I just wanted to let you guys know, I am still crossing places off of my bucket list, despite residing in a cold prison cell, also know as a classroom. And that even a seven hour sentence cannot restrain the power of my travel desires and there will be more posts after New Year's so I can share every bit of magic and euphoric memories with those who feel the same passion for utopian destinations. Endless thank-yous of appreciation for the wonder that is you. :)
My sincerest apologies. As I have been wandering the very upsettingly ordinary suffocating hallways that lie in the deepest realms of hell (high school) I have not had the time, energy, or finacial opportunities to take an enchanting trip to a land better than reality, besides the mall. However, I wanted to make sure that my viciously uneventful life did not get in the way of my deep and intense wanderlust. This year, I will spending my New Year's on yet another floating paradise while on my cruise to the Caribbean, specifically Honduras, Belize, and Cozumel. My family and I are beyond ecstatic about every aspect of this trip. I have been raiding all species of sales racks and Pinterest tags in search of the perfect attire and much anticipation has been put into my daily countdown to December 28th, the day we sail off to a whole island of new family memories.
I just wanted to let you guys know, I am still crossing places off of my bucket list, despite residing in a cold prison cell, also know as a classroom. And that even a seven hour sentence cannot restrain the power of my travel desires and there will be more posts after New Year's so I can share every bit of magic and euphoric memories with those who feel the same passion for utopian destinations. Endless thank-yous of appreciation for the wonder that is you. :)
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Incomprehensibly enigmatic. Tallinn, Estonia had the most extensive effect on my earnest emotions from one end to the other of this trip. Entirely extraordinary. I was entrapped by my own feelings of prestine enticement and full-out fascination. We escorted ourselves off the floating Eden (The Royal Princess) and immediately a sense of enlightenment was reached in which the depths of the excavation were everlasting. Exemplary in comparison and equisitely expert in exhibiting all the finest elements of the earth's essence of expedition. This was "The Place." The euphoria in which my eternal enmity would evaporate and my enduring elegance would be exposed. After flowing past the modern eloquent architecture of Tallinn's metropolitan expanse, as if an evident edge had divorced the converse from the inverse, my family and I entered a universe of antiquity that we could have never collectively fantasized in our most erratic imaginations. Somehow and some way, we ceased to exist as individuals and fused into a whole entity all together embodied and extending throughout Estonia's charming land until we reached the lines that border both the country and our state of utter exemption. Every direction we turned, there was a sight to be reserved and a handful of feelings to be felt. Not the overwhelming kind but the encouraging type of warm embrace that radiates all over the preserved town that vintage can not even compare to. This is what ultimately made my trip evolve from a worldwide search for myself to a (I'll admit, rather selfish) exploration of raw pleasure, which Tallinn, Estonia handed directly to me in a shimmering silver platter. For that, I am forever grateful. I stepped off the boat that day a little too fast and yet not as fast as I wished to be going. I was beyond ready. Adventure, wonder, history dotted among the gorgeous picturesque sights and it was all there in front of me. The first step was, I'll admit, a surreal moment for me. Taking in the symbolism, I stopped ever so slightly just before the platform connecting the Royal Princess to the dock on the edge of Norway's fjords ended. A smile snuck across my face before I could even realize why it was there. My adorable Mary Janes took one delicate step after the other and it seemed as though even my shoes couldn't believe they were trodding along a ground unlike any other. My parents and I walked slowly taking in every scent, sight, sound, and sense of splendid satisfaction. Away from the floating paradise and into a new one. This was our most anticipated port, due to my stepdad's proud Norwegian ancestry, and so far, the simple yet ornates architecture and far-off views of the rest of the country made it feel less like a foreign wonderland and more like home. To be honest that's what made it so special. Oslo, from the first blink to the last, was extraordinary enough that it made it distinct and unlike any other country, but also comforting and intimate enough that made the entire world seem at ease and simple as the shadows of the leaves of the various trees reflected on the smooth sidewalk. The enchantment during our short but sweet canal ride from the City Hall to a small island with boundlessly absorbing museums was captivating and not only reinforced my larger-than-large history fettish but wholeheartedly enamoured me, body and soul, into a deep romance where, in that moment, I concluded that traveling was the only way to keep my mind stable. After arriving at the beautiful island scattered with the opulent, aristocratic mansions of the Norwegian upper class, we trodded the sidewalk taking detail shots of flowers in the