I still remember this beaten up world globe that my mom and grandma would use to keep me preoccupied as a kid. We’d close our eyes, spin the globe, and learn more about the new places that our fingers would land on. I also remember strategically positioning my finger towards regions of the world I had not yet “visited.”

I was particularly fascinated by Madagascar. It had an unusual name, curiously positioned off the southeastern coast of Africa, and it was on the other side of the world from the tiny dot of an island of Guam that I called home.

As a kid, I only dreamed of visiting such far-flung places. With the closest major land mass four hours away by plane, I was just happy to imagine what the world looked like past the horizon on days spent at the beach away from my family’s cramped two bedroom apartment.

A lot has changed since then. I’m sharing this update to pass the time on a six hour train ride towards the Indian-Pakistani border. Yesterday, I visited the Taj Majal and, this morning, I got to explore the house of the President of India. I’m definitely a ways from home.

On this trip, I’m traveling with about sixty other Harvard and Stanford graduate students from all over the world. My fellow travelers come from places like Tanzania and Cameroon, Austria and France, Chile and Ecuador, Canada and America, South Korea and Japan. Just as they come from all over the world, they’ve travelled far and wide bringing with them stories that you just can’t make up. It’s truly a trip on its own to hear about their experiences and the journeys they’ve travelled on the way to who they are at this moment as well as where they plan on going.

I’ve no doubts in their ambitions and goals. Yet as I think about my own experiences, I imagine my ten, fifteen, and even twenty year old-selves would laugh in disbelief at where I’ve landed. In some ways, I suppose some things haven’t changed since I was little- still curious as ever to take this world for a spin.