Why I Travel

I read this piece at the DearBearWolf launch party at Mammal Gallery on May 13, 2014. If you haven't yet, check out ATL-based DearBearWolf here.

We woke up at 3 a.m., jet-lagged from a way too long flight across the ocean. I almost threw my phone across our tiny hotel room as I barely opened my eyes. But I manage to convince myself that waking up was worth it as he gets up and gets ready. I manage to search the internet for a phrase translation and write it on the back of a crumbled food receipt from the night before. The cold air hits my face as we stumble outside to catch a cab and it hurts more than it should have. Is there a word in another language that explains the state of being awake prior to having a caffeinated beverage? As I take my first bite of sushi that hasn’t been outside of the ocean but mere hours, I thought about how glad I was that I woke up today.

We found our way to the water, next to a marsh. We sat on the ground for what seemed like an eternity. We were cold, but we kept moving to make sure we stayed warm. He ventured down the hill to make sure we haven’t missed them, due to the light pollution. In a blink of an eye, they appeared. The northern lights were dancing in the sky for us. A tear traveled down my cheek as we watched them dance.

After walking for eight hours around a historic city with a terrible past, we approached the train station to continue our journey. My stomach grumbled as we took our belongings out of the locker and I asked if we should eat. The yellow light of the train station illuminated the food stalls on the sides of the long, wide hallway. We walked under an escalator and saw an elderly Japanese man standing outside his small restaurant with no sign or name. We walked in and he showed us what he was offering in his own language. After a few hand gestures, we sat down across a warm bowl of soup. The homemade noodles and broth were rich with flavors my taste buds have never experienced. We ate until we saw the bottom of the bowl. To this day, it is the best bowl of ramen I’ve ever had.

We arrived to this beach-side hostel after eight hours of traveling in a very crowded bus in the middle of the night. We went to sleep right away. I woke up, no longer car sick, as a soft mist landed on my face. It was around 5 a.m. and you could see the first rays of the sun out of the horizon. I quickly put on my shoes and ran two miles to the shore. I hate running, but in that moment, all that mattered was for my eyes to meet those sun rays. I sat on the moist sand and ran my fingers through it. I watched the sunrise by the still, quiet ocean and after, jumped into the cold water with clothes and all. I felt alive and welcomed by this town in the middle of our continent.

I read in the New York Times last week that people are happier during the planning and anticipation stage of their trip than when they are actually at the destination. I call bullshit. At least for me.

Happiness for me is eating my way through a new city.  Happiness is having an escape from your daily reality, while boarding a machine that defies physics every day. Planes are pretty weird that way.

Happiness is escaping our routines, contemplating things we couldn’t before and consider obscure possibilities – as we walk through crowded streets and listen to languages different from our own. I travel because I need to. Just like being a writer and needing to get these words out on a daily basis. I travel because your mind transforms when you are away from home – it’s bottled up creativity, knowledge and experiences.

Travel is a passion, an obsession. It’s a priority. For me. The excitement of feeling like an explorer, being spontaneous, discovering history and the connection of it all — it makes you more human. Robert Louis Stevenson said “For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go.  I travel for travel’s sake.  The great affair is to move.”

That’s why I travel.

An Oahu Road Trip with Gypsy Guide

The day after we went scuba diving we rented a car to explore the island. Oahu is the third largest island of all of the Hawaiian Islands. However, you can drive around the island, with stops included, in about 8 hours. The night before we downloaded the Gypsy Guide for Oahu – a really awesome self-drive tour iPhone/Android app that provides you with cool historic bits as you drive around the island. It tells you where to stop and what's next (including driving directions) since it's based on your global positioning. You can buy it at the App Store, plug it into your auxiliary port (or in our case, turn up the volume really high) and start driving! We rented a cute Fiat from Enterprise for the day.

We stayed right next to Diamond Head so we started our driving tour there. We were going to stop at Pearl Harbor, but that particular day was sold out. If you plan to visit the Memorial, get tickets well in advance! They sell out fast and there's no guarantee you'll get a free one on site. You can get them here. So instead we got on the highway and headed to the Dole Plantation!

We ate Dole Whip and walked around the gift shop. We didn't take the Plantation tour, we heard it was overrated. If you went, what did you think?

We hopped on the car and drove past so many fields. Hawaii is so beautiful. The weather was breezy and kinda warm – enough to keep the windows down. We headed up to the North Shore. We stopped at Matsumoto for their famous shaved ice. We got the guava-flavored shaved ice. It was delicious and the perfect (first) snack for the drive.

After passing the surf shops, we arrived at one of the many beaches, parked and walked over to the sand. We walked over rocks and around the shore. The cloudy day was definitely feeding my soul. It was the perfect temperature.

As we headed out of the area, I spied a shrimp truck in a gas station and no, it wasn't the famous Giovanni's. It was a giant blue truck that would quickly change our life. [I mean, I just told Alex if he remembers it and he closed his eyes and sighed. It's that good!] We stopped at the Blue Water Shrimp Truck and got a garlic shrimp plate to share. The plate was huge — packed with rice, pineapple and delicious shrimps with an amazing sauce on top. If you're ever in the area, make sure to stop by. You won't regret it! We pondered on getting more, but we knew we had more shrimp trucks after this.

