The not-so-lonely Planet

During the last seven years I've had the fortune of visiting 64 cities in 10 countries, or so TripAdvisor tells me. It's not much, but it's a start. I can't even begin to describe what travelling means to me. It's a reason to live. Period.

The very first time I was away in a foreign country, was October 2003, when I came to Germany as a student for one semester. It was one of the best experiences of my life. I remember dragging two large suitcases, one fully packed back-pack and a handbag he size of aforementioned suitcases (all weighing approx. 30 kilos) at the airport. I got on a train for the first time in my life accompanied by my fellow students. As the carriages sped through the German landscape, I watched out the window speechless. I wasn't as awestruck by what I saw, but by the fact that it was all new and different! I remember pointing at the houses and telling my friends "Look at the rooftops, aren't they pretty? They're sooo German". Of course back then I didn't really know what "sooo German" was, but that didn't matter.

 The second trip I took to a foreign country was Luxembourg. One of the things that impressed me the most was a magnificent tower in a castle that looked a lot like the one Rapunzel might have dropped her ridiculously extravagant pony-tail down from. I later found out that it was actually a bank, like most buildings in Luxembourg. After the initial disenchantment I decided I didn't care. It was still beautiful!

There are no ways to describe my state of mind when I board on a plane or get in the car for a trip some place new. I'm high on adrenaline, endorphins and whatever other chemicals my body produces when I land somewhere I've never been before.

"Road" sign in Sicily...

Even the slightest things are hilarious, like trying to cross a street in England. This goes something like: I look to the left, I look to the right and then run for my life. I can never tell where the cars are going to come from.

Or facing the inside of a Spanish tapas bar for the first time, where the floor looks as if napkins and cigarette butts fell in love, had amazingly messy sex and popped out many little babies that went on reproducing. I was told that it's considered to be a good thing if the place looks like a pig sty: it means that it's popular and the remnants of the day show how many people visited it...go figure.

I can't wait to open my wings and fly across the ocean, to see, touch, taste, smell, and hear even more. I dream of busy metropolises, sandy beaches with palms, big museums, picturesque little villages and alternative night clubs. And on that note I will now go to sleep and count sheep until I find myself dreaming of those things. Good night and good luck.

Me

I am a 27-year old writer trapped in the body of a translator (not the kind that translates Martin Amis and Philip Roth, but the one that deals with sentences like "silane-modified polymers" and "put screw 1 into hole 2" - not as exciting as it sounds I can assure you...)