Julia's Journeys

This week... I was reminded travel isn't always pretty. Sometimes it's quite disastrous. This post will not be my usual travel destination post where I write about cool landmarks and history to include the occasional academic pizazz. Rather, I'll tell you how a weekend of mostly unfortunate events taught me about traveling and about myself. Not to worry though; of course there is some food content. I'm always eating. There was a Facebook post advertising a sponsored trip strictly for students enrolled in this study abroad program - not my program but the European version. The trip was for students abroad in Bulgaria to go by bus for a weekend in Istanbul, one of the top two cities I wanted to visit this semester. I convinced myself to sign up because we would have a professional guide, and I felt it would be relatively easy. My friend Claire and I signed up on Facebook and told our friends. A total of twelve of us signed up to go together - how fun! We were added to a g...

The past two weeks... This is the third and final full month of classes. The end is in sight, which is extremely sad. It's been a chaotic time of both planning and realization. We are all trying to squeeze in every last minute together with this study abroad family we've formed.  Let's catch up... Within these two weeks, we celebrated a friends birthday, got our first win in the soccer league (4-2), and got stranded at a train station for a couple hours. Fun times. Everyone is trying to plan out our last few weeks, and at this point, I still had two more trips to go on before finals. And some exciting news: I'll be spending a couple of weeks after finals traveling around Europe with my Arkansas roommates! While booking flights and stays I've watched COVID restrictions ease up. The pandemic has resulted in loss in many aspects. Additionally, traveling during the past two years has been difficult for everyone, but it seems that the world is beginning to heal. Entry re...

This week... This edition of Dickmans in Europe has come to an end. For the third and final leg of our adventure, we drove three hours back to Blagoevgrad, so I could return to class. We stayed in a great Airbnb just north of the city center.  The parking situation, however, was tricky. To pay for overnight street parking, you're supposed to text a Bulgarian phone number and pay 1 lev per hour. Pretty neat system, but there is a flaw. This only works for Bulgarian phone numbers. The men woke up to a boot on the van, but then paid a guy 10 leva to get the boot off.  Since classes resumed this week, so did the soccer league. Thanks to Coach Matt's superb scheduling, my family was able to watch this week's game. They must've been some sort of good luck charm because this was our first non-loss; we tied 3-3! Hearing the familiar cheering from my parents brought some normalcy and also the sad realization that this fall back home is the 18th and last year they'll be cheer...

This week... For the second leg of the Dickmans in Europe adventure, we took our van on a 430 kilometer journey to Thessaloniki, a coastal city in northern Greece. Thessaloniki is the second biggest city in Greece behind Athens. We stayed in Nea Irakleia, a tiny beach and farm town 30 minutes south of the city center. My first visit to Greece couldn't have been better. I Learned... White Tower The most prominent structure in Thessaloniki is the White Tower located on the waterfront. It was built in the 15th century after Thessaloniki fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1430. It's been called many different names and has served different functions over the centuries including a station for the Ottoman janissaries, a prison, and an execution building. In 1883, its blood-stained walls were painted white, and it was renamed the White Tower, putting its horrific past behind it and becoming a new symbol for the city. White Tower Ancient Agora In the center of Thessaloniki are the remains o...

This week... My family came to Bulgaria! This trip was the third edition of Dickmans in Europe (surname Dick plus surname Eastman, you get it), and we had a blast. I met them after they landed in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. I played tour guide as we visited the main attractions, which are listed in my post about my first trip to Sofia , and we attended a local football game at Balgarska Armia Stadium. On the third day we picked up our rental 9-passenger stick shift van and headed out east to Plovdiv, one of the most culturally and historically rich towns in Bulgaria. We stayed in an Airbnb in the Kapana neighborhood. Kapana translates literally to "The Trap," which is what the area is known as because it is lively and bustling with shops and restaurants for the tourists. When we arrived, we realized the four bedroom Airbnb I had rented was actually an entire hostel. That's how cheap things are in Bulgaria. I Learned... Old Town Plovdiv is the oldest continually inhabi...