I am still working on capturing in words why I love to travel and what motivates me to keep exploring. I have always liked the idea of my life being an endless quest to find “my city” and inevitably, this has led me on a journey over the past ten years that has spanned multiple continents and left me with five cities and counting which I lovingly think of as “home”, “second home”, or “home away from home” (depending on my mailing address at the time). Those cities are New York, Paris, Prague, Los Angeles, and Scottsdale. I don’t know if any of them are my final destination (“my city”) but each was pivotal in my growth this past decade.
These are the lessons I learned from them –
Paris
I like to think Paris raised me. When I was 18, I was given an incredible opportunity to matriculate into NYU’s Liberal Studies Program, which would allow me to spend my freshman year of college abroad. At the time of my acceptance, I had been strongly considering taking an Unconditional* offer to study Psychology at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland so I was already primed for a study abroad experience and having an option which did not require the cost of international student tuition was very appealing.
NYU gave me four options for my freshman year abroad: Paris, London, Florence, or Shanghai. While I had familiarity with London because my dad had lived there when I was in high school, I decided I wanted a challenge – I wanted an unfamiliar experience and I wanted to learn a new language at my destination. So London was out of the running. Shanghai seemed a little too unfamiliar and the degree of difficulty of language learning there (at this point, I had only studied English, Russian, and Spanish) sent it out of the question for me. How about Florence? Seemed too isolated… Paris it is 🙂
I was pretty tired of Paris when I left in June 2013 but I think of my time there fondly. When I arrived, I was still a child in many ways. For example, I struggled with independent activities – I always felt like I needed a friend with me when I ventured out or I wouldn’t be able to explore the city like I wanted to. It’s funny looking back on this period in my life because I have grown so significantly in this aspect of my character but at the time, it was a real weakness. My winter break in Paris, I found myself alone in the city for a few weeks – all of my student neighbors had gone home to visit family, I had stayed behind to host my sister and friends on visits. I remember sitting alone in my studio apartment (very lucky for a freshman, I know) feeling crippled by my inability to be independent and realizing that if I wanted to visit a museum or a market I had to go out and do it by myself. So I slowly began to venture out on my own.
My first jaunt was a walk to a farmers market near my neighborhood, Oberkampf. Headphones in, I strided over there and silently observed the day’s selection of fruits and vegetables. I didn’t buy anything but I’d made it there alone and that was good enough. Once I mastered that level, I moved on to the Louvre. Then the Musée Marmottan Monet and the list goes on and on. Over time, the sinking feelings of dread, awkwardness and loneliness I felt venturing out solo were replaced by an overwhelming sense of peace. You’re telling me I don’t have to plan around anyone else’s plans and desires? I can go to any restaurant I want to? Any museum I want to? Anytime I want?! What a magical power it was to be independent! And that’s why Paris raised me.
Soon I was ready for my next chapter. After 10 months in Paris, I was craving a faster-paced scene. I was ready to give up the leisurely three-hour-long café perches with a single espresso purchase and replace them with the hustle and bustle of New York City.
New York
And so my next chapter began. My sophomore year, I was placed in a two-bedroom dorm in Gramercy Green (a stunning residential high-rise on 23rd and 3rd) with three friends from my year at NYU Paris. I began working as a student employee in the Library department, walking at a brisk pace, glaring at strangers who tried to approach me, and perfecting my go-to bagel order (lightly toasted bagel with scallion cream cheese, tomato, and cucumber – for the lox bagel taste without the lox bagel price).
Some nights, I sat up watching acquaintances party it up on social media and felt disappointed that I wasn’t being invited to partake. Was I not fun? What was I missing? After many such nights spent feeling left out and racking my brain, it occurred to me: sometimes you have to be the one to take the initiative. Nobody was going to invite me because I wasn’t making an effort with them. I began to work on shedding my wallflower tendencies from there. I started reaching out to more people. I started initiating more conversation. And sure enough, over time, I was always getting the invite. New York taught me to be fearless and put myself out there. Eat or be eaten. Shove your way onto the subway car or be late again.
For a year and a half, I was full speed ahead in the New York mindset. I was always in a rush and no accomplishment was ever enough – I was always striving to be better. And then came Junior Spring semester, one of the most common times for study abroad programming at NYU. I chose Prague.
