I'll be the first to admit it: I'm a notorious coffee snob. It's something I've learned to love about myself and I've nurtured this quirk of mine for several years, developing a picky and decisive palate. There's nothing I hate more than a bad cup of coffee and will go to great lengths to find the best. Some of the first words I learned in Czech were words that enabled me to order a cup of coffee. "Dam si cafe latte, prosím." I'd like a latte, please. Kavarna, or coffeehouse

On the whole, I'd have to say I'm a fairly happy person. Scratch that. I'm an expressive person. It doesn't take a lot of effort to know how I'm feeling, as it's usually written right across my face like a human emoji. Seems pretty normal, right? That's what I thought too, but after I lived abroad, I realized that smiling and how we convey emotion is heavily influenced by local culture. I'm not saying that people aren't biologically hardwired to smile when they're happy, I'm

Traveling forced me to grudgingly embrace minimalism and pare down on the bags that I brought with me. Now, I'm not going to lie to you guys. Since I was certain I would have a consistent home base for the time I was gone, I opted for a suitcase, but even that was a challenge. That being said, I unpacked, shoved the suitcase under my bed and forgot about it until I was packing up to move home. For every trip, I didn't pack in anything larger than a backpack. This may scare s

I was sitting in the living room of my sorority house the other day, working on my Czech and, like many student houses in the spring, the topic of graduation is the sleeping beast in the corner. Everyone tiptoes around it, lest a wave of panic wash over the graduating seniors. It's a delicate balance between being excited for the future and horror at the fact that someone, somewhere let us be full-fledged adults who are going to have real jobs and their own insurance and take