The Voyage Begins

I lost my job.

I was a travel writer for Students In Europe, a great backpacking and study-abroad oriented travel blog that - sadly - didn't make it. C'est la vie, I guess.

I found my job with Students In Europe by accident. Late one night I was sitting on my couch with a friend who was practically falling asleep on my shoulder. I wasn't sleepy, though - instead I was ranting. I was ranting because here I was, a reasonably interesting person with, you know, skills, and I couldn't, you know - and here I nudged my friend to get his sleepy approval - find a job using those skills and, you know, shouldn't there be something out there for a person like me?

My friend made a sort of "mrapp" sound that I interpreted as agreement.

A short Google search later and I was sending off an application to be a travel writer. Writing and travel are two things I love and two of my - I'd like to believe - skills. So I thought: why not? The worst this could be is a hoax. Besides, it was well after midnight. Nothing seemed like a bad idea at the time.

And it wasn't a hoax, either. Students In Europe hired me and I spent seven months with the best job ever: writing about what I love to do. I genuinely loved this job, and now I find myself missing - more than the money - the opportunity to share my love of travel and my experiences abroad with other people who think that travel is more than ticking off a list in a guidebook, it's an opportunity to expand who we are.

It's well after midnight again and I have other things I should be doing (sleeping, above all), but I can't get my desire to keep writing out of my head. Why not share my experiences on my own, I keep asking myself. And so I will. The voyage begins.

Copyright 2010 Sara Harding