2025 was a big year for me. I spent the whole year traveling, made so many friends, created memories I’ll carry with me forever.
2025 had many highs and lows, a lot of emotion and a lot of heart. It’s certainly a year I will never forget, which is part of the reason that I want to make this post, as a way to help me remember all of the amazing things that happened to me this year. But before I dive into the post, I do want to make a disclaimer. The market is oversaturated with all different kinds of “wrapped” statistics.
Spotify Wrapped. Goodreads Year in Books. Duolingo Year in Review. Discord Recap. Google Photos Year in Review. Instagram’s year-end collages. I even made one for the social media channels for the travel agency I work for. We are bombarded with statistics about ourselves — songs listened to, books read, steps taken, countries visited, photos snapped.
And here’s the thing: these stats are fun. They’re shareable. But somewhere along the way, I think we lost the actual purpose and benefits of this form of reflection. We look at the numbers, feel a little rush of accomplishment (or inadequacy, depending on the number), and then move on. We don’t actually sit with what those numbers mean. We don’t ask ourselves what we learned, what we want to carry forward, what we want to leave behind.
So yes, this post has numbers. Because numbers are easy to quantify and fun to share. But it’s also my attempt at real reflection. At asking myself what this year taught me, how I’ve changed, and what I want to bring into 2026.
And I challenge you to do the same. Not just scroll through your Spotify Wrapped and screenshot your top artist, but actually reflect: What did you do this past year? What surprised you? What do you want to do differently next year? What do you want to do more of?
So here’s my year, in numbers and in feelings.
Thirteen Countries
I started the year in Paris, France, watching fireworks set off from the Arc de Triomphe. From there, I made my way down through the rest of France and into Spain, with a quick stopover in Lisbon. Then through the south of Spain and into Morocco for the full 90-day visa. After Morocco, I flew to Turkey for two months. Then I went on a trip with my mom’s travel agency to Zambia and stayed 10 days with my granny in Zimbabwe. After that, I flew to Austria to meet back up with Jordan, and we backpacked for about 20 days through Austria, Slovenia, and Budapest. Finally, we flew to Southeast Asia, where we lived for three months in Siem Reap, Cambodia, took a weekend vacation to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, and then backpacked Thailand for six weeks.
And that was the year.
Thirteen countries sounds impressive when you list them out like that. But what that number doesn’t capture is the exhaustion of moving that much. It doesn’t capture how much of a country I actually saw, or for that matter didn’t see. I mean Vietnam and Hungary are included in this number despite only spending five days in one city.
It also doesn’t capture the magic: the set over the Sahara, the street food in Siem Reap, all of the Turkish food I ate, anything that I actually did or that made me stop and think.
Thirteen countries taught me that more isn’t always better. That sometimes slowing down, staying in one place for three months instead of three days, is what actually makes travel meaningful.
40 Books Read
My reading goal this year was 35 books, which I thought was a stretch when I made the goal, but I managed not only to achieve the goal, but surpass it!
My favorite books this year were the Morgan Le Fay series by Sophie Keetch (I cannot wait for the third book in April 2026), Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H., The Lilac People by Milo Todd, and Mood Machine by Liz Pelly.
Reading has become such an integral part of my life recently. I can’t have too many physical hobbies due to space limitations in my bag, so reading fills that gap. I love my Kobo. I literally don’t know what I’d do without her. If you need an e-reader, I cannot recommend it enough.
If you have Goodreads, add me on the link here, I love knowing what my friends are reading!! Either that, or comment a book recommendation down below please!
When I was a kid, I used to read this much, but I lost the love for reading while I was in college due to just how much academic text I had to read for all of my political science classes. It’s good to be back.
I’ve gotten comfortable with plans being turned inside out
Life moves fast when you’re traveling. Even faster than the pace I got accustomed to in university. I think by throwing myself off the deep end into a world that turns not only upside down but inside out at the drop of a hat, I’ve become a much more flexible and tolerant person. And for that, I’m grateful.
One example: I was planning to live for three months in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Then, a day before we signed the lease, we decided to move to an entirely different city, Siem Reap. It turned out to be the best decision we could have made.
Or that time my mom needed someone to go on a familiarization trip to Zambia and said I should go, and I debated it for a while, but ultimately was like: heck yea, and took it as an incredible opportunity to visit Zambia and see my family!
Another very recent one: Jordan and I were planning to head to Sri Lanka after Thailand. But then, two weeks before we were supposed to leave, we got an offer to housesit in the British Virgin Islands, on the exact opposite side of the world. And for some insane reason, we took it. Now, in a week, we’re heading back to a side of the world we didn’t expect to find ourselves in for at least another eight months.
