Planning Not To Plan

Gabriele Marija (25), who is currently completing Masters of Law in Comparative and International Dispute Resolution, shares her experiences of chasing the winds of New York, getting ambushed by monkeys in Hong Kong and living the island life in Lanzarote.

Instagram: Gabrielemarija

Do you have a random fact?

1: I used to look after hedgehogs when I was younger and volunteering at an animal shelter. They were the sweetest creatures.

2: I am hoping to publish a plan-based recipe book and travelling is my greatest inspiration.

How did you come to reside in the UK?

I wanted to become an actress for as long as I can remember. Shakespeare was born here, which in my mind made UK the best place to study drama.

Who or what inspired you to travel?

This might sound presumptuous but I inspired myself. I knew I wanted to travel because it would help me to grow.

In high school there were all these wonderful places I would read about. They were not necessarily doing better than my home country (Lithuania) but just living in a completely different way, with completely different perspectives. It fascinated me and it was when I knew that if I ever wanted to change anything and make the world better, I had to experience those countries way of living. So that I could understand them.

Let’s take human rights, for example. You can’t stand for something unless you open your mind and appreciate different cultures. Especially with things you don’t support. There are and always will be countries which will do things differently and that’s okay. To continue living on the same planet we have to learn to see their point of view, which is very difficult to achieve without talking to people, seeing how they live and witnessing their stories first-hand.

What is your favourite trip?

Probably my visit to Toronto (Canada) because it was my first visit to another continent. I was 21 and it was a university trip. When the plane took off, I was genuinely surprised when it landed because in my mind it felt like arriving on a completely different planet, which was really exciting.

Before then I guess it never occurred to me that it is something people like me can do. In my mind it was always somewhat impossible for people from small European countries to go to another continent. It was a truly surreal experience which I greatly enjoyed. 

How do you prepare for a trip?

It is important to me that I plan everything in advance. Every. Single. Thing.

I have a template Google document, which I use to create my itinerary and note down where I want to go on each day of the trip. I even make a plan for the day before my trip.

Being able to know my plans minute by minute (when I need to leave the house, when I need to start getting ready, when I need to wake up) helps to avoid that ‘oh no, I probably forgot something’ feeling.

Have you had any travel disasters?

Only one comes to mind and it’s quite recent!

Because of the pandemic I haven’t travelled that much in the last year. I only travelled once in November and by then I had completely forgotten how everything worked. It didn’t help that it was a spontaneous decision, which means I planned my travel two days in advance.

This time, I had no minute-by-minute itinerary.

I simply knew that I had to get to London City Airport, however, it was my first time there and I wasn’t even sure where it was. And because I booked my flight quite late at night, I think it was about 11PM, I looked the airport up on the map and it said it would take 30 minutes to get there, even though it was on the other side of the city. Which at the time made complete sense in my mind.

Then on the day of travel (I don’t know why I didn’t check the map again) I allocated half an hour to get to the airport. As it turns out, the actual predicted journey time was one and a half hours. Not taking into consideration there was traffic in London. Long story short, it actually took me three hours to get to the airport.

By the time I got there, there was two minutes left until the baggage check-in closed.

I was so stressed that when I had to go through security, I forgot to take out my devices and liquids. They had to search me and test the liquids. It was probably the longest time it has ever took me to get through security.

I was convinced I was going to miss my flight but luckily, I didn’t!

Have you had any other memorable airport security experiences?

The first time I was body searched, I remember flying back from Lanzarote and I was wearing sunscreen. Apparently, the sunscreen included some ingredients which triggered the scanner alarm and they had to do a swab test on my skin and then test it to check there were no explosive materials.

What was Lanzarote like?

A dream holiday!

I was probably 20 and it was my first independent ‘adult’ holiday. I had a job, paid for everything with my own money. I went there with a friend and it was amazing because it was the first time I swam in the ocean.

I like to say it was my first and so far only ‘proper’ holiday where I just enjoyed the sun and did nothing serious all day. Looking back, I don’t even remember doing any pre-trip research. I just knew there was an island, we were going there and that’s it. There were no museums to go to, no pressure to visit major ‘tourist’ landmarks, just the beach where we went every day to enjoy the sun.

