Bonjour à tous et bienvenue sur mon journal de mes aventures à l’étranger!
While taking a moment to reflect on my travels, both past and present, I have had many opportunities to travel and live both domestically and internationally.
For me, travelling began at an early age. Growing up with a mother who is Crucian (a person born and raised in St. Croix, USVI) and a dad from Cincinati, OH, both of whom had no immediate family in my hometown of Washington, DC, long weekends and school holidays were often spent in the car or on the plane headed to visit someone somewhere!
In the past ten years (starting with the summer I turned 16), I have been able to experience new cultures and broaden my horizons in many ways, including: regular visits to family in St. Croix; a summer in Biarritz for French immersion; pursuing my university education at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland for four years (speckled with term breaks in France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, England, Germany, Denmark and East Africa); as well as a gap year trying out life down under in Syndey during 2009 (including expeditions to New Zealand and Fiji). As lucky as I have been to have had these journeys, these experiences have required an adventurous spirit, plenty of optimism, and the ability to make lemonade out of lemons.
Upon returning to my hometown of Washington, DC in January of 2010, I decided I needed to put on my big girl pants and figure out if my interest in law school was fact or fiction. I gave the corporate life my best effort working as a clerk in a busy law firm, but after a year of experiencing grueling intellectual property litigation, I realized that law school was not for me. Instead of preparing for the LSAT, I applied to the Peace Corps and I am very excited to be joining a deployment to West Africa in early 2012. In the meantime, an unexpected offer to join some family friends in France this fall crossed my path and it look me less time than the blink of an eye to start writing my resignation email and mentally packing my bag!
Today is Monday, August 8th, 2011 and it is the first day of my next grand voyage! I will be leaving in a week for Villefranche-sur-Mer, a town outside of Nice, France sur le cote d’azur! I’ve set up this page as a way to share my embarrassing episodes of attempting to refine my french language skills and navigating the unforeseen perks and pitfalls of life in the south of France. Please check-in with me reguarly as I update this site with extracts and photos of the new journey I am about to embark upon!
xoxo jules
julia's journeys 