Researching Your Trip

"Before you travel, I say definitely do your research. Get travel books, go hang out at the bookstore. I think it's so much fun just to anticipate the trip and imagine yourself in these far away places with the strange sounding names on a beach, among the pyramids, in castles in Spain. These places you're looking at in the books and you're about to actually go there. I love that. I say read about the broad things. The overview of the culture, the film. Salt actually, it's a huge deal in the world in trade. Food, religions. If wine is your thing read up on that, or maybe checkout your old high school history book that you let fall by the waist side. A woman in Berlin. Get specific with the place you're about to go. Before I went to south Africa, I read The Covenant by James Michener. It was so fun because it was just this narrative telling me the history and giving it to me in a palatable way. You relate to your characters, and once you're there actually walking on the street that they walked on you have all these aha moments and that's really fun. In Peru, read the motorcycle diaries and it just makes everything hit home to me. So yeah, read."