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Life Well Wandered

Lifestyle

New Beginnings: Summer in Review & Fall Preview

Easy Ways to Keep Up with a Foreign Language

Practical Study Abroad Tips from Someone Who’s Been There Before

Travelling Back in Time at the Cooper Hewitt Museum in NYC

Inside the Weekend of a Highly Introverted Person

What Adventure Means to Me

Bastille Day in NYC

One Year in NYC: Looking Back and Looking Forward

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I could bore you with interior pictures of the doz

I could bore you with interior pictures of the dozens of churches and cathedrals I visited while in Paris - and I probably will do so with other cities I tell stories about. But for Paris, I’ll just share Sainte Chapelle (literally, Royal Chapel), built in the mid-13th century and one of the grandest achievements of the Rayonnant period of Gothic architecture. ⛪️ If you enter on any normal day, you’ll find yourself stunned by the 15-meter high windows depicting 1,113 scenes from the Old and New Testaments. If the sun is shining through them, even better. If you visit near sundown on a clear, sunny day for a concert, however, your experience will be much improved. Imagine the warmth of the last rays of the summer sun shining through the thousands of pieces of stained glass with Vivaldi’s Four Seasons played by a live orchestra situated at the altar. I’m not a religious person, but it was in this moment that I felt close to whatever higher power might exist in the universe. ✨ #lifewellwandered

Instead, I spent my short time in Amsterdam in mus

Instead, I spent my short time in Amsterdam in museums. I woke up hours before anyone else in my group and walked from our dirty hostel to the Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh Museum. On the way there, I was stopped twice and asked for directions in Dutch, which was a nice turn of events given that I stuck out in Paris. 🗺 In the afternoon, I rejoined my group and we visited the Anne Frank House and I cried. Amsterdam charmed me with its canal streets, wonky houses - it was unlike any city I had seen before. In Amsterdam, I learned never to judge a destination by its reputation - everywhere has something for everyone. ✨ P.S. If you like taking pictures on the side and want to see how far you’ve come since you first started using a camera regularly, take a look at pictures from years ago. Out of the 310 pictures I took of Amsterdam in 2014, I only liked 5 of them (and I don’t even consider the 5 I liked to be *great* either). 📸 #lifewellwandered

I wasn’t too keen on the image I had of Amsterda

I wasn’t too keen on the image I had of Amsterdam in my head. Pot, partying, and a well-known Red Light District didn’t deter me from going by any means, but they did make me wonder what the weekend away from Paris would have in store for me. 🚆 Alas, if you’re looking for tales of debauchery, you won’t find them in this post - not because I’m hiding anything, but because I just don’t have any. Instead, I ended up staying sober and wandering around the city with my friend after he smoked for the first time to make sure he was okay (classic Alex move). I don’t have any regrets. 🤷🏼‍♀️#lifewellwandered

If given the opportunity, never turn down a free d

If given the opportunity, never turn down a free day trip - even if the train you have to catch departs at 8:05 from a train station that takes over 30 minutes to get to from your apartment. Mont-Saint-Michel is one of those Instagram places that, even if you don’t know its name, you’ve definitely seen pictures of it. I was very intrigued by what looked like a drip sandcastle emerging from the surrounding sand. 🏰 Originally only accessible during low tide, Mont-Saint-Michel was first built as a sanctuary to the archangel Michael in 708. It soon became a major focus of pilgrimage. In the 900s, Benedictines settled in the abbey and a village grew up around it. It was considered an impregnable stronghold during the Hundred Years War as the English assaults were unsuccessful. From the Revolution until 1863, the abbey was used as a prison. Now, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site with thin, winding streets and a few too many tourist shops for my liking. Nevertheless, I loved every minute of my visit. 😍 Four years later, I would see the outline of Mont-Saint-Michel appear in the distance on a drive from Rouen to Saint-Malo. It wasn't on my itinerary and I wasn't expecting to see it on our drive, but it felt like a sign from the universe telling me how far I had come. ✨ #lifewellwandered

Every sunny day in Paris, you’ll find terraces a

Every sunny day in Paris, you’ll find terraces and parks filled with people enjoying the weather. Once a summer in Paris, you’ll find yourself surrounded by just about every other Parisian and tourist alike walking the streets for the annual Fête de la musique, a celebration of music throughout the city that lasts through the night. Streets are filled with people, musicians, and artists in the best way possible. We went from bars to restaurants, from churches to quais, listening to every kind of music imaginable. Highlights included gospel music on the steps of a church, heavy metal in a neighboring café, and rap on the steps of Notre Dame. 🎼 At 2am, I was almost home. I had just gotten out of the metro and was walking quickly down the dark street that led to my apartment. Eyes forward, headphones in with no music playing. Six men sitting on a stoop whistled and made comments about my appearance. I was wearing longer jean shorts, combat boots, and a zipped-up olive green jacket. Not every night in Paris is magical. 🤷🏼‍♀️ #lifewellwandered

Because it was a major D-Day celebration and we bo

Because it was a major D-Day celebration and we booked this trip last minute, we didn’t actually have a place to sleep while we waited for our train back to Paris the next morning. 🌙 Instead, the four of us sat at a restaurant eating and drinking until it closed at 12, made friends with rowdy but friendly English sailors at a pub until 3am, and sat awkwardly in a discotheque with only the bouncer and a dancing older couple until around 4am. After, we curled up on the wooden seats at the train station, dozing off, and getting cricks in our necks until our train departed around 8:30am. If this was only a highlight reel, I wouldn’t mention the fact that I had a stomach bug during this and the only things holding me together were the one too many doses of Immodium and the train station bathroom that I propped open so I wouldn’t have to pay every time I needed to use it. 🤢 On the train ride back, I passed out from exhaustion, so much so that the poor businessman had to shove me awake when they came to check my train ticket and I found my glasses had fallen off my face and into my lap. Such a beautiful mental image, I know. 😴#lifewellwandered

One of the best parts about this newfound freedom

One of the best parts about this newfound freedom was the ability to take spontaneous trips with my new friends. The trips I grew up with were planned months in advance. This new style of travel, where we only purchased the transportation to/from the destination, was new and exciting. ✨ If you had told me before I left for Paris that I would decide to go to Normandy for the anniversary of D-Day without making any other plans besides buying the train ticket, I would’ve laughed in your face. Nevertheless, I hopped on a train to Caen and took a bus through rolling green fields to Ouisetreham and spent the day on the beach with hundreds of other people celebrating D-Day. 🚆 It was perfectly sunny and the beach was well stocked with people sunbathing and men in period uniforms. I wished I had brought a bathing suit instead of the jean shorts and button-up I was wearing. 🏖 #lifewellwandered

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