Over the past few weeks, I’ve spent weekends in Porto and Lisbon, Portugal, and Prague, Czechia.
Even though we saw historic churches and buildings, it wasn’t the sights that stuck with me most. In reality, we walked into the churches, glanced at the artwork, nodded our heads and moved on. Rather, what stayed with me most was shared laughter, frustration and moments of joy with my friends. What mattered wasn’t the monuments themselves, but experiencing them together.
I went to Porto with a group of five other people. After a short, six-hour bus ride, we arrived in a new country, greeted by a piercing sunset overlooking the Luís I Bridge, where the rows of tiled homes reflected the sun’s glow.
After a very filling plate of sea bass, we headed to one of the main streets in town. There, we stumbled into a bar blasting American 2000s hits, where the average age inside had to be 55.
The next day, the temperature got a little chillier, and the wind picked up. After we worked up an appetite walking around Porto’s narrow and colorful streets, we went to eat Porto’s famous Francesinha.
After an hour or so of waiting, I was finally ready to dig in. Unfortunately, the classic sandwich, typically packed with pork, ham and sausage, didn’t quite hit the spot in vegetarian form. It sat like a rock in my stomach, but I wasn’t alone; everyone else was struggling to finish theirs, too.
When we all eventually surrendered our dishes and washed them down with some sweet Port wine, we continued exploring. And as I kept travelling onward, there were other moments far from perfect.
A few weeks later, I boarded my flight to Prague with another friend. I was amazed by the ancient architecture while walking through the city.
While the city was beautiful, the best memories are interchangeable with any place. For example, when my friend and I were getting ready to go out in our hostel bathroom on our last night in the city.
We met two girls from San Diego State University who were also going out, so we hung out together in the hostel common area until we were ready to leave. A 30-something-year-old man approached us with a Heineken in hand, slurring his words. Caught off guard and uncomfortable, we tried to get him to leave.
“How old are you guys?” he asked.
“Seventeen,” one of the girls cleverly blurted out.
But this didn’t deter him from trying to join us on our trip to the pub.
These situations can be scary, especially when there’s a shared living space involved. We stayed together, keeping a watchful eye until he finally took the hint that we weren’t interested in his company. Later in the night, it was something we laughed about and bonded over.
It’s moments like these that define a trip — how you and the people you’re with handle the good, the bad and the unexpected. What good is any trip if you’re in bad company?
While that might seem like a blatantly obvious statement, I hadn’t even considered it as someone who hasn’t really travelled . You’re told to see the main landmarks in every city, but that is just a small sliver of any trip.
So, despite the occasional bad meal and creepy hostel man, any trip can be memorable if you are with the right people.
Contact Shaine Davison at sdavison@alligator.org. Follow her travels on Instagram @shaine_in_spain.
Shaine Davison is a junior majoring in journalism and minoring in environmental science. She has previously served as the editor of the enterprise desk and reporter for university and sports desks. This semester, she will be studying abroad in Madrid, Spain.
