Today will be relatively short (maybe) ... I'm exhausted. Drove 4.5 hrs from Nashville to St. Louis. Checked into AirBnb and met host JoAnn (awesome old lady ... reminds me of my grandma) then headed downtown. I wanted to hit up the City Museum and the Arch.
Consider yourself updated. While it wasn't as hot as Nashville, I walked WAY MORE so I'm tired. Goodnight :) ... on to Kansas City tomorrow.
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Today began my journey across country towards Kansas City, MO. After saying my goodbyes to Yuriy, Anna, and Tyler, I drove 4 straight hours to Nashville, TN ... well I stopped once for gas and bathroom but basically. Since I couldn't check into my hostel until 3pm and it was only 1pm, I decided to hang at a local starbucks and read/study my vietnamese. At around 2, I realized that it wasn't actually 2:00 ... see there are these things called time zones and I had shifted over one. Well I wasn't going to pay for more coffee to hang around for another 2 hours so I started looking for things to do. Downtown parking is crazy expensive (until 6pm when street parking becomes free) so that was temporarily out of the question. Luckily, Nashville decided that they needed their own copy of the Parthenon which they conveniently parked in a public park with free parking. So off I went. It was pretty cool ... the Parthenon not the weather ... it was like 98 degrees outside. Didn't go to the museum inside because even though it had AC, I didn't want to spend $6. Walked around some and lo and behold, I see the King of Pops ... for those of you not from Atlanta: King of Pops is a hipster popsicle company started in Decatur, GA. They're everywhere in Atlanta now... but definitely didn't expect to see them in Nashville. Come 3pm and I'm off to my hostel. First thing I notice as my GPS is navigating me through god knows where Nashville is that there are a lot of roads called "Pike" ... Whites Creek Pike, Buena Vista Pike, Clarkesville Pike ... just why? What's wrong with "street", "road", "lane", "avenue"...? Anyways ... after chilling at the hostel for awhile (free ramen provided), I head downtown because it'll be after 6pm by the time I find parking and I'm hungry. It takes me like 20 minutes to find street parking but I got a spot ... a mile away from where I was going for dinner, but hey I need the steps. Dinner was at Martin's Bar-B-Que and the line is out the door. Why not go somewhere else you ask? Because they have Alabama White Sauce and it's freakin' delicious. At my table, some excellent people watching until the food comes, then scarfing it down super fast because all I had to eat today was cheese toast, a croissant, and some ramen. In my earlier Starbucks research, I had found a nice path across/around the river so I head to check it out. Nice bridge. Pedestrians only. Skyline (ish) from the bridge.
I headed back towards my car but not before stopping at Mike's Ice Cream and Coffee Bar. Red Velvet Cake and Chocolate Raspberry Truffle Ice cream scoops (yes those are both flavors of ice cream... no actual cake) in a waffle cone ... it was definitely too big but I regret nothing. I walk around some more to finish the ice cream then head back to my hostel for the night. Tomorrow I'm headed to Saint Louis, MO - another 4 hour drive - then Kansas city the next day. Edit: I forgot the part where I counted at least 17 bachelor/bachelorette parties. Apparently Nashville is the place to go for those. It was a bit ridiculous. I was driving down I-85 yesterday, following Camp (amazing teacher friend) down the interstate to go eat lunch at Cafe Bombay when I realized that this whole moving to the other side of the planet thing hadn't actually hit me yet.
I've been packing, planning, giving away all of my stuff .... I have my tickets .... I've gotten my shots .... All of my utilities are scheduled to shut off .... I know my schedule from now until I get off of a plane in Hanoi .... I have appointments for visas and housing in a foreign country that I've never been to .... I know what I'm teaching next year .... but emotionally, it hadn't sunk in yet. One would think that leaving a city you've lived in for the last 9 years, friends you've known for up to 7 of those years, a career you've built over the last 4 years . . . but it hadn't hit yet. I'd been going about my summer like I normally do just with some added packing and cleaning. |
ShannonMath Teacher living and working in Hanoi, Vietnam Archives
February 2022
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