"He who does not travel does not know the value of men."
After being born in Philadelphia, for most of my life, I have lived in small town New Jersey. During my junior year of high school, I got my first taste of real traveling, when I went on a school trip sponsored by ACIS. It was a nice-day trip in which I visited London, Paris, the French Alps, and Switzerland along with about 20 of my fellow classmates. After graduating high school, I decided I needed a change of scenery from the Tomato-growing badlands of South Jersey and decided to attend college down South in Florida.
After 4 eventful, and some not so eventful years, I graduated the University of Tampa Class of 2010 with a Bachelor's Degree in International Business and Management, and a Minor in Procrastination. I moved back home after college and I am currently working for an industry leading telecommunications company in the Philadelphia Metropolitan area. In the fall of 2009, I studied abroad for a semester at Corvinus University of Budapest in Hungary, and traveled extensively throughout Europe during that time, concentrating on countries a little off the beaten path of student travelers, such as Croatia, Slovakia, Turkey, and Romania. I've also traveled to various countries in the Caribbean and Central America. Within the next 5 years, I aspire to travel around the world before obtaining a Master's degree in Australia. It will take a lot of patience and frugality, but this is something that I have been dreaming of for quite awhile now and plan on following through with it.
I derive a lot of my inspiration from various authors, be it Mark Twain, or more recently, Anthony Bourdain. Bourdain fascinates me with his love of explore not just what is on the surface, but to dig deep and uncover the inner workings of countries and cultures. Even though he mainly does this with regards to regional cuisine, I believe that it should be the attitude of all travelers when discovering a new and and exciting place. However, I too enjoy sampling new foods from around the world, and using a play on words from my study abroad destination, I came up with the name of my blog.
The first parts of my blog are documentation of what life was like for me during my study abroad trip, but what I hope to accomplish from now on with this blog is to document and share information and advice I take from my travels (I am planning multiple trips in 2011, as well a an "Ultimate" trip sometime after 2013), but also to just vent on everyday topics that interest me. I hope that whoever you are, you enjoy.