Our next stop was Turtle Beach, where sea turtles hang out by the shore and you can see them up close. There's a volunteer group that keeps an eye on tourists and makes sure that no one disturbs them, but you can still get really close. To get there, you park on the side of the road and cross the street to the beach. It's really easy to get to and the app tells you when you get there as there's no sign.

We stopped at Giovanni's Shrimp Truck for another snack and it was a bit underwhelming. The shrimp were chewy, small and didn't have much flavor. It was much more expensive for way less food. I know this is a popular stop but I personally did not think it lived up to the hype.

My favorite stop of the tour was Lai'e Point. We parked our cars and saw the large islet in the distance with a giant hole in it. The waves in this area are large and powerful. The fog made everything better. I'm a huge fan of cloudy, rainy days so I'm glad it turned out that way.

We skipped the Polynesian Cultural Center and stopped at the Chinaman's Hat. Since it was raining at this point, none of the pictures came out. Our next and last stop was the Byodo-In Temple. It was pouring by the time we got there. Even then, I'm glad we stopped. The temple was built in 1968 to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the first Japanese immigrants to Hawaii. It made us nostalgic for our Japan trip.

We got back around 5 p.m. and returned our car to Enterprise. (Pro tip: Just rent your car for one day at a time since parking fees in Hawaii are crazy high! We used Kayak to rent ours for about $35/day) That night we stopped for some ramen at Marakame Udon. It was a delicious and cheap treat! I strongly recommend Gypsy Guide for your Oahu road trip since you can stop whenever and enjoy the scenery. It was nice to see the island without the pressure of a group tour.

Have ever done a road trip in Hawaii or elsewhere in the world? 

Read more about our scuba diving experience in Oahu here and how we found cheap tickets to Hawaii here. 

These pictures were taken on February 2014. You can download Gypsy Guide here.

NYC | Mood Fabrics

At the end of April, I booked a random trip to NYC with my friend Diana. Well, not that random — she wanted to go fabric shopping and what better place than New York City. She opened an Etsy shop after we took some sewing classes together and needed more fabric for her scarves.

It rained most of the time we were there but on Friday, we hit the ground running and went over to Mood Fabrics. You may recognize this store from every reality show competition dealing with design, including Project Runway. It's a really awesome place. It looks small from the outside, but it's two floors full of rolls and rolls of fabric, ribbon and entire walls of buttons and zippers. Here are few pictures from our fabric adventure.

These photos were taken on May 2014.

Nishiki Market + Cooking class in Kyoto

One of our favorite things to do when we are home is to cook. Alex is really into grilling, smoking meats and cooking big meals for our friends. For me, I love baking -- as you can see from my blog, I'm kinda obsessed with baking pies. So when we travel, we try to eat everything and learn how things are made so we can try to replicate them at home. In Atlanta, we have this amazing street called Buford Highway, where we can find all kinds of ingredients from all over the world. We are really lucky to have it. Naturally, when we went to Kyoto we signed up for a cooking class. After much researching, we settled on Taro's cooking class. He offered to teach us how to cook miso soup from scratch, other side items and best of all, KOBE BEEF. Real Kobe beef is hard to find despite several restaurants saying they offer it. Kobe beef comes from a specific strain of wagyu cattle, raised in the Hyogo Prefecture.  It's famous for its beautiful marbling (the high quality fat melts at room temperature!) and flavor. The beef goes through several inspections and must meet specific requirements -- where they are raised, who are the parents and slaughtered only at specific slaughterhouses. Due to the strict nature of the process, a lot of producers, especially in the U.S., cross a wagyu cow with an angus cow and call it "Kobe style beef." But it's not the same! Not at all. Let's just say that all of those requirements are worth it because that beef was AMAZING.

We signed up for the optional Nishiki Market tour before the cooking class. It was nice to have someone to tell us what everything was! Taro met us there with another couple and he picked up the ingredients for our class as we walked around.

An old lady came up to me and offered me this octopus with a quail egg in its head. When in Kyoto, right? It was so good!

After our walk around the market, around 2 hours, we took the bus to Taro's house. His wife and the cutest kid I've ever seen welcomed us into their house. Seriously though, the little kid was dressed up as Sailor Moon. Be still my heart. Their house is SO beautiful. We really felt like home there.

Our class was small, about 6 couples -- all from different parts of the world. We sat around a table as Taro explained to us the menu and the origin of Kobe beef. He even showed us the certificate for the beef we were going to eat that day and checked it online. Then we moved over to his kitchen and he asked for volunteers as we cooked the menu. Except for the Kobe beef -- he cooked that himself as that particular piece was over $100!

Taro's daughter was such a little helper

Kobe beef with its certificate.

The final result!

Taro's class was definitely one of the highlights of our trip. He speaks English really well, his family is so welcoming and his knowledge of the ingredients helped us understand Japanese culture a little more. I would suggest adding the optional Nishiki Market tour, it's a real treat. Plan to be there a whole afternoon, until about six. You can book your class here, with Kobe beef or vegetarian.

Have you ever taken a cooking class in another country? If so, where?

These photos were taken in October 2013.