Do Cool Sh*t (23 page)

16

STOP WITH THE SAME-OLD, SAME-OLD

How to Bring New Adventure and Travel into Your Life

There are so many doors to be opened, and I’m not afraid to look behind them.

—E
LIZABETH
T
AYLOR

W
hen you get to Third Street, and you begin walking west from Third Avenue to Second, there will be a black door on the north side of the street. Knock three times and wait. A man who looks like he’s about one hundred and fifty years old will open the door, and when he does
,
pretend like you know him—his memory is a bit like a sieve these days—and say, ‘Hey, Frankie, it’s me!’ He will let you in, don’t worry, and the place rocks. It’s open for the most part from Thursday to Saturday night.”

Black door? Knock three times? Old man named Frankie? I couldn’t believe it. I’d been living in New York for eight years and never known about this speakeasy. Apparently it had been the hot spot for the mob to go since the 1930s, to grab a beer and chill without the 5-0 after them.

Radha and I couldn’t wait to go. Our friend Matt told us about it, and he always knew about the coolest and most fun things around.

That Thursday, we beelined for the black door at around midnight. Sure enough, after knocking three times on the black door, an old guy opened the door, We said, “Hey, Frankie, it’s me!” in unison, and sure enough, he let us in. Wow.

As we entered, it was as though we stepped back in time to the 1930s (à la Woody Allen’s movie
Midnight in Paris
). The light was dim, there were rows of dusty photos of random Italian-looking men in hats and suits, an old dirty pool table, and some beat-up leather couches, and, of course, the bar. Behind the bar was a regular old white fridge, the kind normally found in someone’s home kitchen, and one of those ancient cash registers that looked like it was from the 1800s.

We each ordered a beer, and the old guy behind the counter opened the fridge, took out two beers and said, “Beer is five dollars.” When we handed him a twenty dollar bill, he put it in his pocket and said, “I have no change.” He handed us the beers and walked away. Amazing. It was obviously part of the experience, and maybe a particular act of initiation for newcomers—and we delighted in it.

This same old guy behind the bar put a jazz record on a phonograph and then came over to regale us with the stories about the men in the photos. It was quite possibly the most authentic New York experience ever, and I was in heaven.

We could have gone anywhere else on Thursday night. But we decided to go out on a limb—in our own town. And now we have a cool story to tell because of it. I dare you to go find that weird place in your hometown, maybe even seek out something off the beaten track, and come away with a story to tell. And when you do, tell me about it at docoolshit.org.

Doing cool shit means you have to stop doing the same shit every week. It means committing yourself to doing new things and putting intent into your plans. That’s all adventure is. New experiences. Different settings. Random encounters. That’s why traveling is so much fun—because everything is new.

For example, when Rads and I graduated from Cornell, we bought a round-trip ticket to London and a Eurail pass that was good for two and a half months. That was it. We made no other plans. Sometimes planning an adventure means not planning anything at all, except for an eventual ticket home. The intent we had on that trip (and I can’t recommend it enough) was to just go where the adventure took us.

When we arrived in London, we met up with my pals from my semester abroad and spent the night catching up at one of our favorite bars in South Kensington, where we all used to go together. We laughed about our silly adventures and went on an impromptu pub crawl, just like the good ole days. It was so cool going back to a city that I once lived in and, only a couple of years later, still knowing where everything was and having friends who were locals in town. My British accent came back almost immediately.

The next day, we took the Chunnel to Paris (the Channel Tunnel from the United Kingdom to France), and spent a couple of days with Radha’s friends from her own study abroad adventure
.
We woke up one morning, both having a craving for chocolate. We looked at each other and blurted out at the same time: “Belgium!”

And off we went.

We jumped on the Eurail to Brussels in search of dark chocolate. As we were walking the narrow cobblestoned streets, we came across a handsome brown-haired boy about our age and an adorable, smiling blond girl also wearing large backpacks, and we got to talking with them.

They were Canadians and we were originally from Montreal, so we immediately connected. As it turned out, they were studying abroad in Amsterdam and were in Brussels for the weekend. They were having a hard time finding a place to stay in Brussels, so immediately, Radha and I offered up our hostel and told them that we could share our room with them. They were so grateful, and to return the favor, they invited us to stay at their student housing in Amsterdam. Perfect! We spent the night adventuring all over Brussels and finding a small club with a dance floor. We Canadians love to dance, so we broke it down together on the
Belgique
dance floor.