slight mist of the early drizzle of an oncoming downpour. Nothing has ever felt more alluringly angelic, a sensation not even Aphrodite could achieve. Everything added up perfectly; the rain, the scenery, the sensuality. It all felt like cuddling with a good song; alone but not altogether unaccompanied. The glistening of the fresh dew drops on the Old Town of Norwegian Folk Houses delicately complimented the pleasing aroma of nature at its finest. A single deep breath could cleanse mind, body, and soul and extract the innermost compassion directly from one's heart. Touring the houses felt like stepping into and being trapped in history; all too willingly. The rain showers gave me a chance to use my bright red umbrella and see Oslo, Norway in the best condition I could ask for; surrounded by gray yet still radiating a yellow that penetrates the inside and out of one's emotions. Wander as I must, Norway's loveliness will forever remain a candle's infinite flame; warming my heart and illuminating my purposeful path towards the yearning that tugs at every piece of me. So there I was, leaning against the wall amidst the constant murmur of conversation much like the tapping of the rain surrounding the world outside of my fantasy on the Royal Princess, when a tall Vista Lounge waiter with a quirky yet undectectable accent suddenly stops right next to me, shoulder-to-shoulder. "So cute, yet alone?" he asked and despite the dim darkness of the club, I knew he could tell my face lit up a bright shade of red reminscent of the crimson sunset just beyond the edge of the ship's rails. I let out the most pathetic, 10-year-old girl giggle which I immediately regretted afterward. Several moments had passed before he decided to continue and ask me if he could get me anything and even more time passed before I could manage to nearly gag up the word "Coke". And then he was gone. I felt myself relax just the slightest bit and then felt the anger well up in the deepest part of my gut. If you didn't know already, I have this huge fear of human contact. ANY human contact. A one-on-one conversation with a person can make me feel like a soldier, imprisoned, tortured, and interrogated, completely aware of my clammy hands twitching at my sides and of the very transparent window into my mind that lies within my facial expressions. This is the exact feeling I was running from that night. I tried to imagine the weight of the fear just evaporating into the thick, damp atmosphere which almost made me feel better. Almost. Before I could form a coherent thought and debate the mere idea of actually making the words spill out of my chapped lips, a round, black tray presented itself directly in front of me with a beautifully garnished Piña Colada that was more elegant and fancy than the flowing dress I was wearing. At the time, I felt that dress had encompassed the entire dome of enchantment that ravaged the floating paradise. I smiled a goofy smile trying to distance myself between the plague of awkwardness penetrating my actions. I thought for sure he had, by now, realized how impossibly boring I am and that he would soon be too far down a road going nowhere if he stuck around. But he just stood there, facing the huge screen but his eyes on me, which was feeling that radiated in the very small space between us. For the sake of my own sanity, I kept my focus on the colorful ant-sized men running back and forth among a world of neon green, much like the struggle I felt with my indecisive demeanor and questionable outlook on the world. Suddenly my mind started racing. This was a soccer match. This entire trip was one vital game that would determine whether or not I could continue to go on. I could choose to be smart and protect my inner goals and objectives or I could take charge of my even bigger goals and go through the challenges to shoot at them with all the power I have. How long it took me to ponder this metaphorical aspect of sports and valuable life lessons, I don't know, but he had gone back to his job and I back to my absent-minded wondering when I realized that this wasn't it; this wsan't just one single game because I knew I had more time. We were on the same cruise ship, in a large net of hopeful hopelessness that can fuel any sincere remark or interlace two fates that, otherwise, would have never even floated past eachother. Waiting things out would be difficult and might not even work, but it was the only option I had the energy and courage to come to terms with. I decided to forget about meeting someone because, I told myself, these things happen when you least expect them to, when they're not planned and rehearsed. Maybe this was the night that could change everything and maybe it wasn't, but just because it was the first night something vaguely similar to the kind of romance I had in mind had occured, didn't mean it would be the only night. If it had happened once, it could certainly happen again, which, of course, would take time but, in that wonderful two weeks full of possibilities, it seemed like I had more than enough time. In the meantime, I enjoyed the day at sea before the waves would bring me crashing towards the magical shore of Oslo, Norway's gorgeous royal blue fjords the next day. The picture andmere imagination of what the next day ashore in Northern Europ ewould be like was the final thought that sealed my night off with a smile in my subconscience and rocked me to sleep to the rhythm of the floating paradise.
