{"id":3699,"date":"2018-05-29T20:15:12","date_gmt":"2018-05-29T20:15:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/?p=3699"},"modified":"2018-05-29T20:25:16","modified_gmt":"2018-05-29T20:25:16","slug":"me-myself-and-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/2018\/05\/29\/me-myself-and-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Me, myself and I"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m definitely a social animal. While I need some \u201cme time\u201d once in a while, I tend to surround myself with people. This is why when I embarked on my first PhD journey, I wasn\u2019t too thrilled to learn that I\u2019d be travelling alone. That sounded so scary, I was afraid that something would go wrong or, in the best case scenario, I\u2019d just feel lonely and miserable for a few days.<\/p>\n

Since then I\u2019ve been to so many conferences in various countries, often extended to a mini-vacation<\/a>. Almost always, completely alone. And let me tell you, I learned to love it. Why?<\/p>\n

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And nobody to disturb…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
    \n
  • Finally I don\u2019t depend on anyone. I do whatever I want, I don\u2019t need to consult my plans with anyone, I don\u2019t even have to plan anything. I just walk whenever I feel like walking, stop when I need some rest, eat whatever and wherever I fancy, just enjoy the moment. No need to compromise, to suffer through art museums just because my mum loves them, to skip a lovely walk in less touristy places because my friend is tired or to get hangry when my boyfriend thinks it\u2019s too early for lunch.\n

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    Travelling alone requires some selfie skills \ud83d\ude00<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li>\n
  • Good company is great, and who\u2019s a better companion than the person I know and understand more than anyone else? Sometimes spending a lot of time just with myself is exactly what I need. Usually I don\u2019t get many opportunities to read, listen to the music, go for long walks or just think. And I forget how much I enjoy these activities.<\/li>\n
  • When I start the journey alone, it doesn\u2019t necessarily mean I end it alone! Usually I spend a lot of time with strangers. Best places to meet them? Hostels or \u201cfree walking tours\u201d, where many travellers are in a similar situation. Hostels basically guarantee meeting very interesting people from all over the world. If I don\u2019t stay in a hostel, I like to google \u201cfree walking tour [city I\u2019m in]\u201d, walk around the city with a local guide and chat to other participants. Usually we form little groups afterwards and spend the rest of the day or weekend together. A few years ago in Cologne I even managed to meet one of my best friends on such a tour. Worth trying!\n

    \"\"
    During one of my lonely travels I met a good friend!<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li>\n
  • My main concern used to be safety. However, I realised it\u2019s not such a big issue as long as I\u2019m not going to a jungle or a battle field. In European or American cities I feel perfectly safe, when in doubt I ask locals if a particular neighbourhood is fine to visit alone. I just make sure to stay in touch with my relatives, so that someone knows what I\u2019m up to, in case I disappeared. Better safe than sorry, but don\u2019t worry, it\u2019ll be ok!<\/li>\n
  • There are times when I wish I had a friend with me. For example, I felt a bit lonely spending a Friday night alone in Paris, while everybody else seemed to enjoy dinner with friends or family. I could have prevented it by making plans with other conference participants or using meetup.com, but I was just too tired to be bothered. But after a quick dinner (in a great vegan burger place, I doubt I\u2019d drag there any of my meat-eating friends, so yay, lonely travels!) I ended up in Pompidou. After seeing a few pictures, I decided it\u2019s enough modern art for one day, so I sat down on the terrace and enjoyed the view. Would I have done it with someone else? Probably not.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    I could keep persuading you that travelling alone is great. But instead I suggest an easy exercise: find a cheap flight or train to a random place and find out yourself!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I\u2019m definitely a social animal. While I need some \u201cme time\u201d once in a while, I tend to surround myself with people. This is why when I embarked on my first PhD journey, I wasn\u2019t too thrilled to learn that I\u2019d be travelling alone. That sounded so scary, I was afraid that something would go […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1026,"featured_media":3717,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[128832,7269,95710,268,127784,114,200972],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about-me","category-conferences","category-leisure","category-life","category-practical-advice","category-travel","category-travelling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1026"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3699"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3699\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3720,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3699\/revisions\/3720"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}