After our jaunt in Belgium, we accepted our new friends’ offer and jumped the Eurail to Amsterdam. On the way to Amsterdam, we met a couple of Californian dudes who were traveling to Germany. They invited us to Berlin, and we caught up with them in Berlin once we left Amsterdam.

And that’s just a sampling of how the entire adventure went. We met people along the way and bounced from Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Stuttgart, Zurich, and Interlaken to Milan, Florence, and then concluded our trip in Rome, and on the smallest student budget you could imagine.

Along the way, we had some of the most authentic local experiences possible, because we made it a point to go off the beaten path in each of the places we went. If we had been content mulling around London and Paris bars, I’m sure we would have had a great time but would not have had nearly as many unique experiences as we did.

One such experience was when Florence won the Coppa Italia, and we were directly southwest of downtown Florence at Le Murate, which was a former women’s prison turned outdoor party space. The place was beautiful and you could tell from the high brick walls that this was once a marching grounds for prisoners.

When Florence won, the entire city went bananas, and all of a sudden, Le Murate turned into the biggest dance party in the entire city. We took part in the celebration and danced till sunrise. We found out about this place by befriending a random Italian dude at the statue of David and specifically asked him what the coolest thing to do in the city was. If we had simply made conversation and talked about the weather or where he was from, we might have missed out on one of my favorite experiences ever.

Another time, Rads and I passed a group of boys playing soccer on the street in Amsterdam and challenged them to a game. We ended up beating these boys in an all-out soccer showdown and had to go back the next day for a rematch because they refused to accept defeat. We ended up staying an extra night in Amsterdam to show them who was the boss. Yet again, another authentic, memorable experience.

The point here is that if your intent is to create memorable experiences wherever you go, put yourself in the best position to do that. What’s the worst that could happen? They might say “I don’t know where to have fun in town”? Those are odds I am always willing to take.

DO COOL SHIT TRAVEL TIPS

Always look for the most-fun people wherever you go. Search for the people laughing the most and those who seem most engaged with each other and their surroundings.

You could start by approaching a person or group and paying them a compliment—say that you like someone’s shirt or tell them where you’re from. Once you get to talking, ask them if they know where the cool local spots are that are off the beaten path or if they know of a unique party to go to. Having employed this tactic countless times, this question alone sometimes does the trick to get invited to a random house party that never in a million years would any other tourist have ever known about.

I even did this when I first moved to New York. I would walk up to random fun-looking people and tell them that I’m visiting from Montreal and wanted to experience something different. It really helped me to find the fun places to go in this massive city and not be limited to the reviews on Yelp or the events sections of the paper. After all, we all know that the most exciting people and parties won’t exactly be found in an ad and are more likely to be discovered through a personal invite. If you give people the opportunity to be an expert, prepare to be delightfully surprised as they will most likely go out of their way to give you their best places to go.

The thing is, everyone wants to have exciting and authentic experiences, but few are willing to take real initiative. Taking the leap into the unknown has so many rewards! If you feel skittish, just take a deep breath and go up to the next group you see who looks interesting. See if one of them seems more approachable—and maybe there’s a pause in the conversation that you watch for—and then go up to them, smile (smiles are the easiest and most effective things you could ever do!), and ask your question. The worst they can do is say they don’t know, or roll their eyes. Listen—their loss for being so judgmental! Life will never reveal its inherent magic with that kind of attitude.

So here are some other ways to take initiative locally, when you travel for a quick getaway weekend or for an out-of-country adventure.

Local Adventure

A fast way to bring new adventure into your life is to be the person that creates new fun for your bored friends who do the same thing every weekend. Or go out by yourself. That’s totally cool too! You will probably meet people along the way, and you’ll see that your circle of friends will inevitably grow exponentially simply because there are so many others who want to do cool shit too.

Here are some fun things to do:

• Geocaching:
  It’s a free treasure hunt anywhere in the world. People have stashed away these geocaches in every city and you can download the iPhone app and go on random adventures in search of these gems around town. Check it out at geocaching.com/iphone/. It makes for a unique experience and certainly a memorable one!
  
