Traveler. Cat lady. Urban Outfitter's addict. harry style's girlfriend. vampire diaries fanatic. ice cream ENTHUSIAST
As I spent my Thanksgiving Break visiting all my family in Michigan, my grandparents were in the kitchen making their infamous Hungarian Chicken Paprikash and showing me their old bible that contained our family tree. It got me thinking...we all have unique families that are not like any other in the world. Each family hold different stories that make us who we are today. Every single individual around you has a different concoction of blood lines from all around the world. And we should be proud of that. So whether you are Irish or Italian (or like me and you are a mutt of many, many different ethinicies) I challenge you to incorporate these heritages into your life. It is fascinating to know that you have blood relations to people that lived in times that we learn in our history classes today. Between the Trojan War to the Black Death, you had distant relatives that experienced these things that shaped modern day life.
Our grandparents are the living connection to the past. So if you are lucky enough to still have them around, make the most of their presence by asking questions to get to know about your family's history. You might have snippets of knowledge on your family but you will be amazed at what you have yet to know. I took it upon myself this Thanksgiving to dig a little deeper and I could tell how happy my grandma was to see I was interested. For example, my grandma shared with me her struggles of growing up with parents that were dirt poor Greek immigrants with little knowledge of English. I learned her father came over all by himself at just sixteen years old from a small village in Greece called Siatista. This choice in the path in life significantly shaped the Hatzizisis family forever. It makes my whole family, who we are today. It's the little things that are so interesting to me. Embrace their traditions because they have shaped you, whether you realize it or not. I personally plan to continue making all the delicious foreign food my grandma makes because it is all that I know. Looking back, I wouldn't have it any other way. It makes my Thanksgiving stories different and I'm proud of that.
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Every family has their unique Christmas traditions. Some families go visit their relatives, some families decorate Christmas trees, some families exchange gifts. And it just so happens that my family has always taken a vacation. It is a time for my family to just chill out and have fun together. Without a doubt, my best memories come from these Christmas vacations. We see this as a silver lining, the thought of being at the beach is what motivates us to get out of bed amidst the cold Iowa winters. In the past, we have always gone to Maui and we absolutely love it there. Between the volcanos, the sweet pineapple, and the indigo waters, there's not much to complain about. But last year we decided we wanted to try something new and and we went to the Virgin Islands instead. There was some debate between my family if we should go back to Maui or try something new again. I was really strong in my argument and we decided we wanted to experience a new culture. I have always taken initiative on planning vacations because its just something that I enjoy. I have a insanely long list of places I plan to visit someday and Thailand is definitely in the top 3. We've had the trip planned since summertime. After buying a couple books and trying to gather as much information as possible, we decided on the island of Phuket. Phuket is in the south of Thailand and as it is technically an island, it is massive. It is surrounded by the crystal clear Andaman Sea. You can reach in from the mainland through bridges. We plan to visit a couple of the surrounding islands, after all there are hundreds and hundreds of them. On my list right now, I really want to spend a few days seeing the Similian Islands and the Phi Phi Islands. We are staying in a villa on the west side of Phuket. We chose the villa because it's on it's own private cove on Karon beach. One perk is that the resort has a 4 month old baby elephant that lives on the property. I'm really excited for the food. Thai food is my favorite type of cuisine and I'm so excited to taste some really authentic food! But I have to say the most exciting thing is all the exotic animals. My family and I are a crazy animal loving squad so the fact that there are monkeys and elephants freely roaming around is just about the coolest thing ever. There is actually beach called "Monkey Beach" that a huge group of monkeys call home and they swim with you...how cool is that? One thing that we are dreading is the crazy flight. It's a total of 20 hours of flying for just one leg of the trip. We connect in China after a 14 hour flight and then we have another 6 hour flight to get to Thailand. This is definitely the longest flight I have ever had to endure. Don't even get me started on the jet lag...it'll be tough but definitely worth it! Here are some pictures of insanely gorgeous scenery: In the summer of 2013, my family and I went to Italy for two and a half weeks. I have so many amazing memories from the trip that I thought I would share them with you. I love to travel and there is something that is magical about exploring Europe. We flew out from Chicago in the middle of June and connected in Switzerland. Within few hours that I spent in Switzerland, I was in awe of how incredibly green and hilly it was. We finally arrived in Venice and I was beyond exhausted after missing an entire night of sleep. It boggled my mind that there was not a single road in the whole city. My family and I caught a taxi (a motor boat) and took a wet and windy ride to the hotel. The hotel we stayed at wasn't your average hotel, it was an old aristocrats mansion. I remember the first night, I had jet lag so so so badly so I stayed up till 5am and read an entire book, Looking for Alaska by John Green. We only spent 4 days in Venice but in that time I thought I got a pretty good feel for the city. I remember appreciating the buildings so much because were so old and pastel colored and there were beautiful flowers on every windowsill. We had to take at least one gondola ride so our last night there, we took a sunset ride and it was magical. The one thing I was disappointed about what the extreme amount of tourism. There were quite a few Americanized restaurants that we tried to avoid. I understand that any big city you go to will have the cheesy nicknacks but this a new level. Venice has almost 3,000,000 tourists a year! Multiple times a day, huge cruise ships would come in at the Piazza San Marco and thousands of excited tourists would flood out. I'm not bashing on these tourists, because after all I was a tourist too but there was something very commercialized about their experience. I am thankful to have seen the country in the most authentic way possible. Overall, I was glad to have seen the infamous city and it was really pretty and unique. I definitely think that everyone should take the opportunity to visit the city but for me personally, its probably not at the top of my list to go back to. Here are some pictures from my trip:
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