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    19 Year Old World Traveler: Real Life Journey of a 19 Year Old Who Traveled the World in 225 Days, Visiting 13 Countries, and Making Lots of New Friends!
    19 Year Old World Traveler: Real Life Journey of a 19 Year Old Who Traveled the World in 225 Days, Visiting 13 Countries, and Making Lots of New Friends!
    19 Year Old World Traveler: Real Life Journey of a 19 Year Old Who Traveled the World in 225 Days, Visiting 13 Countries, and Making Lots of New Friends!
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    19 Year Old World Traveler: Real Life Journey of a 19 Year Old Who Traveled the World in 225 Days, Visiting 13 Countries, and Making Lots of New Friends!

    By HowExpert

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    What began as a wild idea turned into the adventure of a lifetime - this is the story of how I traveled around world at age 19, and who I met on the journey. Cult members and college students, chainsmokers and cameramen, this story recounts a slew of traveling adventures and misadventures. It’s about holding your cool while detained in airports, extreme and convoluted economizing, and getting lost at all hours of the night. It includes everything from hitchhiking at 5am to trying on a 1140 dollar dress on a dare. Gratitude and wonder are the hallmarks of my voyage, both for the opportunity to see and experience iconic sites (Louvre, Great Wall of China, Leaning Tower of Pisa) but also for the chance to meet so many wonderful people (and some strange ones, too). It’s being overwhelmed in the Vatican and petting kangaroos on Mount Fuji, but it’s also making friends on airplanes and being so engrossed in conversation that you don’t notice an entire night slip away. This 225-day adventure was the fruit of months of planning, years of working, and a lifetime of dreaming – and no amount of preparation could have helped me anticipate all the outlandish and lovely experiences that awaited me along the way.

    • A trip around the world in 225 days described in about 25,000 words.
    • This story spans three continents, beginning/ending in Philadelphia, PA and going through Hawaii, Japan, China, Vietnam, England, Whales, France, Italy, the Vatican, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Hungary. It includes places that were familiar to me (Hawaii, Japan) and places that were brand new and overwhelming (e.g. the Vatican).
    • Everywhere I went, I managed to be both awed and a little homesick – not just for my home, but for the places and people I had already left behind.
    • Some places I spent more time in than others, so some places get two chapters (France) while other countries share (e.g. Belgium, the Netherlands, and Hungary).
    • The book is a balance between funny stories/encounters, descriptions of people, and descriptions of the places I visited/sites I saw. It includes stories of both good things that happened as well as some set-backs (including a lot of time spent lost, friction in some relationships, mistakes I made...)
    • The narration is in the first person, in the past tense, and the stories are based on a combination of my travel-journal and my recollections. As such, the perspective is of me, 22 year-old Briana, looking back on the actions of my 19 year-old self. Rather than just being a summary of events, the benefit of 2 years separation allows for quite a bit of reflection about the lessons I learned along the way.

    HowExpert publishes quick 'how to' guides on unique topics by everyday experts.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHowExpert
    Release dateFeb 9, 2019
    ISBN9781949531824
    Author

    HowExpert

    HowExpert publishes quick 'how to' guides on all topics from A to Z by everyday experts.

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      Book preview

      19 Year Old World Traveler - HowExpert

      19 Year Old World Traveler

      Real Life Journey of a 19 Year Old Who Traveled the World in 225 Days, Visiting 13 Countries, and Making Lots of New Friends!

      HowExpert with Briana Grenert

      Copyright HowExpert™

      http://www.HowExpert.com

      For more tips related to this topic, visit www.HowExpert.com/travel.

      Recommended Resources

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      COPYRIGHT, LEGAL NOTICE AND DISCLAIMER:

      COPYRIGHT © BY HOWEXPERT™. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WORLDWIDE. NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM OR BY ANY MEANS, INCLUDING SCANNING, PHOTOCOPYING, OR OTHERWISE WITHOUT PRIOR WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER.

      DISCLAIMER AND TERMS OF USE: PLEASE NOTE THAT MUCH OF THIS PUBLICATION IS BASED ON PERSONAL EXPERIENCE AND ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE. ALTHOUGH THE AUTHOR AND PUBLISHER HAVE MADE EVERY REASONABLE ATTEMPT TO ACHIEVE COMPLETE ACCURACY OF THE CONTENT IN THIS GUIDE, THEY ASSUME NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR ERRORS OR OMISSIONS. ALSO, YOU SHOULD USE THIS INFORMATION AS YOU SEE FIT, AND AT YOUR OWN RISK. YOUR PARTICULAR SITUATION MAY NOT BE EXACTLY SUITED TO THE EXAMPLES ILLUSTRATED HERE; IN FACT, IT'S LIKELY THAT THEY WON'T BE THE SAME, AND YOU SHOULD ADJUST YOUR USE OF THE INFORMATION AND RECOMMENDATIONS ACCORDINGLY.

      THE AUTHOR AND PUBLISHER DO NOT WARRANT THE PERFORMANCE, EFFECTIVENESS OR APPLICABILITY OF ANY SITES LISTED OR LINKED TO IN THIS BOOK. ALL LINKS ARE FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY AND ARE NOT WARRANTED FOR CONTENT, ACCURACY OR ANY OTHER IMPLIED OR EXPLICIT PURPOSE.

      ANY TRADEMARKS, SERVICE MARKS, PRODUCT NAMES OR NAMED FEATURES ARE ASSUMED TO BE THE PROPERTY OF THEIR RESPECTIVE OWNERS, AND ARE USED ONLY FOR REFERENCE. THERE IS NO IMPLIED ENDORSEMENT IF WE USE ONE OF THESE TERMS.

      NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED, STORED IN A RETRIEVAL SYSTEM, OR TRANSMITTED BY ANY OTHER MEANS: ELECTRONIC, MECHANICAL, PHOTOCOPYING, RECORDING, OR OTHERWISE, WITHOUT THE PRIOR WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR.

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      THIS PUBLICATION IS DESIGNED TO PROVIDE ACCURATE AND AUTHORITATIVE INFORMATION WITH REGARD TO THE SUBJECT MATTER COVERED. IT IS SOLD WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT THE AUTHORS AND PUBLISHERS ARE NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING LEGAL, FINANCIAL, OR OTHER PROFESSIONAL ADVICE. LAWS AND PRACTICES OFTEN VARY FROM STATE TO STATE AND IF LEGAL OR OTHER EXPERT ASSISTANCE IS REQUIRED, THE SERVICES OF A PROFESSIONAL SHOULD BE SOUGHT. THE AUTHORS AND PUBLISHER SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ANY LIABILITY THAT IS INCURRED FROM THE USE OR APPLICATION OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS BOOK.

      COPYRIGHT BY HOWEXPERT™ – ALL RIGHTS RESERVED WORLDWIDE.

      Table of Contents

      Recommended Resources

      Before Embarking…

      Chapter 1: Hawaii-nei

      Chasing Sunsets

      Hiking Adventures

      Reflections

      Chapter 2: Japan

      Kansai

      Tokyo

      Hokkaido

      Reflections

      Chapter 3: China

      Beijing

      Shanghai

      Reflections

      Chapter 4: Vietnam

      Hồ Chí Minh City

      The Mekong

      Vũng Tàu

      Reflections

      Chapter 5: The United Kingdom

      London

      Cardiff

      Reflections

      Chapter 6: France I

      Impressions of Paris

      The People You Meet

      The Good

      The Bad

      The Bizarre

      School and Program

      Reflections

      Chapter 7: France II

      Île-de-France

      L’Alsace

      La Bretagne and La Normandie

      Reflections

      Chapter 8: Italy and the Vatican

      Bergamo and Milan

      Rome and the Vatican

      Tuscany

      Reflections

      Chapter 9: Everywhere Else

      Brussels

      Amsterdam

      Budapest

      Reflection

      Disembarking

      About the Expert

      Recommended Resources

      Before Embarking…

      We’re going on a journey together, across time and memory as much as oceans and continents. 2019 has just come ‘round, welcomed with all the fanfare and fireworks of a Hawaiian New Years (Hauoli Makahiki Hou!). I was surrounded by family and friends, and that joyful noise.

      I could not help but remember another New Years, two years ago, when I stood pressed in a suffocating crowd craning to get a glimpse of the comparatively meek and subdued fireworks off the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. That year, my belly had been filled with my (delicious if failed) attempt to bake cake with only semolina, milk, eggs and sugar in my friend’s microwave. It had been snowing lightly. The start of 2017, that nouvelle année had marked the beginning of the end of a very long adventure. Less than two weeks later, I was to finish my more than half-year journey around the world.

      On January 13th at 11pm I arrived a Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. I was weary and awed after seeing 36 cities in 12 countries on 3 continents (plus Hawaii-nei). I traveled in the US, Japan, China, Vietnam, England, Wales, France, Italy (and the Vatican), the Netherlands, Belgium, and Hungary. The voyage took me 225 days, 17 flights and 21 intercity buses. I rode all the lines of the Paris Metro end to end (that’s 206.8 kilometers/128 miles), visited 32 churches/cathedrals, and was lost more often than not.

      I’m kind of joking about the being lost most of the time thing. But only kind of. Because, to be honest, I’m always at least slightly lost when I’m not home, on Oahu. I grew up always having the mountains and the ocean to guide me – going anywhere where I can’t see one or the other is inherently risky and uncomfortable. Traveling – circumnavigating – was worth any trepidation I might have felt, though. And it was worth every hour it took to earn the money to go.

      Here, now, are the adventures of a naïve nineteen-year-old and how I grew a little wiser with every person I found along the way.

      Chapter 1: Hawaii-nei

      Perhaps it seems strange to start an epic trip around the world by voyaging home, but home is the land that nourishes me and formed me. I went to college almost 5,000 miles from Kailua, to a place where people talked strangely and ate different food and had strange customs. That experience of living for an extended period of time on the East Coast prepared me well for potential culture shock…and living with continual homesickness. Still, there were people I needed to see and places I needed to go (and food I needed to eat) to fortify myself, to thrive away from home. After leaving Hawaii in early July, I would not return again until late May of the next year.

      Chasing Sunsets

      I’ve lived in the same cedar duplex all my life, with my parents. My family, on my dad’s side, first came to Hawaii with my great-grandfather: he was a captain in the navy, and the conductor for the president’s band in the territory of Hawaii. My grandmother grew up, here: she remembers the planes flying over during Pearl Harbor, and she learned to swim in Waikiki back when there were only two hotels. When she was a teenager, she moved to the mainland where she stayed until she had children of her own. Once they were reared, she came back here which eventually brought both my father and uncle to the islands.

      My mother, on the other hand, was the magnet for her family: she came here from New Jersey for graduate school to escape the snow and never left. My aunty moved to Hawaii thirty years ago to follow her, and my grandfather retired here to be near his daughters. Half my cousins, like me, were born and raised here.

      In addition to my biological family, I grew up surrounded by my calabash cousins and a whole host of hanai aunties and uncles who I needed to see before I set out on my adventures. There were also, of course, my friends and hiking buddies. While

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