Prague
I got really lucky in Prague. My room was a quad – two bunk beds, four girls. Sounds like a nightmare in the making right? Somehow, a dream. The four of us developed a tight knit bond and due to the flexibility of no Friday classes on the Prague campus coupled with the dirt cheap Koruna (Czech currency), I was able to travel to 12 countries in one semester. Basically, one every weekend.
I’ll get to the lesson faster on this one: always say yes to adventure.
Los Angeles
I moved to Los Angeles in July 2017. I didn’t know anyone there and hadn’t visited in nearly a decade but I was in a risk-taking mood and eager to leave the anxiety and anger-inducing pace of post-grad life in New York City. So, with a job offer under my belt, I packed two suitcases and signed a lease and within a month, I was a Santa Monica resident**.
Coming from the hustle and bustle of New York City, Los Angeles was an adjustment. One of my best friends from college had flown in to help me move and we both reacted in shock and disgust when a man said hi to us on the street. Turns out he had been in our yoga class this morning and wanted to say “Hi”.. We thought he was trying to peddle his mixtape and pickpocket our wallets. Very different vibes on this coast.
Over time, I adapted to the contrasting friendliness and flakiness of the people of Los Angeles and suddenly, a year had flown by and it was time to renew my lease. Rather than renew my rent-controlled one-bedroom apartment (I know!!), I decided I wanted to move further inland. Why? Because remnants of my driven New York mentality had convinced me I had been living too close to the beach (20-minute walk to be exact). I bemoaned that this proximity to a haven of sand and ocean air was making me complacent. “I feel like I’m always on vacation”, I recall telling friends. Apparently, that was a bad thing in my mind. So off I went to a sublet room in the Fairfax district and while I really enjoyed that neighborhood, I came to realize maybe I’d made a mistake.
I never ended up renting in Santa Monica again but I still learned an important lesson: Sometimes living by the beach isn’t a bad thing.
Scottsdale
Fast forward to 2020. I was still living in Los Angeles and the Covid pandemic had spent months reshaping my mindset, lifestyle, and life plan. By the fall, I had come to the realization that it was time for a change of scenery. I had lived in LA for over three years at that point and I felt like I’d reached a ceiling of growth in that city. Not to mention, many of my friends had moved out of LA that year (most driven out by uncomfortable economic consequences from Covid), I was paying an unnecessarily high amount in rent just to sit in my room and work all day, and frankly, I was tired of putting on a mask just to go for a walk around the block.
That September, I ended up taking my newly leased car (a 2020 Mazda6, I love her) on a solo road trip out to Arizona. I had only visited the state once prior in February 2020 and I was ready to see more. I spent a few days in Scottsdale and a few in Tucson and suffice to say, I was charmed. I had also spent some quality time in San Diego the month prior and so I began researching apartments in San Diego and Scottsdale.
At the time, everyone thought we’d all be back in office in February 2021 (how wrong we all were) so I was looking for short term rental arrangements. Scottsdale ended up being more affordable than San Diego so I signed a three-month lease in December 2020, packed by Mazda6 to the brim, and sped off to Arizona with the intention of moving back to Los Angeles in February and finally getting to see all my co-workers in person again. As you may have figured out by now, I fell in love with Arizona and never left.
My initial plan here was to use Scottsdale’s comparative affordability to save money, pay off debts, and eventually launch a freelance marketing agency of my own. One of my first weeks in my new apartment, I picked up a little whiteboard at Target, hung it up in my office (the corner of my living room), and wrote on it “Don’t forget what you came here for”. Occasionally, I would find myself losing track of my goals, getting distracted by irrelevant dramas but I always found my way back by gazing up at the message on this whiteboard. My plans and goals have shifted since my initial move to Scottsdale but the motto remains the same: Don’t forget what you came here for.
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*In the UK university system, an Unconditional offer means you’ve met all the requirements for admission while a Conditional offer means you need to receive a certain grade on upcoming tests (like the AP exam) in order to secure your admission.
**I feel the need to clarify that I had planned for years to move to Los Angeles from New York so this wasn’t quite as psychotic leap of faith I make it seem here. I spent months specifically applying for jobs at companies with offices in both Los Angeles and New York, By luck (which included a healthy dose of networking and putting myself out there repeatedly), I ended up finding such a company which was willing to give me a job offer at their Los Angeles office with a higher salary (in lieu of a relocation bonus). It is true though that I moved within a month of receiving said job offer.