Monaco: Second smallest country with the most character

In short, Monaco was one of my favorite countries that I've ever visited. Before going, I really was not sure what to expect. Would there be lavish examples of wealth that would make the average visitor feel alienated? Would it be too expensive to even make a day trip? The reality that I found was that Monaco was a very charming country filled with polite people (who were even more polite when spoken to in French.) The first day that my girlfriend and I went to the country, we took a SNCF train from Nice, which was a pleasant enough ride.

Once there, we walked down a very nicely maintained street until we got to the Casino de Monte Carlo.

The casino was well worth the 10 euro entrance fee even if one wasn't wanting to gamble simply for the exquisite Belle Epoque interior. Being there truly felt like being back in time due to the dark wood furniture and the abundance of suits as the night wore on. (Unfortunately photos weren't allowed, so I couldn't capture that.) We eventually won a fair sum, so after ogling at the Rolls Royces and Bentleys outside, we went to a delightful restaurant in La Condamine called Quai des Artistes. Their seafood was delicious and the service was great. It really was a special treat to be at such a fancy restaurant dressed to the nines, and in such a historical country that many people never get to visit. The only problem was that Monaco doesn't have any trains after 11:30pm, and the night bus only runs three days a week. That meant that we were stuck taking a taxi back to France, but c'est la vie.

The next day, we took a train in the morning and got to see the country by daylight. It was quite the sight! The multilevel streets were quaint and completely litter free, yet crowded with buildings, and there were some occasional breathtaking sights thanks to the local topography.

While visiting the Greek-inspired Sainte Dévote Chapel, we were amused to see a group of American tourists posing for scavenger hunt pictures in front of the church by throwing tree branches into the air and jumping.

We were tempted to find out more about their hunt, but unfortunately daylight was not on our side, so we had to catch our train to Italy. On our way back from Ventimiglia that night, we decided to hop off the train in Monaco one last time so that we could take photos of the casinos with our dslr cameras. At least, that was the excuse. Really, we just wanted to be back even for another hour. I absolutely cannot wait to go back to Monaco and explore even more of the sights (such as the castle) that the second smallest country in the world has to offer.

Hamilton, Bernie, and the New Revolution

Over the past week, I’ve become obsessed with the Lin-Manuel Miranda musical “Hamilton.” Not only has it taken the Tony awards by storm (and has a box office projection of $1 billion!) but it has caused a renewed interest in the Revolutionary War time period of American history amongst people my age. Originally, I wrote off this time period as a simply mythologized and sanitized period that had little relevance now, as most of the protagonists were white slave-owning men. This musical however showed me that not all of them were so one-dimensional. The titular character, Alexander Hamilton, was an orphan from a poverty-riddled town on St. Kitts who eventually helped found and fund a country, and became the advisor to the president. The musical highlights the grit of his struggle to come into relevance, discussing how he threw himself into his reading and writing so as to “not throw away [his] shot.” As a result of this, he was able to go from having no platform at all to changing the course of a nation. That honestly inspired me to do the same. I have an academic mind, this much Baylor has certified. I have a heart for change, and a passion for making my voice known – as seen through my seven years of fundraising and lobbying for Invisible Children. This musical of inspiration came at the perfect point in both my life and in the lives of many. We’ve just seen Bernie Sanders run on a campaign of equality and empowerment; while he ultimately was topped by the political establishment, he galvanized hundreds of thousands from my generation into action. I watched with pride in my heart as my friends protested outside of the DNC. Though incapacitated by surgery at the time, I joined my friends in spiritual solidarity who marched through the streets of Baton Rouge. In London, I listened to dear friends recount the horrors of militarized police reaction to protests in Ferguson. We have seen young people in the streets and starting grassroots political revolutions. The so-called “selfie generation” is now organizing to elect populist candidates starting from their local municipalities on up through national government. (And all inspired by an old, white, straight, Jewish man from Vermont, at that!) I want to aid in that revolution. My activist heart yearns to become politically involved and burns to make my voice heard in the protests. Unlike Hamilton’s revolution, this will not be one fought by weapons and violence, but rather by purely using our words and bodies to destabilize the power of oppressors and those who perpetuate injustice, whoever they might reveal themselves to be. Our generation is pissed off at racism, at debt bondage, at the exploitation of our very ecosystem. But rather than merely sitting back and ranting, we’re organizing. We’re taking the fight to the political arena, from the ground up. The ultimate hope is that we redefine the institutional structures of power that have for so long propped up outdated and often violent offices of oligarchy which have continuously committed officially-sanctioned acts of violence - whether physical, financial, or emotional - against the poor, immigrants, and minorities. It seems that circumstances in my life have destined me to be away from this country that I’m just now learning how to love, for the next year, meaning that I cannot be in the streets or knocking on doors with my compatriots. I can however be like Hamilton, who spent the first years of the revolution reading and writing with the purpose of becoming educated himself and educating the leaders of the revolution. Without ideological guidance, no revolution can succeed. While I certainly do not profess to have the ultimate intellectual prowess, I can use my academic training and the mental facilities at my disposal to help further this revolution in whatever way I can. I urge you, dear reader, to do the same. Let not your heart be overwhelmed into a state of inaction. No matter what your current position, this is one of the most prime points of history for your voice to be heard. Your voice matters. Your experiences are legitimate. Join the conversation. Join the protests in the streets. Agitate your elected officials into action through lobbying (and if they don’t care to respond, find out how you can help elect new ones.)

Just don’t throw away your shot.