Being in another country is similar to being in outer space, it is foreign and strange but can be beautiful all at the same time.   Three teachers have traveled out of state many times, and have the stories and pictures to prove it.

Traveling is a major part of her life outside of school, but Magnolia is always the place to come home to.

 Mrs. Amy East, AP Psychology/Sociology teacher, said, “There’s too many things to see and do. This is my home, this is where I raise my children, but obviously I’ve settled down here, it’s not like I’m living various places overseas.”

Telling her students about her various adventures is one of the things she loves to do in order to help create more travelers.

“One of my most interesting traveling experiences was in Paris. I was traveling with a group of teachers, it was a teacher trip, and our hotel happened to be outside of the city. The undergrounds stopped running, and the last train stopped running at one o’clock in the morning, and we wanted to go out,” East said.

Seeing Paris at night can be considered a bucket list item to cross off.   

“We were gonna go out, but we didn’t want to go back to the hotel room before one o’clock, because that’s when things get ‘fun,’ so we stayed out all night.”

Mrs. Catherine Page, a World History/Geography and head director of UIL Social Studies, said, “I have several places on my bucket list to travel to. Australia is one of them, I would also love to see Ireland and Scotland, those are European countries that I have not visited yet.”

Traveling to exotic places is one way Mrs. Page spends her time off.

“I would love to see Poland, and my dream is for one day Cuba to open up free enough that I can visit Cuba, because that’s where most of my ancestors are from. I have lots of favorite traveling adventures, some of my most favorite ones w[ere] going to Costa Rica with the family. We had some incredible adventures there, we zip-lined, we hiked and went horseback riding up to the top of volcanoes, took spa baths in the volcanic mud, went snorkeling in the coral reefs off of Costa Rica.”

“Another place I really enjoyed going to was Italy. I love the country of Italy, the food is fantastic. I’ve never had a bad experience in Italy, and I’ve traveled almost the entire country. From the North, to the South, to the East, to the West, to the Riviera, the beaches. It was wonderful, no complaints. Best tasting coffee, best tasting food, and just amazing history,” Page said. 

Mrs. Page hopes to never stop traveling, and to stay in her hometown, Magnolia.

“I’ll travel until I am physically unable to travel to anymore. There are places I don’t want to travel to, such as the war torn areas, or more dangerous areas. I just don’t think it’s worth putting my life at risk, for my family’s sake especially.”

“Most of the cultures I’ve met was Latin or European, but my favorite is the Italian culture. They’re amazing. They’re very friendly, very welcoming to Americans. Unlike the French, they’re not as… Outgoing. It’s not that they’re snobs, or it’s not that they don’t like Americans, it’s just not their culture to be very welcoming and outgoing.”

She also brings knowledge to her students.

“Unlike the Italians, they’ll come up and kiss you on both cheeks, and hug you, and be so happy you’re there. It’s more of an indifference. It’s not that they don’t appreciate Americans, or appreciate tourists, it’s just an indifference”

She also brings knowledge to her students.

“Since I teach World History and have been to a lot of the places that I teach about, I have traveled with other teachers, I have also taken students from Magnolia West to these trips. I have a travel group I’m going with next year, and we are going to Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji Island in the summer of 2017. It is open to all students to enroll.”

If anyone would like to go with Mrs. Catherine Page and Mrs. Amy East to visit various countries over the summer go to either one of their rooms in the history hall and talk to them about it.

The trip is a two week long trip, so hurry and pack those bags!