(I AM SO VERY SORRY DARLINGS yes it has been ages since I posted something due to my inevitable writer's block and the grueling day-to-day struggle that is highschool but I am back with the beautiful stories of my feelings and their adventures) My favorite floor was the 7th "Promenade Deck." It was one of the magical things that made me realize I could've lived my life rather contently on the Royal Princess. Despite the obvious allure of the continent in which the floating paradise was submerged, the inside of the ship held an equivalent amount of indistinguishable eloquence that was more mesmerizing than that of Lewis Carrol's "Alice In Wonderland." I was hooked. Within a world that sheltered my retreat, I found a deeper retreat that I could fall back on when I needed a chance to be myself. On this the third day aboard the floating paradise, everything was fascinatingly exceptional in the way that makes absolutely no sense and yet doesn't really matter. I ended up on the "Promenade Deck" where an elegant balcont overlooked "The Piazza," the center of the 5th floor where ballroom dancing and a live band playing romantic and moody songs dwelled from late afternoons into the festive nights. I would often hang over the sides and smile down at the people who let the cozy entertainment lure them to the dance floor with their loved ones. At peace and never wanting to leave, a mildly large crowd of exotic Spanish-speaking passengers maneuvered their way past the people emerging from the elevators to join the gaiety and sped towards the back of the ship on the 7th floor where, having been there many times on mini-expeditions, I knew the "Vista Lounge" was located. This was the night of the Brazil versus Germany face-off in the Fifa World Cup series and the cruise ship had ever-so-kindly hosted a live viewing of the match in the Vista Lounge. Now, throughout the entire trip, I rarely had the slightest idea where on the cruise ship my parents were hanging out at and this was no exception, so I, alone and having nothing better to do at the time, headed in the direction of the raging fans. I got to the lounge a bit too late and, hastily, all the pleasant seats were taken, which didn't bother me in the least bit seeing as I cannot sit still to save my life. I opted for a space against the back wall with a picture-perfect view of the theater-sized screen at the front of the room. Soccer is not my absolute favorite sport so what really drew me to the crowd that night was the radiating energy that came from the powerful feeling of hope. Just being in that room made me feel a sense of importance as if it were so present in the air I could cut it with a knife. It didnt matter in what form it was in, whether it was the game that was important to the fans, the passengers' needs that were important to the waiters serving them or just the desire for a night of excitment and joy that was important to me, it was invigorating and inescapable, the kind of force that overpowers your mental inertia and accelerates your state of mind towards the unknown. It was, again, something so magnificent that words could not and cannot do it justice. Then something completely unforseen, even through the eyes of my deepest dreams, happened. I wasn't alone anymore.
Everything is so different. The tiniest differences have the biggest effect on the entire feel of the floating paradise, yet it still feels welcoming and hearty. I couldn't quite distinguish the sense of comfort from the glimmer of an unfamiliar sense of enchantment. From the moment I woke up, quickly checking under my pillow to make sure my journal was still there, I knew what I would be doing that day. It was a day "at sea" so I decided to wander aimlessly around the maze of elegance and observe all the people who had the same hopeless amount of hope for a perfect retreat that would change everything. I walked around for hours completely attentive and searching for a low profile place to plop down amd satisfy my wallflower eyes. I went back to my room in the mid-afternoon and drew up a map of the ship to calculate where would be the most ideal retreat. Aside from the main middle part of the "Lido Deck", the 16th floor had two long buffet dining rooms; one for regular meals and the other for a variety of dessert options. The buffet stretched from the middle of the ship to the back where it ended in a small bar and lounge where I had sat and documented a few sketches within the first few hours of embarking the floating paradise. The other half of the 16th deck looked like the following picture. The 16th "Lido Deck" was my second favorite place to be on the Royal Princess. Everyone was so relaxed there. The people, couples, kids, and even the staff members all seemed like there was no other place they would rather be. The fact that there was no roof on this floor made the demeanors of all the vacationers feel so open, like any tension or angst could evaporate within seconds of stepping out of the elevator. However, it was not my favorite floor on the floating paradise. It was the kind of large that I couldnt even fit into a panorama picture with my phone. The Royal Princess. Eighteen wonderful enchanting floors that would serve as my home for the next two weeks. Eighteen floors that i would be free to roam to find the perfectly fullfilling pass time while sailing the open seas of northern Europe. Eighteen floors, each of which I would try my hardest to remember in exact detail how I felt upon exploring them. When my family and I boarded the ship, we emerged onto the 4th floor uniquely named "Gala Deck". Of course, being loaded with people trying to stuff themselves into elevators in a rush to unwind by the pool as quickly as possible, I caught a quick glimpse at the beauty and extravagance of the decor on the ship that had already, from the first glance, seemed to me like a modern take on the decor from Titanic. When I walked into our room, I headed straight for the balcony. We hadn't left the dock yet, but I could see the vast fjord blue waters that awaited