You know when you throw a party and right before you get those nervous butterflies that no one will show up to your event? Perfect way to describe the Surami cluster’s feelings right before our IOD community service event. Continue reading →

Back in Beantown, my first day included a must see for any Boston tourist – the Freedom Trail. This 2.5 mile course leads you through 16 historical landmarks ranging from churches to burial grounds. This isn’t my first rodeo in Boston. I trounced around the city with my dad right after graduating high school in a 2007 northeastern tour of NYC and Boston. We opted to walk the trail solo and just read the placards. We both thoroughly enjoyed the walk taking our time at each landmark, but after experiencing the tour with a trained guide overflowing with interesting tidbits, no comparison. I decided to join a tour group, while my friend that lives in Boston was working away. Our group of around ten people was headed by a local college history teacher dressed in a period Redcoat costume. Our guide not only delivered the facts but witty remarks that spiced up the two hour tour. Continue reading →

In honor of my flight today from Nashville to Boston, I wanted to bestow upon whomever dreams of inexpensive airfare my top 3 tips for purchasing US domestic flights. Continue reading →

My first stop after Japan turned out to be an airport in China. What I thought was supposed to be a few hours layover ended up as an overnight stay in a random Chinese airport “guest room” – not recommended for those that don’t enjoy sharing your room with a critter or two. At 7:30AM the next morning, I boarded another plane and arrived in Xi’an also known as the home of the Terracotta Warriors – Eighth Wonder of the World. My first day of escapades included a saunter around the drum and bell towers. The bell tower marks the heart of town with east, west, north, and south roads running straight out from the traffic circle. Once I returned to the hostel, I joined in “snack night” where two Chinese guys tried to teach me how to count to ten in Chinese. Wow, tones are quite the mystery. Depending on how you say a word based on your tone the meaning can change from mother into a curse word. Supposedly, someone not familiar with the Chinese language should expect to invest five years into learning the language, and that’s just Mandarin. There are multiple languages within the country that vary in number of tones and meanings of Chinese characters. Continue reading →

Welcome to Yokobayashi, which I nicknamed the “man cave,” home of eight dudes in one share house with each turning out to be uniquely interesting, funny, and motivated? I swear friends, no myth just my couch surfing digs in Tokyo. Continue reading →

What a way to start off my Japan jainky backpacking stint! Walking off the plane from Shanghai, I could already tell and feel in my fingertips this wasn’t the Georgia-esque climate of southern China with little to no snow and temperatures well about freezing. Sapporo basically exists as Japan’s Alaska with their own version of northern people well-suited to the icy conditions named the Ainu and the Hokkaido territory remaining the last independent portion of Japan until the late 1800s. My first clue in the “I think I may have taken the wrong flight not headed to the beaches of Thailand” mystery – the heated toilet seats. After that little shocker, I found my second clue – trains run in any conditions. The airport train rumbled past almost 4 feet of snow on either side of the tracks before arriving to the Sapporo Station! I’m definitely not in Georgia anymore. Luckily, the first four nights I couch surfed at a residence in the suburbs of Sapporo with a girl named Anna. She recently graduated from a smaller, private university in Virginia and decided to pack up all her personals and teach English in the JET program – organization run by the Japanese government that seeks out native English speakers from all around the globe to teach in Japan. Continue reading →