Using Facebook to Travel

          Facebook is truly a place to share your life with others. I’m not talking in a creepy or stalking way but in a way that is educational for others. Over the last four years of college I’ve had numerous Facebook friends go on study abroad who have had experiences that will last them a lifetime. Although, I missed them while they were gone, at the same time I’m glad that Facebook exists. Through Facebook, my best friend, who had gone abroad our entire junior year, could share her story with me as it happened. I saw pictures from her first day of school, her visiting monuments and museums, her at coffee shops, and even photos of her out at night with her friends she had made there. Facebook makes it possible to feel like you are right there, sharing an experience that you are not actually apart of at all. You can essentially travel to all these different places without every having to leave your bedroom.

          Over these past few years I’ve seen pictures of the Eifel Tower in France, beautiful graffiti walls in Prague, my sorority sisters in front of the Trevi Fountain in Italy, the beaches in Barcelona, Spain, the city of Budapest in Hungary, and even pictures of one of my fellow PR majors in Romania, my favorite country. As I click through their hundreds of pictures of their time abroad, I can only imagine myself in each one of the pictures, wishing that I had gone abroad.

          It is truly crazy that Facebook can share a story like this. Through the pictures, statuses, likes, check-ins, and updates, a person can really feel like they are somewhere they aren’t. The Internet has made it easy to travel without ever having to look up from your computer screen. I know I browse through pictures of all over Eastern Europe, just hoping that one day I can actually visit these places that I Google. 

A Boy's First Secret Santa

        The first time I ever participated in a Secret Santa was Kindergarten. I loved the overall secret and the exchange of presents when I was a five year old with all my classmates. As time has gone on I still enjoy Secret Santa, true, but I feel it is almost a tradition to be apart of some kind of Secret Santa, whether on a small scale or a larger scale. This year was not much different from past years when my roommates and I decided to do Secret Santa, except that it was much different from past years because I never had done Secret Santa with someone who was Jewish.

         As we picked from the hat that would have who one of my roommates explained this was his first Secret Santa. We were all shocked that he had never done Secret Santa before until he told us he was Jewish and he never believed in Santa, which seemed even stranger than him never doing Secret Santa, at least to me. As the days went on we saw that he got increasingly more and more excited about Secret Santa than any of us ever thought a 21-year-old frat boy could get about exchanging gifts. But, in Secret Santa traditions, Secret Santa got ruined when one of our roommates accidently told who had who one day. He was distraught and I am not exaggerating. He was extremely upset his first Secret Santa had been ruined but when he gave his gift and realized our roommate loved it; he was not as upset any longer.

          It was a funny experience to see someone get so excited about Secret Santa when I had been doing it since I was five years old. It was an experience for not just him but also for me. It showed me that different cultures have their own traditions and something that seems so normal for me is actually extremely bizarre to someone else. These cultures diverging together and sharing your traditions with friends is the best Christmas gift.

Broad Street, Providence

       Sometimes a new experience is right around the corner, literally. I never imagined that my winter break would start off by going to a place I had never been to before that was less than 10 miles from my home. I grew up in Warwick, Rhode Island and went to school in East Providence, Rhode Island. I traveled on highway 95 twice a day going through just a tip of South Providence, but never actually venturing through it until just recently.

         South Providence is not actually a real town or city in Rhode Island, it is just the southern part of Providence that runs parallel to Cranston. South Providence is like entering into another world. Stepping out of the car as a blonde girl, I was already in the minority, as this community is predominately Hispanic. It is a bit comical that I am Hispanic but still feel in the minority from my light skin, light hair, and light eyes from being Swedish, though my brother would fit right in with his darker skin, dark eyes and dark hair. This feeling of being in the minority from a place that you grew up only a few miles away is an extremely strange feeling. The signs in every window of every restaurant, pawnshop, and supermarket you pass are in Spanish and everyone here speaks Spanish, mainly as their primary language.

         Let’s just say I was shocked. I heard all about this town, even warning from my parents not to stray too far from downtown Providence, but here I found myself working right in the middle of all this action on Broad Street. As I looked out the office window, I got a glimpse of South Providence life and realized these people living not far from me lived an exceedingly different life than I did. As my internship supervisor on the way over narrated the streets:

 “This one had most murders last year”

“This one had the most drive by shootings”

“These speed bumps are put in the middle of these intersections to make it difficult to shoot while driving through them”

“These speed bumps discourage drug deals.”

