Europe Musings: Closing Remarks

It has been almost nine months since I got back from my 24-day solo DIY Europe trip (this post is backdated). The euphoria should’ve faded. But, every time I write another Europe post, I can still feel the happiness. The euphoria wouldn’t die.

Everytime I come back from a trip, my “bubble of happy thoughts” gets bigger. After this trip, I’ve accumulated happy thought bubbles that I would rekindle forever. Random things remind me of random memories that occurred during my trip. As I blog my adventures, I am amazed that it really happened.

Why am I feeling so victorious?  This is one trip I’ve been aching to do forthe longest time. Now I finally did it. An idea was translated to numbers,saved and tracked in an excel spreadsheet, plotted and planned in another workbook then blessed with a stamp in my passport. After all the saving and planning, these finally translated into an actual experience, imprinted in my mind, immortalized in pictures.

The Colosseum in Rome.

I came home with a different perspective. I still love my family, friends and my country too but it feels like there’s a whole world out there that I could love too. After achieving an ambitious goal, I’ve realized I can do more. I can BE more.

As I eased back into reality, I was expecting that I’d do something outrageous and life changing: Like quit my job and spend the rest of my savings traveling around the world. The idea teased me lot when the travel bug bit me. But the thing is, I realized after my three-week backpacking stint, I longed for the comforts of having a routine. I missed my family, my friends, and yes, even the office.

As I sift through hundreds of work emails, I recognized that I valued the experience so much not just because I struck out places in my bucket list: the experience brought back BALANCE to my life. Travel is important to me not just because of the sights, values and lessons; it is important because it reinforced the reason why I am working. That I actually like my work, I just forget that sometimes. It is a life-long pledge to balance work and play. Equilibrium was restored.

As cheesy and as common as it sounds, I feel like I left a piece of me back there. Back in the canals of Venice, the shops in Paris, the streets in Amsterdam. I came back with a piece of those countries. Now what exactly can I do about those pieces? They will be bubbles of inspiration to do another equally ambitious trip.

Because of this success, I’ve been entertaining more ambitious ideas. Like getting a post graduate degree from an international school is not really that impossible anymore. If I’d like to work overseas, I could make that happen too.  The thing is, I have lots of ideas and I don’t know which one to pursue and which are just bold imaginations fueled by the trip.

Some dreams died while others are resurrected. On some days, the dead dreams come alive, and the live ones sleep for a while. I am still figuring out which should be what up to this day. It feels like I can accomplish something bigger for myself. I’ll do that, and get there eventually. Now, I am still basking in my victory. The whole Europe Experience is not easily forgotten.

A collage of my whole Europe trip. With the purple camera case.

My Oscar speech. Thanks to:

God. Thank you for blessing me with this experience. I’ve learned so much from it.

My family. Despite my crazy idea to do backpacking alone, they didn’t stop me.

My best friends, who were there to comfort me when I spilled tears over the first visa denial.

The regular posters in the European Tours thread in Girltalk. I’ve never met you personally, but you’ve been an important instrument in making my dream a reality. Planning became fun!

My work teammates, who shared the burden of my workload when I was gone.

And to all my readers. This blog came alive because of this trip. Your kind and encouraging comments fueled me to recall and write about my adventure.

Thank you very very much. *beauty queen wave*

To the dreamers out there, keep on dreaming. Save for it. Plan for it. The experience is worth every cent.

My theme song for this trip would be “No Boundaries” by Adam Lambert/ Kris Allen. The lyrics of each encouraging song reflect my journey. Cheeeeeeesy right? But I feel that it is so fitting in my whole experience.

Europe, I am definitely going back.