• Live shows:
  If you look in your city’s local newspaper, you will likely find free shows, musicals, art exhibitions, or seminars all around the city. Don’t even waste your time thinking if you’ll like it or not—just go. For example, in New York, one of my favorite places to go is a great live music venue called Rockwood Music Hall. It’s free to enter and the music is the best and most original in the city. I’ve met some great people at Rockwood because it’s intimate and cozy and you can still have vibrant conversations with strangers (who often become friends) in between sets. The events you choose don’t have to be musical live shows though. I’ve been going to the Moth—a storytelling series—for a while as well. It is simply amazing and inspiring. You just have to seek these shows out. You’ll be glad you did.
  
• Sports:
  Nothing beats the camaraderie that forms after a good game of dodgeball or kickball. There are leagues all over the major cities that pick up individual players who don’t come with a full team and want to play. I formed several Urban Soccer teams in my day, and so many friendships were made this way.
  

The Authentic Travel Experience

In my opinion, in order to have the most authentic travel experience, this is what you need to do:

• Create a Fun Fund:
  Get a good group of friends (who you think really get along) and ask everyone to pool in $1,500 or $2,000 (or less, you can scale your trip to the income of the members of your group) per year that will go to the Fun Fund. Each year, two people will be appointed to manage the Fun Fund and will plan an epic trip somewhere awesome for one week.
      In this way, every single year you will have a surprise waiting for you with your favorite people. It will be something you look forward to forever because of the surprise element. We started doing this recently and it’s incredibly exciting! Start saving now!
  
• Rent your apartment on Airbnb.com:
  Whenever I travel, I rent my apartment on Airbnb, which pretty much covers the entire cost of my trips. It’s incredible. And not only does Airbnb give people the freedom and ability to travel almost anywhere for very little cost, it also gives you an opportunity to meet interesting people from all around the world. I love Airbnb. It’s such a smart business.
  
• Join the couch-surfing community:
  There is no better way to connect with locals immediately wherever you go than through staying on their couch (Couchsurfing.com is a great resource). If you don’t want to spend any money on lodging or simply want to experience the authentic way of life where you are, definitely join the interesting couch-surfing community. The one caveat is that in order to stay at other people’s places for free, you must offer your place up as well for other couch surfers passing through town. My friends who use it swear by it and say that some of their closest international friendships were born from it.
  
• Let festivals guide you:
  Find the coolest festivals around the world and let them guide your experiences. You will be able to encounter local music, art, film, dance, and everything else authentic to the area if you revolve your travel around festivals. Some amazing festivals to check out at least once in a lifetime: Burning Man (of course), the Philadelphia Experience (PEX), Full Moon Party in Thailand, AfrikaBurn in South Africa, any Renaissance festival, Coachella, the Tribeca Film Festival. There are so many regional festivals all over the world—you simply need to research them. I am dying to find more obscure festivals so please post them on docoolshit.org!
  
• Travel with no itinerary:
  There is a real magic to getting lost. Allow yourself to lose your awareness of time. No need to chase train schedules, hotel bookings, flights, etc. Just go with the flow and you will find that your experiences will be that much more authentic if you simply travel with the intention of getting lost and losing your typical focus on time. Try it for just a few days; you can do it!
  
• Fresh start:
  Travel is a unique opportunity to get out of the hustle and bustle of everyday life and just
  be,
  wherever you are. Traveling by yourself from time to time is not a terrible thing to do. It encourages you to meet new people, get outside of yourself, and practice being the best version of yourself at all times. It also puts you in more unusual situations than if you had someone familiar with you amid your familiar surroundings and habits.
  
• Ask yourself the important questions:
  A great way to maximize impact on your trip is to go on vacation with intent and ask yourself a few questions along the way. Make sure you bring a journal to write down your thoughts, especially since we can learn so much about our patterns and the ways we get stuck from just looking back at what we’ve written. Here are some good questions to get your mind going:
  
• What am I neglecting in my life?
  
• What am I not doing that I want to be?
  
• What can I change in my life that can make me so much happier?
  
• What risk can I take right now that would add value to my life?