What does Christmas mean to you?

I've been having trouble answering that question this year. For many it is the joyfulness and happiness of holding those you love close to you. But for some of us the holiday season just isn't that simple this year. Finding joys in little things is important. Here are a few things that have made me smile this Christmas.

A perfect Christmas Dutch Baby

An ugly little tree

Frozen beauty

Generally I am a believer that love and beauty is all around us, and usually in the holiday season it is easy to find. This year I have had to search harder as many others I'm sure have. But I do believe that it is near.

Life back in th Northwest

As I was flying home from Germany back to Washington I became aware of just how much I would miss my adventurous lifestyle that I had adopted over the last few months. As I listened to Sigur Ros and looked out my window only to see Germany getting smaller and smaller below me I began to cry. When I landed in Iceland I honestly considered just not getting on my next flight and staying there for a while. That day I was filled with sadness as well as hope that someday I would go on another adventure that would be as fulfilling as this one has been.

Once I got to the states I was fortunate enough to see my dear friend Becca right away. I had missed her terribly and it made my heart happy to see her. However, when I saw her I had this feeling that we might be about to embark on some sort of travel again, but I was sadly mistaken.

I am back to real life.
Real life with all of its comforts and disappointments.
Real life with a job and warm friendly faces.
Real life with my own cozy bed and no excitement regarding where I will be sleeping.
Real life with delicious breakfast food but pretty lame pastries.
Real life with more clothing options and constantly feeling overdressed.
Real life with the holiday season and a lack of money.

As much as I am happy to be home so that I can see my family and friends but the culture shock is really not wearing off. I've been back for a week already and I just wish I was still roaming around living out of my bag wearing the same hobo-chic clothes day after day. I suppose I need to learn how to appreciate where I am instead of wishing I was somewhere else.

I'll work on that.

Berlin

As I was exploring the city of Berlin and listening to my tour guide tell me hundreds of interesting facts about the history of Germany and more specifically, about Berlin, I realized that Berlin might have been my favorite city and Germany my favorite country.
Just in the past 100 years the history of Germany has changed so much, they have gone through so many different forms of government that it is hard to keep it all straight.
From what I saw and from what I have heard, the city of Berlin is the most hip city in Germany. Full of young people and artists the city seems to never sleep and never become boring.

The picture above seems to be nothing but a starbucks coffee building, which sadly, are all over Europe.
But I was informed that this building used to be the Stasi police head quarters back when the East side of Berlin was communist controlled. We discussed how ironic it was for a group of people who were so against capitalism to now have their old building be taken over with one of the biggest corporations in the world.

The Berlin wall.
I found it funny that the wall that was once built to "protect" East Germany from the rest must now be protected from tourists who try and take pieces of this historical monument.

TV tower.

This memorial located on the ground of one of the main city squares in Berlin was created in memory of the famous book burning that took place during WWII.
The story of the book burning is basically that a few Nazi police went into the university in Berlin and encouraged the students to do their part in cleansing the country. The students then left the classroom and went to their own library and took all of the books written by Jewish authors and burnt them in the square.
Today there is a nonprofit group at the University that stands outside the school every day selling books that were written by the authors of the books that were burnt on that day.

The Holocaust museum in Berlin.

My cute little hostel in Berlin was a cozy place to stay even though my roommate situation caused one of the more awkward moments of my life.

Dresden

On my way from Berlin to Prague I was fortunate enough to stop into the city of Dresden for a few hours.
Only being in this city for a few short hours really wasn't enough to learn very much or
to see everything that I wanted to see;
but I was thankful to see what I could of this amazing city.

Although I do not know much about the history of this city, I do know that in 1945 it was bombed and it is estimated that up to 50,000 civilians were killed due to these bombs that were dropped on during the night.
The bombs caused the largest fire in Europe's history and the beautiful city was completely destroyed.
Everything was eventually rebuilt exactly as it was.

Walking around this city was an extremely strange feeling,
it was very similar to the way I felt at the concentration camp earlier on my trip. Being present in a place where so many innocent lives were lost is one of the most intense feelings that I can ever recall feeling and I couldn't help but notice the music of Sigur Ros playing in my head as I explored the town of Dresden.

Metting new people and ideas

While traveling you tend to meet a lot of interesting people.

Sometimes, you just click with a person that you just met; you might bond over something that seems so silly and small. And sometimes, you meet people who you have nothing in common with other than your current proximity.

Yesterday, the girls and I had coffee with an acquaintance from Bellingham who is now living in Paris. He pretty much just up and left his life in the states and took on language class in France, then got an apartment with a few French people, and is not making a living by giving people English lessons. I couldn’t help but think of how brave he is for doing what he is doing. Then I thought back on a girl who Becca and I met back in Germany who is from Canada and has been traveling for over a year. She finds a job in a bar and works until she has enough money to travel some more and then travels until she runs out of money and then finds another bar tending job. This also seemed very bold and very brave to me. These two individuals are only a few among so many that seem to be living such adventurous lifestyles and I am a bit jealous of them to be frank. I mean. All I have done is a little backpacking. I know it’s a big deal and it is quite exciting and I have loved every minute of it… well, perhaps not EVERY minute. But I guess meeting all of these people have just made me want to do more. I am Meghan and I am always craving a new adventure. That is all.

Today was the day that Becca left me.

It was bittersweet.

I realized today that Becca and I have spent everyday together, and almost every second of those days, for the past 6 weeks. That is a lot of time spent with the same person. I am proud to say that Becca and I are great travel companions. I am so sad that she is gone and I know that I will miss her, but I am also looking forward to having some adventures by myself. I think it will be a good growing experience for me and I hope to learn a lot along the way.

Goodbye my dear friend.

Paris, yet again

We did a bit of sight seeing in Paris during our stay this past weekend and our first stop was a famous cemetery, the name is escaping me at the moment. But, many famous people are buried there, like Simone de Beauvoir and Jean Paul Sartre. The tombstones were amazing and many of them from so long ago. It was strange to be in such a historical place.

Second we went to Luxemburg gardens.We sat in the sun on the lounge chairs and took fun photos in the gardens and by the fountains.

We went out to lunch which was far too expensive but it’s hard to avoid that in Paris.

Becca and I ventured out on our own to Versailles, the famous palace where Marie Antoinette lived as well as Louis the IV. Sadly, we got to the grounds at 17:00 which is when it closes, so we didn’t get to go inside but we saw the outside of the palace that was fenced in by a gold gate. From what we could see I’m sure it was amazing. Perhaps I will go back someday and see what I missed.

Going back to the cemetery that we visited here in Paris, I would just like to say a few words about my old friend Ben. Ben was an old family friend of mine who I have known since I was a child, and he was tragically killed a little over a week ago. I go this news the day before I visited this cemetery so as you can imagine it was quite emotional for me to be in such a location after learning of such awful news. As cliché as this might sound, I began thinking a lot that day of the people in our lives who we impact and get to know. I guess I just thought about how Ben and I were best friends when we were children but grew apart, as we were older. I hadn’t talked to him in years I think, but it doesn’t change the fact that he had a huge effect on my life. I remember wanting to be just like him when I was little, and I think he wanted to be a little like me too. I feel like I am rambling, but I guess that’s what happens when you have so many feelings running around inside and you don’t have the words to express them. I guess what I wanted to say was that, as shitty as this world is at times, we can all make an impact on the lives of others as they do in ours and hopefully it is a positive one.