

It was totally worth the ordeal!  We had SUCH an awesome vacation.  We visited the colonial city of Antigua, we climbed a volcano, we hung out at Lago de Atitlan, swimming, kayaking and 'swimming', we went shopping in Mayan markets, we looked at ancient ruins.

Exploring

Spicy and salty- our favorite flavors!

Medeha, the Friendly Giant

Such happy friends!

 In typical 'Medeha and Julia' fashion, we ate and drank our way through the country.

CHEEEEEESSSSSSY

Eating ice cream in the plaza

Drinking a Krishna

mmmmm I want to eat that right now!

The PERFECT bite!

But for me, it was more then just a vacation.  It was through this trip that I had the realization that not only was travelling- real, long distance, new country, new culture, new language, new people, travelling- not only was it possible for me, but it was necessary for me.  It was at that point in my life that something was sparked, something clicked in me.

I caught travel fever.

I definitely didn't realize it at the time though.  At the time, I just thought:

 "Hey this is cool, we're spending the week partying in another country!  Booze is so cheap here!"

But the course of my life was forever changed.  

Some people know their whole lives what they want to do, they seem to have been born with the image already in mind of what they want their life to look like when they're grown up.  Not me.  I can't really plan for the future because, quite honestly, I can't picture myself getting old.  It's amazing, when I'm looking back, most of my major life decisions (being only 26, there haven't really been that many) were either just based on impulse, or were a default choice.  I ended up living in New York City for three years because I got a bad stomach flu and missed a job interview in D.C.  I am so glad I got the flu.  New York was the best (and the worst!) thing to happen to me.

Anyways.... this post was supposed to be about Valentine's Day, and it's deteriorated into random ramblings about life...  What I guess I'm trying to say is that I'm now going to celebrate Valentine's Day because it is a definitive point where I can look back at it and see that it was on that day I started the rest of my life.


I was raised (am still being raised) by parents who always told me that I could be anything, that I could do anything I wanted.  But it wasn't until I actually started figuring out what that actually meant ('I want to see new things, go new places') and doing that (I'm going to buy a one-way ticket to Mexico.  I'm going to go live in Asia), did I understand that I COULD do anything I wanted.  And not in the sense that it was permitted, but in the sense that I COULD.  So, in honor of Valentine's Day, I'd like to say THANK YOU and I LOVE YOU to everyone that helped me get where I am today.  Even when that meant letting me (and encouraging me) to move far away.





Oh god.  This became so sappy. I promise I won't do that to you again. Ever.


But really, I love you.