Up, Up, and Away

I´m a little brain dead after my five hour red-eye flight from Las Vegas to Orlando. Not only were we taxiing for all eternity, I was also the lucky gal to be seated in front of a child, screaming his lungs out, in Portuguese.

Other than that, I don´t think I´ve had so much fun on a flight. I use the term¨"fun" loosely, though. Speeding off a tarmac with a full view of everything from MGM to Mandalay is quite a view(for a city-scape anyway). It gets even better when you´re hovering around the tip of the Eiffel Tower. =)

Being above the lights and below the stars is always the best part of the trip. It´ s the point when you try to prepare for whatever you may run into. Whether you´re traveling for work, leisure, solo, or in an obnoxiously large tour bus, you have expectations. But not knowing anything about your destination and shedding any preestablished stereotypes before your arrival can end up being incredibly rewarding. You get to dive into a place that probably won´t share your  views on life, that´ll challenge your religious affiliation, that´ll test your ability to communicate without a common spoken language. It´s challenging, but maybe that´s why people are traveling now more than ever.  Forget about advancements in technology and globalisation and such; travelers do what they do to be challenged. It takes a certain type of person to accept constant criticism and to be confortable in completely unfamiliar environments.

 Then your little daydream of hearts and flowers bursts when you get off the plane and in sets jetlag.

And then you have to run to catch the last train of the night and because it´s Sunday (or some sacriligious event) everything is closed so you can´t eat until Wednesday. Good luck. You get out of the train station to see gypsies and some southeast asian man is yelling at you in his languge for directions. blah, blah, blah. Some series of unfortunate events will inevitably occur. So many love to think about the "romantic" sides of traveling but rarely do they think about the less-publicized sides of travel. The people who can come out of a travel-fiasco without being scarred for life are the ones who get the most from the experience. People who shake off the teachings of their cultures and go to the unknown are real travelers, the one´s who go around looking for something to sink their teeth into (North Americans all too often exempt countries like Albania, Montenegro, Bulgaria from their European travel plans because it doesn´t have some place as beaten into as Las Vegas, Barcelona, Paris, etc.). (I major in hospitality management. I should really try to be less sinical about touristy cities...).

Anyway, I´m offically a Disney Cast Member. I´ll be working Food and Beverage at All Star Music. I just train this week. Work starts next Monday. Time to make some magic.