“This is the elementary school where someone got shot in front of at 3 a.m. this morning.”

        All the realization that a short ride from my safe neighborhood in Cowesett, one of the safest neighborhoods in Warwick, was one the most dangerous neighborhood in Rhode Island. This experience was truly an eye-opening experience that traveling only a town over housed a place that you don’t want to be caught walking around after nightfall.

Best Breakfast Shakes in Rhode Island

One of my favorite places to get breakfast in Rhode Island is Nutrition Dynamix. It is a small nutrition shake store in Wakefield. At first when I tell people about Nutrition Dynamix they cringe with the word nutrition shake because that isn’t breakfast. But I always tell anyone not to knock them before you try them. Nutrition Dynamix uses Herbalife products like teas, aloes, and shake powder along with treats like pumpkin pie, chocolate chips, fruits, and coffees.

          The first time I went to Nutrition Dynamix was with my roommate, Patty, a nutrition major and an employee at Nutrition Dynamix. As you walk in it is a very friendly atmosphere with a bar in the center with barstool, except they don’t serve liquor, they serve breakfast shakes. I sat at one of the bar stools unsure of having a breakfast shake for the first time. Patty walked me through the process: first you order a tea (hot or cold) with a shot of aloe to help regulate your digestive system. The teas come in lemon, raspberry, peach and original. I even got my raspberry tea made lukewarm instead of piping hot or ice cold, just like I like it. Next is the shake part. There are dozens of different flavors and combinations to try from. I don’t remember my first shake flavor but I know my favorite two now after an embarrassingly high number of trips to Nutrition Dynamix would be Oatmeal Cookie and Pumpkin Mudslide. The shakes are made with Vanilla, Chocolate, Pumpkin, or Cookies and Cream bases with extra ingredients added. The shakes are so filling and look more like a Frappacino from Starbucks than a healthy meal replacement shake.

       I loved the shakes so much I bought the Herbalife powder to make my own shakes at home. I thought with buying the Herbalife shake powder I would stop going to Nutrition Dynamix but that did not happen. The Herbalife product is more of a community of Herbalife users. I love going to Nutrition Dynamix in the morning with the rest of my roommates and just relaxing in the morning before going to class with the rest of the morning goers that frequent the establishment. I urge everyone to try a nutrition club, which is what these places are called, at least once in their life. You will definitely be surprised to realize you might just be a breakfast shake person after all!

Traveling for Thanksgiving

        For the past few years my family has been traveling to Puerto Rico with my grandma to spend Thanksgiving in a nice resort town with palm trees, Caribbean seas and warm breezes that I looked forward to all year. All with the except for this year, because this year my mother decided that it would be nice if we went to visit my grandpa instead. And no, unfortunately my grandpa doesn’t live in Florida; instead he lives in Campton, New Hampshire. And on Thanksgiving Day Campton New Hampshire had six inches of snow already on the ground and it was 6 degrees at noon when we got there.

      The drive up was something I would not wish upon anyone. We hit enough traffic to delay us for two hours and it was pouring rain the entire time. On top of that my mother is a terrible driver without traffic or rain. Now, with us driving in the same direction as the storm and her slamming on the breaks was a nightmare. This was especially true for a person who tends to get car sick, like myself. The experience continued with yelling and arguing from every member of my family for the entire car ride there.

      When we finally got to my grandpa’s house that I hadn’t seen in more than two years it wasn’t much better. I felt out of place in his home that he shared with his new fiancée. I quickly escaped to a bedroom and fell asleep hoping to make my time pass by in New Hampshire quickly. As I stayed in the room for most of the morning I finally went downstairs when it was time to eat for Thanksgiving. I do not like meat much so Thanksgiving is one of my least favorite holidays for food. As I went downstairs and looked at the table that is when I realized I had too quickly judged my grandpa and all of New Hampshire. My grandpa had made me a plate of pasta since he knew I didn’t like Thanksgiving. I couldn’t believe he had remembered from years ago when we had Thanksgiving with him. I spent the rest of the day having a good time enjoying the company of my family, which would never have happened if we went to Puerto Rico. I would have most likely just spent the day with my brother on the beach.

        It is funny how sometimes what starts off as horrible traveling experiences can turn into memories that you will remember forever.