Lost with Boyfriend: Arriving in Quito

ADP: After we waited at the carousel in the Quito Airport for nearly a half hour and not spotting out bags, Jeff and I were convinced the airline had lost our luggage. Eventually we spotted them, our two sad little suitcases sitting all alone (just waiting to be snatched) at another carousel several feet away. But they hadn't been taken—maybe our luck was changing after all.

Jeff’s buddy Andrew met us at the airport with their mutual friend Jenna, and he immediately whisked us off in a taxi to his brand new place—a restaurant transformed into an English school for well-to-do Quiteños. Not only was the place massive, complete with its own enclosed courtyard mini-jungle, in-ground fountain and guardhouse (apparently there’s quite a bit of theft in the big city), we learned that the total rent on the place was less than $600 US.

“Hey man, you guys interested in teaching some classes this week?” asked Andrew, 24, who was running the school with his 26-year old Ecuadorian girlfriend Lau. “We’re really desperate to hire some new teachers.”

As Jeff quietly contemplated not returning to his regularly scheduled job teaching English in the Bronx (his kids are significantly less enthused to learn the subject than Andrew’s, who actually want to pay to be there), I got to know Lau. She was a bottlerocket of a girl, positively crackling with energy and enthusiasm for her boyfriend, her business and for American idioms.

“I say to Andrew all of the time, ‘teach me some new words, I want to know the slang!’ Even I offer to pay him, but he doesn’t do it! So, sometimes I forget to give him the paychecks for working,” she said, cracking herself up. I promised to teach her a few choice phrases before Jeff and I took off.

Although I was exhausted and desperately wanted to crash at our hotel, the group convinced me to push through and join them for drinks and salsa dancing in The Mariscal.

When we arrived, I could see why the locals refer to the neighborhood as “Gringolandia." It was crammed packed with upscale bars, restaurants, dance clubs, coffeehouses, hostels and guesthouses, and teaming with students, travelers and hip young locals.

We grabbed a quick bite and settled into an outdoor bar at Plaza Foch, a place hemmed in on all four sides by an international crowd looking for the fastest route to good time. Sucking down a few capiroscas (vodka with muddled lime and sugar), I managed to swallow my exhaustion and forget about the nightmare travel day we’d just gotten through.

Successfully subdued, I hardly blinked when Jeff and I finally showed up at the Marriott Quito only to be told that I’d botched the reservation completely and we didn’t actually have a room. I just stood there, staring dumbly, until the guy behind the desk got uncomfortable and eventually started working his magic. Somehow he managed to come up with two working room keys and the porter lead us to our room.

At last, nearly 24 hours after we’d woken up, 17 travel snafus and thousands of miles, we fell into a blissful cloud of clean white sheets.

LG’s Law of Travel #483: The better prepared you attempt to be for your journey, the more egregiously your best-laid plans will veer off course.

Jen, Holly and I pretty much relied on dumb luck, and the occasional kindness of embassy officials, to get us from point A to B during our year around the world. But since Jeff and I had never traveled internationally together, I was determined nothing would go wrong and I planned accordingly. Big mistake.

The first domino toppled when the Dial 7 car service I’d pre-ordered to take us from my Lower East Side apartment to the airport at 5:00am never showed (I live on the East River near the Manhattan Bridge where no yellow cab dares to tread). Nearly 30 minutes, several frantic phone calls and absolutely no answers from the company later, Jeff and I tore off down the streets with our suitcases and managed, miraculously, to find another overpriced vehicle to take us to JFK. Racing through the streets of Queens in the predawn, pre-gridlock hours, we congratulated ourselves for making it to the airport in just under 20 minutes. That’s when we walked inside the terminal to find a line at the Avianca desk so long, it looked like an American Idol general casting call.

We walked and walked and walked until we found the end of it, and stood there dumbly for several minutes, noticing that nobody was moving. Not an inch. T-minus 90 minutes til our flight departed. Then one hour. Then 45 minutes. The line refused to snake forward, not even a few feet.

