San Antonio

(In this picture, the image of the lions, the painters and people, the sky, and even the tree and shadow are all part of the same mosaic.)

There are some cities that when you think of them, they remind you of family or giant architectural feats of man. San Antonio stood out to me more as a city of art and culture. They take great pride in their mosaics and crafts - especially of Hispanic or Native American descent.

The sidewalk chalk art seemed like a waste of talent - I almost wanted to cry when I realized it would be washed away in the next rain, it was so fabulous. The small shops were suburb in carrying original, hand-made items. I bought a set of 7 llamas made of some sort of precious stone I still have yet to figure out what. I don't even like llamas! Everything was so outrageously simple, yet somehow detailed - and every shop had something new.

It was kind of a nice change in pace, though, from some other Texan towns to find San Antonio not quite as populous as I thought it would be. The streets we tended to travel down were not concrete, but brick. And the Alamo was not nearly as packed with tourists or protected as I had set in my mind's eye. Nevertheless, when I visited there, it was almost as if I had stepped back in time inside the museum and could witness everything through my imagination.

This was definitely not a city I would think of off the top of my head as a big hit for a tourist spot or a must-see for your next vacation, but as far as family trips go, it is perfect. The atmosphere is unique, the weather is wonderful (of course), and the people are nice. I would not mind going back.

Orlando

Experience is a powerful thing. When people talk of it, it mainly refers to work experience or other non-fun things like that, but what people don't tell you is that with experience comes the memories. Some are wonderful. Some are sad. However all are worth the "experience."

Hundreds upon thousands of people visit Walt Disney World every day, but few get the experience of living there. How many people do you know woke up to the sight of Cinderella's Castle, the Epcot ball, or Mickey's wizard hat every morning? They say not only is it the happiest place on earth, but also the most magical. Happy, well.... that's relative to the people you're with. And as for magical, that I do believe. There was one night I was walking across the park at 12am and was admiring the landscape and very smooth pavement as I dragged my feet home for the day. The very next day, as I entered the park around 6am, I found a whole new building that wasn't there before! We're talking indoor plumbing, fully functioning kitchen, the works! Where it came from, I will never know. Magic.

Too many of us lose that power to make believe whatever we wish to believe and I think the fact that a company out there still encourages us to do that is fantastic however they wish to do it. Granted, I did get to see the inside workings all the way down to the nitty-gritty that no one would EVER want to see, but I never lost sight of what they were trying to do. It was too incredible an idea to give up.

Not until I left did I realize that you really can do anything you want to. Sure, your parents always say that when you're a kid, but I never believed it. Did you? I do now. Tomorrow I think I'll be an astronaut....

Kansas City

Home sweet home... The Missouri side, that is. It wasn't until I traveled outside of Missouri that I realized people don't go to the mid-west much. I've been asked so many seemingly-rhetorical questions about it.

Caution! Real and stupid questions ahead... "Why don't you have an accent?" "Where's your cowboy hat?" "Is your back yard made of hay?" "How many cows do you have?" "How do you like it down there in Kansas?"

I don't live in Kansas. I've never had a cowboy hat (personally they make my head look funny). Mizzou is the top school in the nation for journalism due partially to the fact that we don't have accents here. No, I don't own hay, but my cow Betsy's doin' just fine, thank ye very much.

It wasn't until I decided to look at my own perceptions about the world that I found where they were coming from. Egypt isn't just sand dunes and pyramids. Hawaii has more than small-town shops and pretty beaches. And Disney World isn't really the happiest place on Earth.

But even though there are bigger (and possibly better) cities out there, I wouldn't trade this biggest "small town" for all the world. I like that the greater city area is larger than St. Louis and I love that you can carry on a conversation about carrots with a stranger in the grocery store checkout line. Try that where you came from... Yeah, that's what I thought.

New York City (x4)

The City that Never Sleeps. They should call it the City that Never Changes. I've been there so many times and for some reason I keep expecting it to change, but I'm disappointed each time. Albert said it best when he dictated the definition of insanity: "doing something over and over again and expecting different results." Yet, I look forward to it every time.

Wonderful city. Full of color, lights, sounds, smells.... Oddly enough it's clean (relatively) when considering the amount of people that live/visit there. My favorite thing about it, however, isn't the giant Coke ads or movie posters or going to see what used to be the TRL watch spot. It's the fact that you can walk down the street ten times and find a different shop you didn't know was there the first nine times you passed it. The plethora of mom-and-pop shops amazes me - especially considering you can have a multi-million dollar corporation squeezed in there somewhere and you'd rather pass it to go to your favorite small-time family pizza parler that serves it for twice the price, triple the waiting time, but somehow makes it taste so much better.

Tourists always go to the big spots: Chrysler Building, Rockefeller Center, Lady Liberty... But it's the little stuff that makes the city. Next time you're in New York City, try looking at the little side shops. Yeah, yeah... I know the Toys 'R Us has a Ferris wheel inside it and you can buy an actual bag from Gucci, Coach or whatever the latest name brand is, but be rational - are you really going to spend $105 on a sing-and-talk Elmo or $413 on a shoe? Just one shoe? Who buys just one shoe?

Stop following the flow of traffic and look left. I guarantee you you'll see something you never knew existed. And not only will what you buy be cheaper and help pay for someone's overly-priced electric bill, you can truly say you "got it in New York!"