Note To (Your)Self

Disclaimer: Songza's playlists have led me into a quasi-reflectional mood. Break out the Sigur Ros before reading this post.


"It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." - ee cummings.

The Basics.
Travelling, especially alone, forces you to learn a lot of things about yourself, and it forces you to learn pretty quickly. 

In that sense, it is a lot like everything else you do in life. 

The Details.
I don't mean to say that travelling is like every other aspect of life. Nothing could be further from what I believe. What I'm actually saying is more along the lines of: everything you do in life has the potential to challenge you; it has the potential to show you a side of yourself that, for whatever reason, has thus been unseen. Someone who used to lead me always said something that inspired me everyday (if I'm being honest, almost everything he said inspired me, but for the sake of this blog post, we'll focus on one quote in particular). He said, "if it does not challenge you, it does not change you." It became a mantra for him, our team, and my life. 

Stop to think about it for a second, if you're reading this from the East Coast, it's 6PM. The day is over and the night is coming to a close as well. Think about what you've done today; think about all the things you've accomplished. Are you proud of what you've done or have you let today go to waste? I don't know you, reader. I don't know your life story or why you wake up in the morning. However, you've wandered onto my blog, so for all intents and purposes, you're in my world now. There is but one rule in Kiandraland (Kiandraworld? Kiandropolis?), and it's this: do one thing every day that scares you. Eleanor's words, my personal philosophy.  You only get one July 5th, 2013 in a lifetime. You may as well make it count for something other than silly tv shows (shout out to my newest obsession: Girls) and cheap food (I'm looking at you Hamm Burger). 

So by now you're thinking: okay, that's all fine and nice, Kiandra, but what does it have to do with travelling? Oh my dear, sweet reader...it has everything to do with travelling. Travelling enhances our carpe diem (read: YOLO) mentalities; it allows us to take more chances, explore more options, meet more people because when are we ever going to be in Szeged, Hungary or Krakow, Poland or Manila, Philippines again (seriously, when? I'd love to know)? The chance to be IN these places already adds flavor to the soup that is my/your/our life. It already takes us that much further from our comfort zones.

For some people, that's a hard pill to swallow (I have to stop with the cliched statements). For others, it's a door to exciting and endless possibilities. For every single one of us, it's a chance to find out what makes you tick, how you react under stress/pressure, and how you deal with a language barrier. It's a chance for you to grow without you even realizing it (and just like that, this blog post is back on topic)! 

I think that one of the most significant aspects of life is that it puts you in situations you've probably never encountered before and forces you to tackle them head-on. If you've ever been a part of AIESEC before, you know what I'm talking about. You're thrown into a group, or a team, or onto a project that has never been completed before, and you're expected to make it successful with only a handful of ideas and an army of support. You get frustrated; you get stressed out, but in the end, you get results--whether they're the results you wanted or not, you get results. You push yourself to (what you think are) your limits, and you survive, and next time, you're equipped with so much more knowledge and willpower, and it only gets better. That's what travelling teaches you. That's what AIESEC teaches you. That's what life teaches you. 

it's a real thing. i swear.

Yesterday LinkedIn sent me the "Top New for Kiandra" as they do every day, but yesterday something compelled me to actually read it. 
Inside the heavily loaded email was a section entitled Finding Your Passion In Work: 20 Awesome Quotes. If you even remotely know me, you're probably aware that I'm in loveeeee with quotes (so much so that my favorite high school teacher gave me a Big Book of Quotes entitled The Quotationary as a graduation present), so I couldn't resist opening that particular article. 

Now whether all twenty quotes were awesome are now, isn't up for debate in this particular post, but I will say that one jumped out at me.

Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears. 

Those are some powerful words. At least to me (and since you're in my world...to you as well, reader). We so frequently let our fears control us that we let life and all its many opportunities pass us by. Our fear of being alone. Our fear of being judged. Our fear of failure. Our fear of success. All these things are just pawns in the game of chess. In the grand scheme of things, they're irrelevant. You will out on so many more cool people, and places, and experiences if you let these little fears control you than if you just took the chance. 





