Sunday, 6 July 2014

How Europe defeated me, and why I'm ok with it.

Yes, indeed, I have been defeated by Europe. It's rather embarrassing to admit, actually. Especially since I've invested so much of my time and money into planning this great adventure.

It's funny, I was just chatting to an old friend in Sydney the other day and I joked 'If you can conquer Europe, you can can conquer anything'. It was less than twenty four hours later that I had conceded that Europe had, in fact, conquered me!

For those of you who don't know, I am currently travelling solo on a 30 day adventure to experience and photograph Western Europe. Unfortunately, however, I hadn't anticipated just how overwhelming and stressful this adventure would be on my own in foreign countries.

My journey began in London. And it was brilliant. I spent a little bit of time sightseeing with Imogen and James, working on my university assignment and, of course, photographing. Being in London was easy because we share the same language. It was once I had left the familiarity of English soil that I began to feel Europe's objection to my presence.

Loneliness. Language barriers. Sickness. I had lost my voice. I was overwhelmed by the stresses of travel.

As courageous and independent as I thought I could be, apparently my young, naive self was not up for the challenge of individual excursion. But it's not what happens to you, it's how you respond, that matters. And I did what any smart person should do: I cut my losses. Disregarding any previous plans I had made, I knew this was my holiday and I sure as hell wasn't going to continue doing things that didn't make me happy. So I reached out to some friends in the lovely town of Lincoln, UK (which I'm now told is actually the centre of the universe) who were kind enough to take me in for a few days. I tied up some loose ends in Barcelona and headed to Lincoln.

The thing is, although I might be missing out on visiting Italy and Greece, I absolutely know that I made the right decision by returning to England. And the beauty of travelling on your own is the fact that you're able to be spontaneous, and change plans last minute. Nobody else is counting on you to stay with them or catch up with them later.
You know what they say: one door closes and another one opens. The opportunities I have to visit some of the English countryside, make some new friends, and reconnect with old ones will be far more rewarding and relaxing than frantically trying to fit the entirety of Western Europe into a few weeks. Plus I'll get loads of opportunities to take some great photos!

I am truly grateful for this journey I am on. I am learning more about myself, and the kind of person I want to be; a person that is able to respond to any given situation with positivity and trust.

So that's how Europe 'defeated' me, and why I'm ok with it :)

God bless.


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