Vienna’s Cafe Central is like a time machine. One step inside transports you a hundred years in the past to a ritzy cafe where the likes of Freud and Trotsky spent their afternoons discussing the world over coffee, cake, and a thick cigar. Nowadays Cafe Central is one of the most famous Viennese coffee houses, with good reason too.

When you walk inside Cafe Central you see sophisticated waiters carrying tray fulls of delicious treats as they sway alongside marble-topped tables. This exquisite room features chic booths situated under nearly a dozen paned glass windows, each with a silky pair…

I’m writing today from my balcony in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona. It’s summertime. It’s hot. Tourism is at its highest. I look out below as selfie sticks extend, sunburns worsen, and loudness takes over.

Living in the Gothic Quarter has been one of the best, yet worst decisions I’ve made while living in Barcelona. I’m surrounded by beautiful architecture, fantastic shops are at my doorstep, and my favorite coffee shop is just around the corner. However, also at my doorstep are hundreds of tourists. …

Once upon a time, traveling to Europe from the US was a seamless, easy, and exciting procedure. We simply needed tickets and a valid passport. Now, as result of the COVID-19 pandemic, we must bring along a grocery list of certificates and verification before heading off overseas. The idea of booking a spontaneous trip to Europe has very well gone with the wind, leaving many Americans wondering when they will be able to travel again. Here’s what it’s like traveling from the US to Europe during COVID-19.

Booking a flight, the easy part

The seemingly easiest part of traveling from…

I’m peacefully reading a book under the Mediterranean sun when a group of girls plants themselves nearby. They drop their bags, grab their iPhones, and immediately commence a bikini photoshoot by the water with the backdrop of the iconic W Barcelona Hotel.

This show goes on for half an hour as these Instagrammers pass around their mobiles like American sorority girls passing a candle in ceremonial delight. They’re effortlessly posed and in a seek of desperation to document themselves candidly, a sense of urgency that if the photo didn’t happen neither did the moment. Once the act concluded, they picked…

Chocolate boxes of red and pink have filled the aisles of your favorite supermarket, red roses are on sale at every street corner, and that snuggly crisp breeze fills the air… Valentine’s Day is just around the corner! Like many of us, you might be stuck at home this Valentine’s Day, so here are some easily romantic ways to spend Valentine’s Day this year.

Celebrate with a themed dinner and movie night.

Whether you want to recreate one of your favorite dinner date nights or travel off to some beautiful country with excellent cuisine, enjoy Valentine’s Day at home with dinner and a movie.

Perhaps you’ll travel to…

I sit looking out over the East Tennessee mountainside writing this as my grandparents lay in hospital beds facing the reality of the world we’re living in. Hospitals at capacity sent them to Asheville, North Carolina, blood clots and pneumonia have grown in their bodies as this unforgiving virus takes hold of them. There’s nothing I can do now except call them and wait for the uncertainty to reveal itself.

I was driving today, and I imagined myself hugging them, thinking about my life of uncertainty has led me to almost never hug them. Maybe once a year. …

When the year 2020 has more similarities with a fictional, dystopic interpenetration of 1984 than the prior year, it’s evident our world has become quite familiarly unfamiliar.

In George Orwell’s 71-year old book 1984, we follow the main protagonist Winston Smith as he navigates London in what he believes to be the year 1984. Working for the Ministry of Truth, he spends his days as a journalist altering news articles and erasing the past — not by choice, per say. It’s the world he lives in. …

He’s not what you might be picturing right now. He doesn’t wear a turban or a kaftan that goes down to his ankles — at least not on a typical day. No, in fact he prefers floral, short sleeve button-downs, black jeans, and leather loafers — all which hug his body perfectly. He’s got soft skin, a warm heart, and a wise mind.

The day we met

I came to Morocco with every intention of connecting with the locals, but I had never expected to meet a man romantically — it never even crossed my mind. …