All the while I was torn between my desire to be a lighthearted, cute and fun travel buddy to Jeff (we’ve only been dating 5 months, after all), and the now-thoroughly seasoned, airport-wizened, take-no-bullshit road warrior that I actually am. As the clock ticked down to ½ hour before our flight, I finally broke down, grabbed the lone Spanish-speaking Avianca ticket helper and frantically told him that we were going to miss our flight if we didn’t move up. Amazingly, her responded, moving us up in line. By T-minute 20 minutes til departure, we were standing in front of a ticket agent who peered at us apologetically and said. “Oh yes, I am sorry, but we have overbooked your plane and you cannot go today. Next!”

That’s when I lost it.

“What??! You can’t do this to us! We booked our flight months ago!” I shrieked, making a total scene.

“Yes, I understand, but every airline reserves the right to overbook the flight by 3 percent, and everyone else has checked in. You’ll just have to go tomorrow.”

With that, I erupted into tears, and moved away from the counter, afraid of doing something illegal to ticket agent. Jeff stood there, champ that he was, and tried to talk some sense into the guy. Finally, the man picked up the phone and called a supervisor, who told him that for a pair of $600 vouchers, two volunteers had gotten off the flight and we could indeed get checked on.

Snatching our tickets, we tore off through security and barely made the flight. We later realized that the ticket agent had neglected to print our connecting boarding passes, requiring us to go through immigration in Columbia, exit the terminal and try to explain our situation (in Spanish) to a reservation agent in Bogotá.

Collecting out tickets, we finally checked onto our next flight (delayed by two hours) and made the short flight to Quito. I prayed to the travel gods that this inauspicious start was not the sign of things to come.

Lost with a Boyfriend: A Fling to Ecuador

ADP: I have a confession to make about the marathon journey Jen, Hol and I took around the planet last year. By the time we’d had reached the end of the trip (and I’d completed an extra month of exploring Australia on my own), my enthusiasm for backpacking had fizzled to the point of almost total burnout.

Whereas I once got a high from the scent of a freshly minted guidebook and thrilled at the idea of exploring the hidden side streets of a brand new town, hardly any new experience excited me much anymore. I certainly wasn’t psyched about the idea of schlepping my perpetually damp clothes to yet another hostel, trying to orient myself in some unfamiliar city, stumbling over the basics of a new language and making social gaffs that drew stern looks from locals.

By July 2007, the romance of travel had definitely worn off. I was ready to go home.

Jen (who had similar feelings by the time that she boarded her return flight) told me that no matter how exhausted she might after a year on the road, she would get itchy feet again after a few months at home. I remember thinking that might be true for her—but I was staying put for a long, long time. My backpack had been retired. Maybe I would consider boarding a plane again in 2009 for a luxury vacay to the Caribbean. Or maybe I’d just spend my getaway someplace laid-back and English-speaking—like Colorado. Or Maine.

Well, stamp my passport and call me gringa, because yes, that was me you saw last week at JFK, boarding an Avianca flight bound for Quito, Ecuador with my new (and eminently travel friendly) boyfriend Jeff. After six months spent crashing back into “real life” in New York City—and getting re-introduced to those late work hours and strict deadlines I’d been so happy to leave the first time around—I felt more than ready to run away to South America. But this time, I’d be going with a cute boy. Oh la la.

I’d never gone away on such a long getaway with a guy before, and certainly never to a country so far from home. In the back of my head I wondered how it might compare with a traditional Lost Girls expedition. Would he want to go shopping with me? Listen as I talked for 45 minutes straight about the snacks I was craving? Get bored after our 157th hour spent in super-close proximity?

For now, I'll simply say that we returned home on the same flight--and still together. I learned that in travel, whatever doesn't break you up makes you stronger. More on details on that (oh yeah, and on Ecuador, too) in the next few posts…

Why I Got Lost: Doing Business in Italy

When New Yorker Chris Caruana, 23, wrote to tell us that he'd be leaving the city next month to get his MBA in Rome, we were psyched for him--and more than a little curious. What prompted this all-American guy to forgo the ivy-draped business school experience in the US to learn macroeconomics and sales strategy from the Italians?

As were relieved to find out in his reply, below, the reasons have nothing to do with bostering his resume, impressing recruiters or making himself look more attractive to future employers (actually, he did mention this one---but his other four reasons have nothing to do with working!). Check out this "Why I Got Lost," then learn more about Chris' educational adventure on his blog, RTD in Italia.

