In September of 2011, I visited Mongolia. My trip came at the tail end of a long summer job at the tail end of my graduate program at the tail end of a long distance relationship. I had been traveling a lot in between Seattle and Seoul, Korea (a former home) to spend time with my then partner. On my third trip of the year, I decided I needed something more – so I started researching flights to other exotic destinations in that general part of the world.
Istanbul is one of the great cities of the world, no doubt about it. I was awestruck by the city’s beauty from the moment the plane made its initial approach to Ataturk Airport. It was dusk, and the last remnants of the sun were flickering across the Bosphorus, as well as casting shadows of the great mosques all over the city. Aside from its breathtaking beauty, it had easily navigable public transportation, and the people were all incredibly friendly. But since returning from that trip and starting this blog, I have not felt extremely compelled to write about my time there. I have sat down time and time again to try and write a story about my experiences in Istanbul, but have been left bereft of words.
I have the most vivid memories from my childhood of my great aunt, Jeanette, telling me and my sister stories of her travels after World War 2 around the world as a schoolteacher on U.S. military bases. She traveled everywhere (as a single woman in the 50s and 60s) that I dream of going today. As a young child, the stories that made the biggest impact on my life were those of her time in Japan.
While I was browsing my favored geography/travel news related outlets this morning, I happened upon a slideshow of the new UNESCO world heritage sites for this year. I used to pay a lot more attention to the UNESCO lists than I do today – when I was younger, UNESCO’s curated lists seemed to apply more to my travel style than they do now. That said, looking through the list of 2015 inscriptions was a bit surprising to me – included were several places I would have never thought of as being UNESCO World Heritage material.
