Roxy Traveling Light in Europe: The Roxy Traveling Light Series

By Roxanne Christine Neely

Roxanne Christine Neely
Ms. Neely is a 2012 graduate of California State UniversityEast Bay with a BA in International Studies and TEFL.

Roxy is widely traveled. She is fluent in English and Farsi. She is also studying Hebrew and Arabic.
Roxys Travels:
Austria - Canada - Costa Rica - Czech Republic
Denmark - England - Finland - France - Germany
Holland - Hungary - Israel - Italy - Lebanon
Mexico - Norway - Slovenia - Spain - Sweden
Tajikistan - Turkey - Venezuela
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Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, Washington, DC, Southwestern United States including Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Nevada, Hawaii, and Alaska.

The Roxy Traveling Light Series
Roxy Traveling Light: A Journal of Personal Growth
Roxy Traveling Light: Dushanbe, Tajikistan
Roxy Traveling Light: Europe

Aut viam inveniam aut faciam.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9781514481707

Roxanne Christine Neely

Roxy and friends in a Costa Rican rainforest I love to read what others have written about their travel. I hope you will enjoy reading my book too. I have written this because I want to share the riches that travel and good fortune have provided for me and to express my gratitude to those who have helped to make it possible and who have extended their hospitality and generosity to me in so many ways and places. I feel so blessed. My next travel experience will involve an extended stay in Israel. I am terribly excited about this new challenge. As I finish this book, I have begun active planning and preparation for what is to come. Of course, I will chronicle my experiences and produce a fourth book. It seems to me that one is more engaged in an experience and less likely to let things slide by without adequate notice when there is a book involved in the process. Knowing you are going to try to present and represent your experiences to others in a formal manner causes one to look longer and more deeply question the details of what is taking place. I hope you enjoy reading this book and that you find going through it to be a valuable use of your precious time. It is my fervent wish to one day meet you in interesting circumstances somewhere along the path to wherever it is that we are destined to go. Roxy

Book preview

Copyright © 2016 by Roxanne C. Neely.

Library of Congress Control Number:          2016905406

ISBN:                    Hardcover                    978-1-5144-8172-1

                             Softcover                    978-1-5144-8171-4

                             eBook                    978-1-5144-8170-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 04/20/2018

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

732537

Contents

The history of mankind is the instant between

two strides taken by a traveler.

—Franz Kafka

Dedication

Foreword

Introduction

Chapter One: Decisions and Preparations

Chapter Two: Bring It Promotions

Chapter Three: Slovenia

Chapter Four: Turkey

Chapter Five: Spain, Madrid, Granada

Chapter Six: Sweden

Chapter Seven: Odense, Denmark

Chapter Eight: Hamburg, Germany

Chapter Nine: Prague, Czech Republic

Chapter Ten: Vienna, Austria

Chapter Eleven: Budapest, Hungary

Afterword

Appendix One

Appendix Two

Appendix Three

Bibliography

Cover photo: RCN

Text Photography: RCN

All unattributed photos and maps: Wikimedia or open source

Book design, editing, and publishing: M. W. Neely

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Roxy

Quartz Hill, California. The Traveling Light series was written specifically for upper elementary, middle, and high school students but will also interest college volleyball players and graduates thinking about competing or studying abroad.

The books in the Traveling Light series chronicle the personal development and adventures through the teenage, college, and the postgraduation years of Roxanne Christine Neely.

Roxy has done what every teenager and young adult in America imagines doing. Her books recount her adventures and the early experiences that motivated her.

She has been a championship athlete, a martial artist, a musician, a marksman, a linguist, an international traveler, an adventurer, a professional athlete, and an extremely fortunate and blessed young American.

She was the kind of child every parent dreams of having, according to her father and biggest fan.

Roxy mushed sled dogs in Maine and trekked through the rainforests of Costa Rica with Outward Bound. She fought on the US Junior Pan-American Judo team in Venezuela, earned a junior black belt in tae kwon do, and lived with families in Tajikistan, Lebanon, and Costa Rica. She has now played volleyball in Sweden and Israel and traveled through Scandinavia and Eastern Europe.

Roxy Traveling Light: Book Three; Europe covers her 2012-2013 travels to Slovenia, Turkey, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, and finally Hungary.

The Author

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Roxanne Christine Neely

Not everyone strives to be a success, but apparently you do.

I would be honored to help you on your way.

—Don Hurzeler, author of The Way Up

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Few are the giants of the soul who actually feel

that the human race is their family circle.

—Freya Stark

About the Author

Roxanne Christine Neely is a graduate of California State University—East Bay (Hayward). She holds a TEFL certificate and is a heritage speaker of Farsi, the language of Iran. She continues to be a student of Arabic and Hebrew.

Ms. Neely is the author of the Roxy Traveling Light series, which includes

Roxy Traveling Light: A Journal of Personal Growth

Roxy Traveling Light in Tajikistan

This is her third book in the series:

Roxy Traveling Light: Book Three; Europe

I care about winning and want to be the player who really makes a difference in the outcome.

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Roxy’s Travels

Austria, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Lebanon, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Tajikistan, Turkey, Venezuela

–

Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, Washington, Washington, DC

–

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Aut viam inveniam aut faciam

Dedication

How can you frighten a man [or woman] whose hunger is not only in his own cramped stomach but in the wretched bellies of his children? You can’t scare him—he has known a fear beyond every other.

