A few weeks ago, Adventurous Kate panned Barcelona. She felt utterly ambivalent about one of my favorite cities in the world. If you follow me on twitter, (hello to all 12 of you!) you know I initially felt very defensive, but reminded myself that my first days in Barcelona were less than idyllic. Regardless, I grew to love Barcelona dearly, and, for that reason, I felt the need to compile a top ten list. I studied abroad there for five months, and while I am by no means an expert on the city, I feel qualified to give you a few recommendations in no particular order. One: Eat tapas Spanish…
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Announcing…
The Great European Adventure! This is the trip that prompted the birth of this blog. It will be my first solo trip abroad, and I can’t wait. My itinerary is below, but let me stress that it is tentative. It outlines the plan for where I will go if I meet no one interesting who asks me to go elsewhere. This is where I’ll be if I never fall in love with a city and need to stay longer, and if I never hate a city and have to get out early—all of which seems very unlikely given what I’ve read on other travel blogs (see: China is what happens…
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Capital Pride
Who doesn’t love a good pride parade? With drag queens, marching bands, families, allies, gay cowboys, and countless political candidates hoping to snag “the queer vote”, DC’s pride celebration delivered an enjoyable afternoon this past weekend despite temperatures in the 90’s (around 35º C). Here are just a few photos: It does indeed.
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Adventures in Public Transit
I don’t like to ask for directions. Ever. And as a result, I try never to leave my house without a plan. Now, this does not mean I never wander or decide where to go serendipitously. I just plan to be serendipitous. In fact, one of my favorite things to do in a new city is meander down the streets, and look at architecture or find a secluded cafe, which I can pretend no tourist before me has ever encountered. I’m comfortable wandering down random side streets despite my discomfort with asking for help because I love maps and I fancy myself a person with a good sense of direction.…
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DC: First Impressions
Yesterday my housemate Lisa and I made our first venture into the city. I’ve visited DC before, but not in about 10 years. My 7th grade class took a three day field trip to DC, but mostly I remember visiting the FDR memorial in the rain and drama over who was rooming with who at the hotel. Needless to say, my experiences this time around are a little different. Lisa and I weren’t up for a Smithsonian or too much sightseeing. We just wanted to wander around and get dinner, so we took the metro to Dupont Circle, a neighborhood in Northwest DC, which is known in part for its queer-friendly…
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On the move
This post is coming at you from my new apartment via stolen internet. Thank god for people who still don’t put passwords on their wireless networks. (Don’t worry, I have no intention of stealing my neighbors’ wifi forever–Verizon is just having trouble activating the internet in my apartment.) Lack of consistent internet aside, this has been a busy week. It started on Tuesday with packing up my apartment in Boston. Then I spent one day at home in Rhode Island getting coffee with friends, visiting the ocean, and packing my bags to move to DC for the summer. Because I took the train down to move into my apartment, and…
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Just a little more information about New Hampshire
I hope you find this enlightening and informative.
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I’m a New Englander, btdubs
Tomorrow morning I’m heading to New Hampshire for a few days at a lakeside cabin with five of my friends from high school. Four years ago, before we all went away to college, we spent a weekend at this cabin talking about our hopes and fears for the future, reading aloud from terrible romance novels, and swimming in the lake. Now that we’ve graduated from college, we’re returning to the cabin to do it all over again. I was born and raised in Rhode Island (which is the smallest state in the US, and which I will surely talk more about later) and I’ve spent the last four years at…
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Graduation
Yesterday I graduated from Tufts University, and as a (very) recent college grad, many people are concerned and curious about what I’m doing next. Luckily, I landed a fellowship in Washington, D.C. for the summer, so I have a response. I sound fairly legitimate when I say I’ll be working for the US Department of Education, and then I tell people that I’ll see what happens after the summer is over. But the truth, which I’ve been unwilling to share with many people for fear they won’t understand, is that I know what I’m doing when the summer is over, and I have known for a while. I’m traveling. For…