Thirty Countries In: What I Know—and What I Still Want to Learn

Thirty countries sounds like a lot until I think about how much of the world I still have not seen—and how much I still do not understand about the places I have visited.

The number is useful shorthand. It suggests experience, accumulated miles and a passport that has been put to work. But it does not tell you whether I understood a country, whether I moved through it thoughtfully or whether I simply became more efficient at being a tourist.

After 30 countries, I know how to navigate an unfamiliar airport. I can compare flights, build a complicated itinerary, find the right neighborhood and pack for several climates. I know that an early train can save a day, that the least expensive flight is not always the best value and that a well-located hotel can completely change a short visit.

At Waiʻānapanapa State Park near Hāna, Maui, waves move across black volcanic sand beneath a coastline shaped by lava, wind and water. It is a place that feels raw and unsettled.

These are not always the choices I want to make. Sometimes I have to spend more than I would like because a particular flight, hotel or connection can make or break the itinerary. I do not want to spend money unnecessarily, but I have learned that the least expensive option can come with a cost of its own.

Those are useful skills. They are not the same as understanding a place.

If I am honest, becoming more efficient at being a tourist is probably the truer answer. But it is not the traveler I want to become. I want to submit to a place—to its rhythms, challenges and imperfections—rather than expecting it to conform to me.

That distinction is part of why I created Beyond the Return Ticket.

I know that staying for a week does not make me a local. It does, however, give me the opportunity to move beyond the version of a place designed primarily for visitors. The question is whether my planning helps me pay closer attention—or becomes another barrier between me and the place itself.

Near the White Tower in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, medieval stonework and half-timbered buildings still shape the rhythm of everyday life. Early in the day, before the streets filled with visitors, the town felt less like a preserved attraction and more like a place whose history had simply continued forward.

Planning Shapes the Experience—but It Cannot Control It

I believe in planning well.

I research neighborhoods, transportation, opening hours, reservation policies and the history that shaped the place I am about to enter. I would rather arrive with context than spend the first several days trying to understand the basic geography.

Good planning creates freedom. It reduces the number of small decisions that can consume a trip and gives me enough confidence to change direction when something more interesting appears.

But travel has also taught me that control is fragile.

Weather changes. Trains are delayed—or missed. A restaurant I planned to visit is suddenly no longer there. A place I expected to love feels strangely empty, while an unplanned lunch or an ordinary neighborhood becomes the part of the trip I remember most.

Those unexpected changes can often become some of the most memorable moments of a trip.

The itinerary matters. So does knowing when to stop following it. What am I being drawn toward in that moment? What might I miss if I insist on keeping to the plan?

Harburg Castle overlooks the Wörnitz River from its hilltop position above Harburg, Bavaria. It was one of the unplanned stops I discovered along Germany’s Romantic Road in 2025.

Food Is Not Separate From the Story

Often, what draws me away from the itinerary is food. A market I did not know existed, a crowded street stall or a lunch that lasts much longer than expected can reveal more about a place than another hour spent following a checklist.

I have never understood the idea that food is an indulgent side note to “serious” travel. I have planned entire trips around eating. That is not the sole purpose of the journey ahead, but food will always be important to the way I experience a place.

A meal can explain migration, trade, religion, agriculture, class and family structure. A market can reveal what grows nearby, what had to be imported and how the geography of a country shaped its table.

Food is history that people continue to prepare every day.

Some of my strongest travel memories are attached to meals—not necessarily because the food was expensive or technically perfect, but because the table helped me understand something about where I was.

I can enjoy a street-stall meal as much as—or sometimes more than—a three-Michelin-star restaurant or one recognized among the World’s 50 Best. They offer different experiences, but price and prestige do not determine which one will stay with me.

A long lunch in France can change the pace of an entire day. A hawker center in Singapore can make the country’s cultural influences feel immediate rather than theoretical. And the food scene in South America is extraordinary. Some of the meals that most changed my understanding of a destination happened there.

Food connects me to my surroundings.

At a cooking class in Vietnam, bánh xèo, fresh herbs and crisp vegetables turned a shared table into a lesson in flavor, balance and technique. Cooking is a passion of mine, so I try to take a class almost everywhere I travel.

I travel partly to see the places where history happened. I also travel to see how history continues to live—in architecture, rituals, conversations and the food people prepare.

I often wonder what someone 100 years from now will think when they look back at the way we live today. What will they recognize? What will seem impossible to understand? Which ordinary details will survive to tell our story?

More Is Not Always Better

I have taken trips where I tried to fit in too much. I have also stayed longer than necessary because I was afraid of missing something.

Neither approach guarantees a meaningful experience.

The right amount of time depends on the destination, the purpose of the trip and whether it is a first visit or a return. Sometimes 48 hours is enough to reconnect with a familiar city. Sometimes five days barely allows me to understand how its neighborhoods relate to one another.

I have become less interested in counting how many attractions I saw and more interested in whether I gave a place enough attention.

Do I understand this place—and its place in the world—more clearly than before I arrived?

I do not expect to understand it as a local. A visitor who looks more deeply is still a visitor. But I hope to leave with more than the simplified version that can be absorbed from the most popular sights.

That does not mean every trip needs to be slow. It means the pace should be intentional.

Brussels Town Hall rises above the Grand-Place with the kind of detail that rewards a much closer look. Standing beneath its Gothic tower, I was reminded that the history of Brussels is not confined to museums—it remains visible in the architecture and public spaces at the center of the city.

Comfort and Understanding Are Not the Same Thing

Some destinations make travel easy. Transportation is clear, service is polished and the routines feel immediately manageable.