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Chris: I had a game plan before touching down in Italy to begin my spring semester of junior year. As the theme has been throughout my life: live with no regrets. I promised never, not during a single moment, to shortchange myself during the next five months in Florence.

I lived in an apartment with five other students on Via del Terme in the heart of the city. Instead of walking past the dorms and repetitious architecture found on most college campuses, I strolled past the Duomo every day on my way to class. I relished the four-day weekends and engaged in the most eye-opening period in my life. When my plane touched down at JFK airport at the end of the term, I realized just how much I longed for it to continue along the runaway and make the return trip back to Italy. With me on it, of course.

Ever since that study abroad experience, I've been awaiting my chance to return--and a graduate program in business seemed an ideal opportunity. In June 2007, I scheduled my GMAT test, a necessary requirement for anyone looking to apply to graduate school for an MBA (Masters of Business Administration). The following month I started a blog to document the whole process of applying to grad schools abroad, and the potential move overseas. But I kept the whole thing a secret from family and friends until December 19th, when I got my acceptance letter to St. John University's Rome Campus (plus a notice that's I'd been given a scholarship). That's when I finally shared the news that I'd be leaving.

The most repetitive question that’s been posed to me as “Why Italy? So (finally) I give you my five reasons for doing my MBA in the heart of Italy, Roma:

#1: The lifestyle. While Americans live to work Italians work to live. They put a premium on getting the most out of live and enjoying it with their loved ones. Nothing else matters as much as the joy of everyday life spent with your loved ones. NOTHING…

#2: Past experiences. Let me first say I’m not spiritual or religious at all. With that said, if I had never studied in Florence for a semester during my undergraduate, there’s no way I’d be heading back for my graduate degree. Living, traveling, studying abroad opened up my senses to a world outside of my own. It was in those five months that I realized there’s so much more to life, so much more to experience.

#3: Culture. This is different then my reasoning of the Italian lifestyle. Why? This is does not just include the lifestyle led (the crux) but it also incorporates the food, language, interaction, weather, architecture, people…you get the picture. I have friends, family, colleagues and complete strangers ask me about Italy. My simple response, “Embrace the culture and it will embrace you back more then you could ever believe.”

#4: The C.Q. I didn’t have a name for this reasoning until I read the topic in a newsletter. It’s called ‘Cultural Quotient’. We live in a global economy. Business is no longer done on a state or national level. It is carried out on an international stage. Even the smallest of decisions by your corner shop shape or can shape the global economy. Businesses are willing to overlook I.Q. in return for a higher C.Q. The ability to understand cultural differences and practices throughout the world is becoming an invaluable asset to anyone looking to work for a multi-national firm. Studying abroad is a great way to skyrocket that value.

#5: No regrets. This is a personal decision. As aforementioned I’ve lived my life and will continue to live it without any regrets. I’ve made mistakes and even followed through on decisions detrimental to so much in my life, both mentally and physically. I do not regret one of those actions, for they have shaped and molded me into the person I am today. The opportunity for me to further my education studying in a place where I get the most enjoyment out of life could not be passed up.

Could I have studied anywhere in the U.S. and been happy? I’m sure I could have. I’ve seen much of the U.S. and North America, but I’m ready for more. Studying abroad is not for everyone but I challenge every student to at least attempt it. It stretches you both mentally and physically, and expands you as a person. Not only do you walk away with an understanding of another culture and those who live daily in that culture, but you find out more about yourself in the process. Whether you’re willing to take that leap is up to you.

In the meantime, if you’re ever in ‘bel paese’ drop me a line. Depending on what day of the week you can either find me studying in the eternal city or traveling. Ciao…

--Christopher Caruana: christopher_caruana@yahoo.com

Holly Corbett Has No Regrets

HCC: People seriously crack me up: A certain New York gossip rag wrongly quoted me as saying that travel changed my life for the worse.

Ha! As if I’d ever look back at a year spent hiking the Inca Trail in Peru, diving in Thailand, and biking through wineries in New Zealand as a mistake and think, “Dammit! I should have worked more instead!”

It’s no big secret that taking an around-the-world trip with my fellow Lost Girls was the single best decision that I’ve made. In fact, deciding to travel is one of the few decisions in life that you’re almost guaranteed never to regret.