Every day is an opportunity to discover something new about yourself. Every person you meet and every place you go is another chance to rewire your hard drive, and create a version of yourself you can be happy with.
I'm taking my chance, and I'm sure I'll take many others after this one is done. The question is: what will you do, reader? Will you shy away from the chance to create yourself, or will you dive right in?

While you ponder that, I'm gonna go dive into some SONA forms. (Don't kill me VP Make Shit Pretty)

It's Simple Math.

Disclaimer: This blog post has revealed to me that I may perhaps be a very confused feminist.

Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love. -Albert Einstein

The Basics.
Men in Hungary > Men in the States

The Details.
I would support this quasi-mathematical statement over and over again. Don't get me wrong. I love my American boys--full of spunk, and sass, and smart-assery. It's just about everything that keeps me entertained day in and day out. 

But I've come to experience something different whilst in Hungary, and I'm tempted to say...I like it. Practically every guy I've met here has been a class act. A huge gentleman. They open doors for me, they let me go first, they pour my drinks and my soup. The amount of times that I have heard the Hungarian phrase for "Ladies first" is practically equivalent to the amount of times that I've told people that I don't speak Hungarian (hint: that's a lot). 

Here's the thing about standards...they're set by the community around you. I genuinely think that there are just different values, different standards in this part of the world than there are in my part of the world. It begs another question though. I think of my high school friends, the hilarious group of guys that I would play Mafia with (yes, Demon, Rofl I'm talking about you; don't let the "hilarious" comment go to your heads) and conversations that we would have about men and women. They always saw it one way: equality or chivalry because we couldn't have it both ways. It was (is?) too much for us to ask to both be treated as an equal to a man, yet still be privileged and respected as a woman. 

Now at the risk sounding like a crazed feminist, which who knows...I might be, I did mention that this treatment of women in Hungary begs another question. I can't help but wonder, over and over again, what are the women of Hungary sacrificing in order to be respected and idolized by the men of this country? Every time a man pours my soup for me, is it because he wants to be a gentleman and thinks that it's the polite thing to do, or am I just so high on my dainty little pedestal that it would be impossible for me to reach the ladle all by myself... 

Sometimes in times of crisis, the American government finds it necessary to sacrifice certain freedoms in order to increase public security (that's not an issue I'm going into, it's just to set up this point). What sacrifices are the women of Hungary making in order to be treated this way? Lower wages? Less working hours? Or are the sacrifices less obvious than that? A subtle comment here, a misplaced glance there...The whole thing makes me want to dive back into my quest to uncover the hidden secrets in Disney movies. If I wasn't so convinced that I would be terrible at it, maybe I would be a Film major...or a Women's Studies major. But I'm not particularly fond of doing things that I think I'm bad at (take OChem, for example).

So at this point, you're probably more than a little confused. I said that I thought Hungarian men were better than American men (smash), but I seem to only be criticizing and critiquing their actions. Hah, like America's stance of women is one to be particularly proud of (thank you Todd Akin). I absolutely adore being around my Hungarian boys. They are some of the sweetest, kindest, funniest people I have ever been around, and I know they would take me to Heaven, Hell and back if I asked them too. I think that's all I'd like in the States knowing that there are people out there who have the capabilities to laugh with me, play with me, joke with me, but at the end of the day still respect the hell out of me. At the end of the day, they still open doors for me; they still care about more than just themselves. Chivalry, contrary to popular belief, is not dead. 

Again, all of this isn't to say that I don't love my American boys; I do. All I'm saying is, my expectations are now higher. I come back in a little more than 3 weeks, guys. If you know me well enough, you know what all too appropriate quote I would typically reference at this point in my rantings/ventings/bloggings. 



Well, I've taken a new stance. Sir William wasn't right about everything, was he?