Other places require more patience and time.

Ease can make a trip enjoyable, but it does not automatically make it meaningful. Difficulty does not automatically make a trip authentic, either.

I am learning to resist both assumptions.

A place does not need to be uncomfortable to be culturally important. It also does not owe me familiarity, convenience or an experience designed around my expectations.

In fact, I often enjoy the inconveniences a different place presents. They force me to pay closer attention and reconsider what I assume should be easy.

In America, we often expect almost anything to be immediately available. Somewhere else, the same thing may still be possible, but getting there may require more patience, another conversation or a completely different route. Sometimes that journey is more rewarding than the convenience would have been.

The useful question is not whether a destination made travel easy for me. It is whether I paid attention to the place beyond the way it served me as a visitor.

Mist gave Château de Chenonceau a quieter presence, softening its Renaissance details without diminishing its scale. Built across the River Cher in France’s Loire Valley, the château is a reminder that architecture can reveal history before you ever step inside. Once inside, WOW!

People Are Not Representatives of an Entire Country

One generous interaction does not prove that everyone in a country is welcoming. The reverse is also true: one frustrating exchange does not define a culture.

Americans hear these kinds of generalizations about France all the time. A single unpleasant interaction becomes proof that the French are rude, while the context, circumstances and individual person disappear from the story.

People are individuals, shaped by their own experiences, pressures, beliefs and personalities.

I am sure I have made those generalizations myself. They may reflect how an interaction felt in the moment, but they are not fair conclusions about an entire country.

After 30 countries, I am more cautious about turning a personal experience into a universal judgment. I can describe what happened to me. I can explain how it felt. I can try to place it within a larger context.

I cannot pretend that one week—or even several visits—makes me an authority on millions of lives.

I will always share my experiences, but I will also make clear that they are mine. Someone else may have an experience that is better, worse or simply different. What matters is not proving whose version is correct. What matters is how we walk away from those experiences and what we are willing to learn from them.

A neighborhood boulangerie in France offers its own introduction to daily life: baguettes standing upright, loaves stacked behind glass and customers arriving. Some of the most revealing travel experiences are found in ordinary routines rather than famous landmarks. I love morning bakery stops!

Returning Can Teach More Than Arriving

There is a particular excitement in seeing a country for the first time. Everything feels new, and even ordinary details demand attention.

When I was 25, I had the opportunity to take my mother to Paris and Normandy. It was her first trip overseas, although I had taken a few smaller international trips by then. I was excited to experience that part of the world with her, and I did not imagine that I would be back anytime soon.

Now, after approximately 20 trips to France, I see that experience differently.

I have learned to take in as much as I can without treating every visit as my only chance. I may return—and that possibility allows me to be present rather than consumed by the fear of missing something.

But returning offers something else, too. It creates a depth of experience that is rarely possible on a first trip.

On a second or third visit, I am less consumed by the major sights. I notice neighborhoods, routines and changes that were invisible when I was still trying to understand the basic shape of the place.

I also notice how I have changed.

The destination may be familiar, but I arrive with different questions.

That is part of what interests me about returning to Vietnam and Thailand during the journey ahead. I am not trying to recreate an earlier trip. I want to know what feels different this time, what I failed to notice before—and how I have changed between visits.

Across the vineyards in France’s Champagne region, rows of vines follow the landscape toward villages on the horizon. The Champagne region has become one of my favorite places in France to revisit and reconnect.

When Visiting Is No Longer Enough

I know how to travel.

What I do not yet know is whether I understand how to live somewhere that initially feels like travel.

I have wanted to live overseas for years. On previous trips, I have tried to create small versions of that experience by staying longer and settling into a routine. But a week—or even several weeks—still does not reveal what it means to build an ordinary life somewhere.

Visiting a city is built around possibilities: where to go, what to see, what to eat and what might happen next.

Living there includes errands, health care, loneliness, laundry, work, relationships and ordinary Tuesdays when nothing remarkable happens.

Those ordinary Tuesdays can be hard for me.

Vietnam is an important part of my upcoming journey because I am considering it as more than a destination. I want to explore the possibility of living there, but I do not want to arrive determined to prove that it is the answer.

I want to understand what daily life there might actually require.

I also want to learn how to distinguish a possible move from an escape.

Travel can be healing. It can create distance from routines and identities that no longer fit. But distance alone does not answer the harder questions.

Am I building a different life, avoiding an old one or doing some complicated combination of both?

I do not have a polished answer, and I do not want to manufacture one before I leave. I want to learn the answer by living inside the question.

Perhaps that is what 30 countries have actually taught me: experience should make me less certain, not more. Every trip has shown me how much can be missed, misunderstood or reduced to an easy conclusion.

Thirty Countries Is a Beginning, Not a Credential

Seeing the countries I have visited on a map puts both my experience—and how much of the world I have yet to explore—into perspective. That is what I want Beyond the Return Ticket to become: a place for practical planning, personal experience and deeper questions about culture, history, food, people and home.

I am proud of the places I have visited and grateful for what those experiences have given me. I cannot fully explain how fortunate I feel to have had these opportunities.

But 30 countries is not evidence that I have the world figured out.

If anything, travel has made me more aware of how quickly a place can be simplified from a distance—and how different it can be from what we thought we understood.

That is what I want Beyond the Return Ticket to become: a place for practical planning, personal experience and deeper questions about culture, history, food, people and home

I will share what I know. I will be honest about what I do not. And when experience changes my mind, I will tell you that, too.

Which country—or which lesson from travel—would you like me to explore first during my upcoming months in Asia?