—John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 19

I dedicate this book to my grandmother, Mildred Doran (Leonard) Neely. She survived the grapes of wrath. She worked the cotton fields of Oklahoma and experienced hunger and deprivation as a migrant farm laborer in California’s San Joaquin Valley.

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As a child, Grandma Mildred survived the suffering and uncertainty of the Great Depression and developed into a self-sufficient and enduring human being. Her struggle to succeed and her ultimate success has inspired me to develop my own spirit of independence and perseverance.

When I feel I am losing my way and need a boost, it is her spirit I call upon to guide me out of my darkness.

Special thanks to

Dar Loughat Cross-Cultural Center in Granada, Spain

Team Sport Agency

We are working for your victory.

Bring It Promotions

Vimeo (http://vimeo.com/63343762)

Vimeo is video + you. We put your videos first and give

you the best ways to share, discover, and be inspired.

Foreword

Who would ever think that so much went on

in the soul of a young girl?

—Anne Frank

I am a retired teacher and have always been fascinated by history. I find it incredible that my daughter now works with a coach in Israel, Arie Selinger, who as a six-year-old is said to have met Anne Frank before she was exterminated by the Nazis. The unlikely life story of a boy who survived the Holocaust—befriending Anne Frank during the nearly two years he spent in a concentration camp

(http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340, L-4111207,00.html).

There are so many connections in this world, and the manner in which they interlace and interact in the present and also with the past amaze me. As Roxanne travels and experiences her world, I see her building links to other cultures, languages, and human beings all over the globe. As you move out into distant places, you cannot avoid engaging yourself in the historical importance and relevance of all those other humans you meet and the places they inhabit.

This book represents the third collaboration between my daughter, Roxanne, and me. We worked together twice previously to produce books about the youthful adventures and the international and national travels she has been able to experience. Those early ventures into the adult world were fairly extensive.

The first book, Roxy Traveling Light: A Journal of Personal Growth, was mainly an attempt to preserve a record of her early opportunities to travel, meet people from other cultures, and spend time in different environments. It included a good deal of autobiographical information and material related to her family heritage.

The second book, Roxy Traveling Light in Tajikistan, contained the contents of, and many photographs from, the journal she kept while studying in Tajikistan in 2010. It also described a visit she made to Lebanon that year and included several essays on international conflict management and the ramifications of globalism and intercultural engagement. Some of the material from the first book was included as background in appendices.

This book is different. For the first time, all of the travel arrangements and decisions were made independently by Roxanne. My role here has been purely advisory and editorial. She arranged a visit to Slovenia in order to find a position with a European volleyball club. She took my advice and spent a month in Granada, Spain, at the Dar Loughat Cross-Cultural Language Center where she was able to study Arabic under the tutelage of its director, Nizar Liemlahi. This gave her time to relax and examine her options as well as to productively study Arabic in a very safe and culturally fascinating setting.

Roxanne eventually decided to accept an offer from a volleyball team in Svedala, Sweden.

Nine months later, after a reasonably successful season, she traveled to Denmark to look at a team there and then proceeded to join up with her mother in Prague, Czech Republic.

Roxanne stopped for a few days in Hamburg, Germany, on her way and then spent a week each in Prague, Czech Republic; Vienna, Austria; and Budapest, Hungary, before finally returning home at the end of April 2013.

This book chronicles her travels through Scandinavia, Northern Europe, and Eastern Europe. It is also a preparation for her next challenge and book—a year in Israel.

As always, we are happy to welcome you as a reader, traveler, or fellow adventurer. We hope you find this book to be entertaining, informative, and inspirational.

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Michael W. Neely

Introduction

I think the girl who is able to earn her own living and pay her own way should be as happy as anybody on earth. The sense of independence and security is very sweet.

—Susan B. Anthony, American suffragette and

advocate of women’s rights

As I write this introduction for my third book, I am preparing to return to Israel after a pleasant visit home for new year in January of 2014. I am busy gathering material for the fourth book in my Roxy Traveling Light series. Book 4 will be about my experiences in Israel.

My father and I have worked together to produce the first three books. It hasn’t always been an easy collaboration, and I’m not sure that this should come as a surprise. We are from very different generations and, necessarily, have some widely varying ideas about what these books of mine should contain and represent.

But I am happy that it has provided an excuse for us to spend a considerable amount of time together. In addition, the two of us bring very different sets of skills to the endeavor, and that is probably a good thing as well. I have provided the content, and he has done the organizing and editing.

Dad wanted me to write about my travels and experiences so the memories wouldn’t fade away and become lost. At first I just went along with him, but now I can see the value of the project. I am proud of what we have accomplished together. I hope the material we have presented in the first three books is interesting and useful for you as well.

In the first book, we wrote about how I came to travel, what my family was like, and what I had been fortunate enough to experience up to age twenty-one. Book 2 was about my trips to Lebanon and Tajikistan in 2010.

This book is about my extended stay in Europe in 2012-13. I started out in Slovenia and from there went to Spain. On the way, I managed to squeeze in a stop in Istanbul, Turkey, to visit with a friend. From Turkey I continued on to Granada, Spain, in order to study Arabic at the Dar Loughat Cross-Cultural Center and take some time to consider my options.

I spent a very pleasant and productive month experiencing and exploring Granada, and then I headed to Sweden to play a season of volleyball with a club team there in Svedala.

After an enjoyable and educational season in Sweden,