A trip to the old world…

You wake up tomorrow morning to find all your plans have been cancelled for the next seven days and $10,000 on your dresser. Tell us about your week.

If I woke up tomorrow with a cancelled week and 10,000 on my dresser [with the assumption I have to spend it all in that week or else it disappears] I’d instantly book a flight to Athens. I’ve been to the ancient city before but didn’t explore much of Greece outside of the Plaka. I’ve seen pictures of the islands and other cities and would love to take the opportunity to check out those. So I guess my week would break down as follows:
Day 1 – fly to Athens
Day 2 – jet lag adjust in Athens
Day 3 – head to island of choice (perhaps I’ll kick off spring in Santorini)
Day 4 – relax & explore
Day 5 – relax & explore
Day 6 – travel back to Athens
Day 7 – fly home

It may be ‘boring’ but the last time I went to Athens it was a safe haven in the middle of a turbulent  time of stress for me. Although I was only there for roughly three days it holds a special place in my heart. Obviously I would want to go there again. Oh, whatever I had left would go to paying off my student loans (since I can’t stick it in the bank to save it).

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If I were leaving on a jet plane [Daily Prompt]

Oh decisions, decisions. Where to go if I were going to study abroad for a year? How does one decide? It all depends if there are rules, and even then I don’t know if I could decide.

If I was restricted to only being in one country for the duration of time I may pick the UK (which is kind of cheating because it’s actually four). It’d be so easy to divide up my time between then, 3 months exploring each (I’d take online classes so this would work). I’ve always had a love affair with Great Britain and Northern Ireland (in case my interest in their pop culture has been hidden from you in the past – Harry Potter, Sherlock, Doctor Who…) and it would be nice to flush out the understanding outside the stereotype I have in my head. I spent a long weekend in London when I studied abroad in Rome (including a day in Oxford) and it simply was not enough time to take everything in. Although we did try our best to do it. I think it’d be lovely but also a somewhat lazy choice. No real language barrier (accents don’t count for the time being), no huge cultural difference (not as drastic as say living in Asia for a year would be), no obvious issues that are part of the learning experience that studying abroad should have.

We decided to pretend we were shooting a CD cover.

With that mindset I think Greece would be a very interesting country to live in as well. As the gateway to the east it has an interesting blend of art and culture that not even a year could put a dent in. I took a long weekend here as well and didn’t even make it out of Athens, barely out of the Palaka. Besides the few days our class had a field trip to Switzerland this was almost the hardest trip I was on because the alphabet system is so different. Fortunately since we were in a tourist-ridden town they had signs using the English alphabet as well (which I could at least take a stab at sounding out. What sound does a delta make?) The history of this country, from city-states to present-day state, is infused into so much of their culture (or at least that was my impression) that I think being there would be an out of this world experience.

Other places:

• South Africa
• Japan
• New Zealand
• Ireland
• Sweden
• Switzerland
• Russia
• Brazil
• Peru
• Ethiopia
• Galapagos Islands
• Australia

I guess I’ll just get my PHD in traveling and be a full time student.