our discovery. To be honest, it scared the crap out of me. The thought of the endless and lonely ocean kind of reminded me of my fear of being alone and I wanted nothing to do with that. So I figured i might as well get over it and to do that I had to face it. So I went to the 16th deck, "Lido Deck" and walked to the back of the ship where there was a terrace and some sofas placed near the railing of the ship. I spent close to two hours there, long after we had already set sail, and drew a sketch of my view from where I was sitting and wrote an entry in my travel journal. I had emptied out all my ideas onto my papers and closed both journals to focus on the constant waves and swooshing sound of the voices of the wind combining with the melody of the water. All around me there were both elderly and young couples standing close together just peering out at the sunset and I realized just how beautiful this experience is even without visiting a popular city. I must've looked like a sad loner standing there around all these couples just staring out into nothing that seemed to have the equivalent value of every object of beauty in the world. By the time I reached my room on the 8th floor, "Emerald Deck", I felt at peace. There's nothing more enlightening that seeing something so compex in something so simple. That night I imagined I was the ocean itself. Free, rough, untamable, and so different in and of itself. It was still slightly unsettling to feel the subtle movement of the cruise ship, but for the most part it felt like a rocking cradle and again I fell asleep with the greatest of ease. Everything felt so surreal and I had an epiphany moment in which I realized that this journey would be completely unpredictable in the most magical ways possible. So in a 10 hour, jet-lagged blur, I arrived in Copenhagen, Denmark. It wasn't particularily bright for a middle-of-summer day. Waking up in a different country than the one I had fallen asleep in made everything I looked at glow with the spark of emense unfamiliarity. Anything I could have seen everyday back in Texas seemed so much more important and worthy of appreciation in Denmark; the graffiti in the metro station or even the way there were more people on bicycles than in cars. I wish I could write in detailed explanations how I truly felt but it would be full of contradictions. I felt comfortably uncomfortable with the slightest recognition of not belonging there but feeling like I belong there more than where I really belong. On our ride to the hotel, my parents and I raced past dreamy sights I could not comprehend as the same world I have lived in every day since my birth. Every inch of the street, every crack in the sidewalk, and every single building looked like a piece of art and had a way of making me feel freedom as if it were as present as the crisp air engulfing every part of me. The architecture was the first thing I noticed and continued to awe at every day since then. The details and opulence of simple, every-day buildings made it seem like the normality and mediocraty that linger in the streets back home could never catch up to me in Copenhagen. The day I spent there was never-ending. In an effort to take in every single ounce of architectural beauty, we walked everywhere we went, snapping pictures of suburban houses and a few exquiste details on some old buildings. Of course my parents could not pass up an opportunity to tour the Carlsberg Beer Factory when we reached it and by that time, the 8 hour flight had caught up with me so i fell asleep on a picnic table after taking pictures of just about everything in sight which was pretty exhausting given that any direction you look, there is something worth saving. The day dripped by slow enough to appreciate its grandness but fast enough for me to be afraid to lose it. I felt that if we didnt do something absolutely and undoubtedly memorable while also taking a sufficient amount of pictures, I would have lost the entire experience of what it was like to, briefly, feel like someone new but not all that different. Walking to and from the factory held a certain enchantment, as if every step I took, I gained an unsettling amount of abundance, like I would never experience anything like that day, which so far has been proven true. Despite the Radisson Blu Hotel's lack of air conditioning, falling asleep came easy and the view of the 10 o'clock sunset was so exceptional that it didnt seem like the constant sun or much less hold the same elegance as any other I've ever witnessed. For the first time in forever, I slept well, without a hint of insomnia, the window open to let in the all-too-perfect breeze, and dreaming of what would await me on the floating paradise cruise ship the next day. Austin, Texas. This is the place I call home. They say home is where the heart is, but somehow, my heart has roamed the entire face of this planet and has yet to find a place to settle down. I've only taken one extreme journey in my life, but I've found that the worth of the trip isn't where you go; it's what you see. The big or small treasures you encounter where ever you go are what draw a journey closer to your heart and carve it into your fondest memories. As far as memorable trips go, all of mine that come to mind are short and sweet journeys to my hometown of Monclova, Mexico. Yet, all the time I've spent there dreaming of being anywhere else, I realized that the more adventure I crave, the more i go looking for it. So, by the end of any trip, I find myself somewhere completely different than where I thought I was. The borders of Austin, Texas can't hold my wanderlust in, and when I have finally traveled where ever I need to go to find who I am and where I belong, my heart can decide on a home or come back to it. So here we are on my journey to find the journey to find myself. It'll be long and grueling and sometimes boring, but never unsignificant. Because you can't start a book without finishing it. So we go on to Chapter One.
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