A Bit of Wisdom

The most meaningful lesson this city has taught me so far is that a sense of adventure is the greatest bond between people. I know that if I never shared these experiences with my fellow explorers, there would have been a piece of my life that was missing. Before this class, I knew about two people out of our whole group and as days pass, I'm getting to know more and more about the people I travel with. We all come from different walks of life; different ages, upbringing, interests, etc. but right now the greatest commonality we all have is a calling for the exploration of Athens.

My roomates and I

have special memories together than only the people in "The House of Athena" will understand. I know I never would have gotten to know these girls if it wasn't for the memories well all share with each other. One of the best ones so far is finding a way for all four girls to share ONE power adapter to get ready in the morning. As confusing and hectic it was to find time to pass the outlet converter to charge all our electronic devices, we all somehow made it work.

I cherish the memories that I share with these boys, especially the day we wandered around town and ran up a random hill only to find an amazing 360 degree view of Athens. It was the four of us that share this memory out of our entire class. Only the four of us can share the story of me wandering off like I always do with the three of them not far behind. We shared those moments of amazement as we saw breathtaking views as we ascended the hillside. There was hardly a trail that we followed, we just let our sense of adventure take control and it lead us to one of the most amazing viewpoints in Athens. It was only after we had spent some time at the top taking pictures and enjoying the view that there was a paved and much shorter path on the other side of the hill. It was a comical and breathtaking moment in my life that I will forever share with only these three other people.

I especially cherish the memories I share with these explorers. Let me give you the situation: separated from our group in the sketchy part of down with roughly about 45 minutes left of good sun before all mischief breaks loose, no phone or phone numbers to call, no map, and surrounded by a dozen different immigrant groups that speak little to no English. This was easily one of my living nightmares traveling abroad. Thankfully, we all worked together to find out where we are and how to get where we needed to be as well as keeping an eye out for our group that we needed to reunite with. Let's just say that for those couple of hours, we had to combine all of our knowledge of Athens (which was not much at that time) as well as our street smarts to get ourselves out of a scary situation. It was only when we wanted to get some snacks and coffee that we ran into them which is why everyone in the picture is smiling because the exhilarating but scary unknown portion of the adventure was over.

I guess out of all this jibberjabber, the point that I am trying to make is that it's important to value not only the experiences that you have, but also who you share them with. I would just like to say that this is one of the most exhilarating journeys of my life and I am honored to be sharing these memories and experiences with all of you.

Stay classy Athens and thanks for stopping by,

Khadijah