We also took a tour bus around the island and one of the cities we stopped at was the proper ‘touristy’ city with big hotels, pools and everything. The AirBnB and town we were staying in was small, with very few guests.

Do you prefer to travel solo or in a group?

It really depends. If I’m traveling for work or university, then I prefer being in a group because you get to share that experience.

When I’m going somewhere purely to explore, I prefer going on my own and the main reason is that it allows me to walk around the city for seven hours and take pictures of boring things at my own pace. I can easily walk 20km without getting tired and just enjoy taking the city in, without having to rush because of something someone else wants to see.

What are your top tips for exploring a new city?

There are two and they might sound quite contradictory but hear me out!

1: Do your research.

When I’m preparing for a trip, I like to open the city map to get the feel of the general structure and understand what is where. Then I will read as many blogs as I can find and watch videos to see which places I feel drawn to. When drafting the itinerary, I make sure I schedule time for visiting those places.

Plus, I will research museums, find out their opening times, anything else I need to be aware of, so I have all the information in one place.

2: My second tip would be to leave one or two days to purely explore.

Go wherever your feet take you and absorb the environment. That’s how I discover the best hidden restaurants and local spots.

What led to you visiting New York?

It was a #DMUGlobal university trip. We went to visit the United Nations and to learn about the American legal system. We had some free time as well, which is one of the things I like about university trips. We would get to go to those places that are not for tourists and participate in local activities, which gave me such a different perspective of the city. We only spent a week in New York but it felt like I was actually living there for a bit. It was really nice.

What are your New York highlights?

The weather! It was so so so cold there.

I usually like cold weather but the wind there, it literally blew me off. I went to Frank Roosevelt Island and I put my bag on the bench next to me, just to fix my hair and I then had to run after my bag because it was being blown away.

It was really interesting to hear from the Americans about 9/11 because of course they were the ones who experienced it first-hand. It truly made me think, it is one thing reading about an event in the news and then it’s a totally different experience when you speak to people that were there.

I will also never forget or stop talking about the food. There were a lot of little trips to spots I wanted to visit. In Chinatown we went to this restaurant I wanted to see because everything they serve is vegan. The menu looked a bit dodgy but I haven’t tasted such delicious food or tea anywhere since. There were only a few locals in there and it was simply perfect!

Overall, I was sceptical about New York and what a big deal everyone makes of it but now I understand. It was life changing.

How did the opportunity to see Hong Kong arise?

It was also a university trip. We were in Hong Kong for 12 days in total. One of the main concerns I had about going there was the 12-hour flight. I had no idea what the jet lag would be like. Funnily enough, when we got there, there was absolutely no jet lag whatsoever. When I came back to the UK, I slept for 23 hours straight.

On the first day in Hong Kong, I don’t know if it was the cultural shock or something else but I kept thinking ‘I hate it here, please take me back. I don’t understand anything, the streets feel weird.’ Then by the end of the week, maybe because we felt so safe there and we had an itinerary filled with activities where we met many local people, I wanted to stay and live there.

The city was so familiar by the end of that trip because we spent a lot of time exploring. We didn’t even have to look at the map anymore. Someone from the group would ask me how do you get somewhere and I would be able to tell them which line to take and where to change. I can’t always do that in London!

We found plenty of little local spots along the way which were nice and authentic.

I greatly enjoyed Hong Kong and hope to go back one day (though I am unsure about how that would work now the political landscape has changed).

What were your Hong Kong highlights?

The nature there and the colours. I can still vividly see it in my mind as we speak.

On the first day of the trip, we formed a group of people. Everyone had such an inspiring personality and we just hung out together. I learnt a lot from all of them.

One day we went to Monkey Park and almost got killed by a monkey. I personally wanted to visit the park from an animal law perspective. From what I understand, the park is a secure zone, so the monkeys just roam free and there are a lot of signs which warn visitors to be careful and stay away from the monkeys.

