The Trip that started it all - Mexico 1997
One of my greatest passions in life is travel. I mean, who doesn’t want to hop on a plane, train, or magical carpet to see the world? Most folks in their 20s dream of globetrotting, ticking off places from their bucket list like it’s a scavenger hunt. In my case, I hit the travel jackpot during the summer of 1997, just before heading into seventh grade. My grandma decided it was a good time for a mission trip to Tula, Mexico—yes, you heard right, a mission trip! My dad thought it would be a brilliant idea for me to gain some “cultural experience,” so he whipped up a permission slip faster than you could say “¡no hay problema!”, and off I went with my great-grandma, my great-uncle, and my uncle Chris, who is slightly younger than I am. Now, Chris and I have been buddies since we were in diapers—literally. Lucky for us, I had a smattering of Spanish under my belt, courtesy of my elementary school (which I suspect was taught by a pair of mismatched socks). We piled into a white Dodge van