a girl in the world

finding beauty, pleasure and grace on the road less traveled

Lisboa – Europe’s best kept secret

I’m back from a wicked weekend holiday in Lisbon with the girls.  It’s Monday and the damage is done – we’re back at work, totally exhausted, sore and sleep-deprived.  But damn, it was worth it!  This weekend topped all other girly weekend trips thus far and now Lisbon is my new favourite city in Europe.  It’s cheap, colourful, warm, friendly and beautifully historic.  It’s a hilly city, with cobblestone streets, medieval castles and old monasteries.  The food was exquisite – fantastic fresh fish and to-die for pastries (pasteis de Belem).  We had the most amazing chocolate mouse I’ve ever tasted in my life.  

If you’ve ever seen the movie Vicky Cristina Barcelona, you’ll recall that the threesome in there happened because there was a special chemistry that could only exist between the three characters – they all fed off each other.  And M, C and I were just that amazing combination of personalities that made this trip so special.  It was madness and silliness and the most painful laughter I’ve experienced.  It was the ultimate joy for me to be with my two best girl friends – no limits, no holds-barred, no secrets or rules.  

We met people who couldn’t speak a lick of English, danced to live Brazilian samba music in hole-in-the-wall pubs in Bairro Alto.  We salsa’d till 4am and tiptoed in our high heels through cobblestone streets packed with locals and tourists. It was music and laughter and sunshine and amazing food.  We climbed ancient castle walls, rode trams in the evening wind and hopped in and out of taxis so cheap it didn’t feel like Europe!   

I’ve always loved Latin everything – the dances, the culture, the music.  And Lisbon surprised me because it is the most latin city I’ve experienced outside of South America.  We met some new Brazilian friends and managed to communicate with non-English speaking people with an English-Portuguese dictionary.  It is in these moments, where you are pushed linguistically and culturally,when travel really stretches you.  It forces you to communicate outside of your own tongue, it forces you to see through another cultural paradigm and it makes you forget about all the material comforts of your own life and home and pulls you into a completely new world.  This is the reason I am addicted to it: the newness, the stretching, the moments of pure disbelief that you are actually there, doing what it is you’re doing, meeting with the people that you’re meeting.  It’s the kind of shake up that makes me feel so so alive.

I’m exhausted and completely sleep deprived.  But memories from this weekend are the happy thoughts that would give me the power to fly if I were Peter Pan.  =)

A blast from the past

A few months ago, I was going through some old boxes at my parent’s house and found notebooks that I kept from high school.  In there was a time capsule booklet that I was meant to open five years later.  It listed goals I wanted to have accomplished, my favourite things, my passions, my best friends.  It was the most amusing experience to read over all of that and compare it to the present time.  Mostly, I realized that I am still the dorky positive dreamer that I was way back in high school.

Tonight, I had a similar “blast from the past” experience with an old friend that I haven’t seen or heard from in about a year!  We had a falling out over something really stupid but she contacted me to meet up because she’s leaving London in a few weeks.  It was great to see her.

What struck me most about seeing her tonight is how different my life is now compared to one year ago.  She asked me about the plans I had to move to Paris, about my plans to move back home, about all the boy drama that was happening back then.  And I suddenly remembered that a year ago, I was learning French, planning to move to Paris and very much missing home.  I was a work-a-holic, travelling almost every week to another G office.  I hardly spent any time in London and hardly knew anyone in the city.  I could never have predicted that I would be here now, still in London, and so very settled.  It felt good to compare and to realize just how much I’ve grown and changed over the past year. 

I was also very proud that she decided to pursue her own dream!  For the longest time, she had been talking about moving to Bermuda to start a new life.  And she’s actually going to do it.  She has no idea where she’s going to live or where she’s going to work but she has faith that something great awaits.  She has always been a romantic – so positive about the world and the opportunities in store.  It’s inspiring.  She reminded me that dreams can easily be made into reality if you really commit to pursuing them.  

The tease of The Travel Bookshop

One of the best things about living in Notting Hill is the fact that on any given Sunday morning, I can walk ten minutes down the road and enter the treasure trove called The Travel Bookshop.  This is the same Travel Bookshop that is featured in Notting Hill, the movie.  It’s the type of place that I have to approach with caution.  It creates a strange pain in my heart because every time I enter, a sick feeling of wanderlust enters me and for a few days afterwards, I am dizzy with longing.  It’s a form of self inflicted masochism.

I woke up today knowing that I would make the trek to this little shop. And I knew that it would do my head in – to read the “Best places to go before you die” type of picture books, to soak up all the amazing photography books, to wander the shelves as if wandering the world.  It all made me want to drop everything and wander the globe.  The store is sectioned off into continents and countries.  For an hour and a half I wandered Asia and Africa and South America.  I read bits of Pablo Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair in both Spanish and English.  I browsed Lonely Planet’s Festivals guide and vowed to myself that this year, we are going to attend La Tomatina in Valencia Spain.  I touched African hiking maps and Japanese phrase books and War Photography compilations.  And it took every bit of self control to not purchase 100 pounds worth of these things to take home with me.  

As always, I left feeling breathless – antsy for more travel, inspired to plan another great adventure, caged for being here and not there (somewhere, everywhere).  Psychologists have said that sometimes, success can be limiting.  It provides us with a sense of stability and accomplishment but prevents us from taking big risks.  It makes us afraid to fail. And many times, I’ve wondered how true this is for my own life.  As thankful and blessed as I am in the wonderful amazing journey that I am living, I have always known that there is something bigger, different, more life changing than this.  I just know within myself that I am meant to be doing something different.  And lately, I haven’t been able to shake the very strong feeling of wanting to discover what that calling really is.  My best friends say that I’m the type of person who sees the possibilities, always the possibilities.  These days, a giant cliff of the black unknown has been staring me straight in the face, teasing me with the possibilities, egging me to take that leap of faith where reason and passion collide to bring about real change.

It takes a leap of faith to become great.

Hi, I'm Denise. I'm a writer, artist and photographer. This is where I share what I'm seeing, learning and making.
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