Bean Town

Do you know the feeling? The feeling that makes it hard to sleep, the feeling that makes you mark X’s on a calendar counting down the days, the feeling that leads to persistent day dreams? For many people including myself it happens anytime traveling is in the near future. Last September and October I had the opportunity to feel that for 30 days. Thanks to the wonderful and ingenious people at Jetblue Airways I purchased a month long Airfare pass. If you can imagine a bus pass that you can hop on and off different busses Jetblue applied that to their flights. I traveled on 17 flights, landed in 8 different cities in the US and the Carribean and had a perpetual travel high!!

For people like myself I thrive off of airports, metal detectors, random conversations with strangers on airplanes, in flight snacks and recycled air. Like the Oscar Nominated Movie, Up in the Air watching the country from 40,000 feet, going from friends couch to cheap hotel room; it all was a way of life I have dreamed about and finally was able to live. I flew through metal detectors in a precise systematic way, no belt, sandals, no change, small carry on and rarely had checked baggage, George Clooney, nothing but an amateur in my opinion. Before I developed these systematic and near religious tendencies I had to embark on my first journey, which for me was to Boston with two of my college buddies.

The difference between my experiences from that of the George Clooney’s or Rick Stevens of the world is that I am a recent college graduate with no full time job and little money. I mean the ticket was a very generous birthday present from a combination of every member of my family. When I flew on planes I pocketed snacks, I ate enough dollar menu items and 5 dollar foot longs so much that I forgot that some restaurants you sit then THEY serve YOU. So as I relive my experiences please keep that in mind, I traveled my whole month spending less money on food than they did in 2 or 3 days.

My college roommate, Danny, flew on the same flight with me back to Boston to rendezvous with our mutual friend Steve. Arriving in a city that you have never been to in the evening time creates a sense of mystery and imagination. Seeing the silhouettes of imposing skyscrapers, the constant stream of yellow and red of headlights and taillights and the unquestioning glow of Fenway Park stirred within me an innate desire to explore. As we disembarked the metro in the Cambridge area the past and present seemed to be living in a harmonic and beautiful way. There were cobble stone paths and churches dating back to the 1800’s running along Internet cafes and casting shadows on Starbucks coffee shops. The young college students of Harvard and MIT that share this part of Boston have made it their own while respecting the history. Our Marriott hotel stood tall on the riverfront with a view of Harvard and Boston U. The hard bed and small floor space was welcoming after a day of flying.

Before we slept we couldn’t miss a chance to see the city we have traveled so far to see. As I did when I visited Europe, I wandered Boston with no sense of direction, no place to be and no specific time to get anywhere. It was freeing and created an environment for a great night. We ate dinner, celebrating my buddy Steve’s birthday at the Cheers bar. After our dinner we just began to wander, walking through deserted squares, past towering office buildings and taking pictures at a Samuel Adams statue. The demographic of people in the city at night were Red Sox fans and skateboarders that were enjoying a few sessions under the cover of darkness. However with jet lag creeping in and my intention to get up and run in the morning we headed back to our two bed, 8th floor Marriott room for an inevitable argument of who gets their own bed and who has to share.

As my feet hit one after the other on the riverfront sidewalk I admired the stark contrast between day and night. I walked this same path the night before with not a person around and now I ran avoiding walkers, watching bike after bike fly past me and late college students doing everything in their power to get to class on time. There were rowing teams knifing through the water, cars honking, sirens sounding and in the midst of all this people biked. I saw more bikers on my run than I had ever seen before creating a memory of the first scene of the movie 21 as the main character bikes to MIT. So movies are true sometimes.

After waking my still sleeping friends and taking a much-needed shower we started out on our only full day in Boston. As for many of our cities on our trip we had little time in each one so we tried to make every minute count. Due to our lack of money and no car we relied fully on mass transit to get us everywhere. In our one Boston day we ate a canole, saw the Garden, stood in front of Paul Revere’s house, stood at the top of the famous Bell Tower, sampled Samuel Adams beer at the Factory, walked through the largest outdoor garden in the US, spent some time at the Warf and culminated our trip with the holy grail of Boston, A Sox game.

Red Sox nation is worldwide. It has fans across America. I even ran across a bar in Aruba that had the title of Red Sox Nation, truly incredible. I come from southern California where sports are recreation not like Boston where it is life. The passion, the fans and the environment makes Fenway Park an experience in itself. We sat in center field after buying cheap tickets off of stubhub.com. We sat in the midst of season ticket holders that all knew each other. They wore Sox gear from head to toe and forced us to stand and sing Hey Caroline. Watching a game there isn’t sitting and watching a game with random people, they are a family. Not by blood, race or occupation, they are black, white, asian, plumbers, executives, school teachers but when the Sox play they become closer than family. They cheer with complete passion and love. I have to say that the movie Fever Pitch really grasped the true atmosphere of Fenway and Red Sox nation. I require going to a game for anyone who visits Boston no matter if you are a baseball fan or not. Consider it a pilgrimage as an American or a sports fan, whatever you want to call it. Go to Fenway, get a hot dog, cheer the Sox on and you can’t help but join the Boston chorus in a beautiful symphony of “Sweet Caroline. DaaaaDaaaaDaaaa!”