This year taught me that plans are just suggestions. That the best experiences often come from saying yes to things that don’t make sense on paper. That flexibility isn’t just a nice-to-have skill, it’s essential to keep your head above the water in an ever-changing world
Four Volunteer Stays
We started the year volunteering in the Sahara Desert in Morocco, where we chilled out in the sand, learned how to tie a headscarf, watched the sunsets from the top of a sand dune, and contributed to desertification by pulling plants out of the ground for our volunteer host’s goats (which I don’t feel great about having written the majority of my essays in university on soil health and reversing desertification, but it happened).
Then we moved to Anza, Morocco, where we spent an incredible two months volunteering at a surf hostel. We met so many incredible people, learned how to surf, helped a cat give birth to kittens, went to the local souk to buy groceries every day, learned how to cook Moroccan food, and fell in love with the cuisine.
Then we flew to Turkey, where we volunteered in Butterfly Valley, which was essentially a soap opera, but in the best way. Once again, I met so many amazing volunteers, all of whom I think about often. We did yoga, gave each other dancing lessons from our respective cultures (I taught them the Cotton-Eyed Joe 🇺🇸), took sunrise yoga classes, swam and kayaked in the blue waters.
Then in Istanbul, we stayed for five weeks volunteering at a language center. We made so many good friends who collectively boosted Istanbul to the coveted spot of my favorite city I’ve ever visited. And I know if I came back to Istanbul, I’d have so many friends waiting to greet me.
Volunteering is complicated. There are ethical issues around it: the voluntourism industry, the way some programs exploit both volunteers and local communities, the question of whether you’re actually helping or just taking up space. But for me, it’s been one of the most meaningful ways to travel. Not really because I think I’m “making a difference” in some grandiose way, but because it forces you to slow down and helps you feel like a part of a community.
Two Volunteer Reunions
We were able to reunite with two of our volunteer friends over the course of the year.
We met up with Charlotte (who we volunteered with for six weeks in Anza, Morocco) in Salzburg, and she became our unpaid German translator through the city.
And then we ran into Mohammed literally last week in Phuket. We’d volunteered together at the English language club in Istanbul, and now he’s a flight attendant. He was on a layover, and we happened to be in the same city at the same time. It felt like the universe aligning.
These reunions reminded me that travel isn’t just about places. It’s about people. The friends you make on the road become part of your story in a way that’s different from friendships back home. You meet someone, spend weeks living and working together, become unbelievably close to a stranger you met three weeks ago, and then you part ways, not knowing if you’ll ever see them again. And then sometimes, you do.
I Learned to Sit with Loneliness
There were moments this year where I was profoundly lonely. Not because I was alone, I was with Jordan most of the time, and I met so many people along the way. But there’s a specific kind of loneliness that comes with being far from home. With missing birthdays and holidays and mundane Tuesday dinners with friends. With realizing that your life is moving forward in a way that makes it hard to stay connected to the people you love back home.
I don’t have a neat resolution to this. But I’m learning that loneliness is part of the deal. And that it’s okay to feel it, to sit with it, to acknowledge that the path that I have found myself on, as beautiful as it is, also comes with sacrifices. But that sacrifice will make reuniting all the more sweet.
Five new pairs of shoes
This is a tough one. For some reason, I cannot hold onto a pair of shoes for more than a few months. I wear through the heel so fast, its actually infuriating.
I think it’s because I walk funny. A chiropractor once told me my legs are different lengths. Also, I have hip issues because I dislocated my hip trying to do the splits in college. Not to mention I only ever have one pair of sneakers at a time due to space constraints.
So all of those factors come together to make me buy shoes constantly. I think I’ve found a solution, which is to place heel pads on the backs of my shoes so I wear through them slower.
Let me know if anyone else has this issue or any advice. Please.
46 Newsletters
If you’ve been subscribed to me for this whole year, that means you’ve received 46 newsletters. That’s a lot.
Thank you for reading what I write. Thank you for sending it to your friends and family. Thank you for replying to my emails with your own stories and thoughts. Thank you for being part of this journey with me, even if we’ve never met in person. Writing these newsletters has become one of my favorite parts of traveling. It forces me to reflect, to process, to find meaning in the chaos.
With all that said, what lessons did this year teach me?
Well, most of all it taught me how much I value connection. To people I meet along the way, to friends and family back home. It taught me that I need to prioritize this above all, to keep myself happy, healthy and sane. This year reminds me that I need to put myself out there, and make connections along the way, because that is what travel is all about, making new memories and connections to people and places.
This year taught me to be flexible. To be open to change and the universe pulling me in different directions towards new experiences. Those experiences may be different, scary, or not what I was expecting, but they can also be beautiful and exactly what I needed at that moment in time.
This year has taught me how much I value spending quality time in one place. I would rather know the ins and outs of a singular city and actually feel like I lived there and understood it, even if it takes three months, than barely scrape the surface of multiple cities and towns in that same period of time. Not only that, but traveling that fast is exhausting, and after a while of traveling at a breakneck speed, I think it is easy to become a bit blasé about everything you are seeing.
So what has this year taught you?
xx abby
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Love to you and Jordan
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