Initially, we couldn’t see any monkeys and went for a hike. Then the monkeys started coming in from the forest and the 5 of us were like okay, ‘hi, nice monkeys, maybe we can go now.’ We went to leave the park and got to a taxi pick up point (taxis are really cheap there) but there were more monkeys there. Other people were feeding the monkeys and they looked quite happy.

Then we went to a different parking lot, where our taxi was waiting. There were way more people there, with way more monkeys and those monkeys were attacking people.

To get to the parking lot, we had to pass a road barrier. There was a monkey sitting on the barrier which meant we had to get quite close to the monkey or walk into the road with cars whizzing past. At first, the monkey was staring at us. Then it started shouting, looking like it was going to jump. My friend jumped off into the road where there were cars coming.

Luckily, it all ended well but that is why you should not interfere with nature and let animals have their natural living habitats.

New York or Hong Kong?

It is impossible to choose as they were so different!

Both trips have greatly contributed to my personal growth and development, which is very important career wise. They were a truly invaluable experience especially because I got to learn about two different legal systems. It was much better than just readings words in a textbook.

When I read the news about America or Hong Kong now, it makes me appreciate the information so much more and understand better.

What was it like being vegan abroad?

My answer excludes Lanzarote and Brussels - I wasn’t yet a full-time vegan.   

In Toronto, which I learned was a very new city compared to Europe, there was no traditional non-vegan food that I was aware of or wanted to try which made it easier. I always try to make the best of whichever city I am in but with that said, it was difficult because I was with a non-vegan group. There were barely any vegetarian options in the places we went. Maybe it was because we were staying in the central district and veganism wasn’t that well known back then.

Hong Kong was the opposite. I tried to stay vegan the whole time and it wasn’t difficult even though no one spoke English in the local restaurants. Once we even ate the market street food and I don’t know how I survived but I did. I would just say ‘vegan’, ‘vegetarian’ or ‘no meat’ and they would either show options or just bring me steamed rice and vegetables. That was mostly what I ate for the week but it was so tasty and I loved it.

When I went to New York, I knew there were plenty of food options there as I made a list of vegan restaurants I wanted to visit in advance. The friend I went with was vegan too, which made decisions about where to eat easy.

Fun fact, I was preparing that New York list for over a year, saving posts I would come across on Instagram. It had about 15 places on it and I went to all of them. Next time I am in New York I will know exactly where to go.

What has travelling taught you?

Great question! I guess the most important lesson was that letting things just run their course is not always bad. Which was a truly significant revelation for someone like me, who likes to have control over things. In life there are and always will be things you can’t control. Trains will be late, flights will get cancelled and weather will change. But that doesn’t have to ruin the experience! You just have to take it as it comes and improvise.

In Hong Kong, I learnt that just letting other people take the lead, can result in wonderful discoveries. They will see places that you would just never discover on your own. 

Travelling has also taught me that the taste of locally grown food in other counties is simply extraordinary.

Do you have any advice for first time explores?

1: Stay aware.

When you travel for the first time, there will be a lot going on and it’s important to keep your eyes open.

2: Stay cautious.

Maybe this is the lawyer in me speaking but make sure you know the local laws, like whether you can cross the road anywhere or whether you should always use green light and pedestrian crossing.

3: Respect different cultures and be aware of local traditions.

One thing I loved about university trips was that they would give us a little cultural presentation, explaining what the local customs are. This is something I always research for my own trips, just to make sure I am being respectful.

Where will you travel to next?

Hopefully Japan!

I want to go there for like 3 months or even better, stay for the whole year and travel to the little villages and experience all the different parts of the country. I have been dreaming about this trip for at least the last couple of years.

I would also like to visit India and Africa because they are the complete opposites of places I have visited so far. I wish to see the diversity of nature. Ideally, it wouldn’t be a solo trip but part of a volunteering opportunity or something similar, so that it is not purely touristy.

The trips I took so far were quite glamorous - staying in beautiful apartments, visiting Instagramable places, taking colourful photos but truth to be told, that isn’t what I like. On my next trip, I hope to see a more raw and unedited side of the world.

What do you want to be remembered for?

I want to be remembered for my work contributing to creating a more peaceful, sustainable and healthy society.

Instagram: Gabrielemarija