Travel changes your relationship with money in ways exchange rates never could. Somewhere between unfamiliar currencies, cheap street food, overpriced airport coffee, and mentally converting everything back into dollars, I realized money isn't just about what it buys—it's about the freedom it gives you.

Lebanon didn't feel completely foreign to me. It felt familiar in the way family recipes, loud dinner tables, and stories passed down through generations sometimes do—like parts of my identity existed there long before I ever arrived.

London felt exactly how I imagined it would—rainy, endlessly walkable, and full of neighborhoods that each seemed to have a completely different personality.

Belize felt humid, chaotic, sunburned, salty, and a little messy in the best possible way—the kind of trip where ferries run late, everyone lives in swimsuits, and eventually you stop caring about plans altogether.

One of the strangest parts of solo travel is how quickly strangers can stop feeling like strangers. Somewhere between hostel kitchens, overnight buses, and unfamiliar cities, conversations become far more honest than they ever seem to at home.

I don't travel because I hate home or because I'm searching for escape. I leave because the world feels too big, too interesting, and too temporary to experience secondhand.