.:If you're going to San Francisco, wear flowers in your hair:.

I leave from Zurich for Paris tomorrow. It is surreal that I've been here 3 days already. Zurich, Luzern, and Bern are the places I have been these days, and I can't pick one as a favorite. The way of life here is so beautiful. I want to stay! I keep asking Rob if Starbucks could transfer me here. Why not? You have but only one life to live, after all.

I wrote this today in my travel journal (that I have half-full so far - but it's tiny anyway). Enjoy.

"Sept. 27

I'm writing from the Rosengarten (rose garden) on top of a hill in Bern. It overlooks the city, and the view - it is hard to describe accurately how beautiful it is. I see the Muenster church and the Congress building in the distance, 2 places I've seen up close. The trees are below me and I'm sitting on the grass. I was on a bench, but I chose to come here.

I've only been in Switzerland for 3 days, but most like all the international places I've been (less so for Bangkok), I find myself attached to it and all its charm. Right now, we are on the train back to Zurich from Bern. The sun is shining on my face as I watch it fall over the Swiss city over my right shoulder. This is a time and feeling I do not want to take for granted.

I realized that today while I was sitting in the grass at the Rosengarten overlooking Bern. Ever since I planned this trip, I had envisioned myself up high over a city, looking out, and having some kind of moment where my life made much more sense than perhaps the moment before. I had that very feeling at the rose garden as well as now on the train.

So often, I take things and people and places in my life for granted, and I don't necessarily mean to. Either I become very busy or very distant for one reason or another, and I think that is an excuse I make to keep up what I've been doing. How many people are as fortunate as I am to have the friends, family, and lifestyle that I have? I cannot think of too many, really. How many people do I know who can say they have watched the sun set over a valley in Switzerland, or have been in 4, 5, or 6 countries where the common language they first overhear in the morning is not their own? Again, not too many. I am eternally grateful for my life and the incredible things that occupy it. I hope that from this moment on that I can remember being moved to tears on a mountainside by the gorgeous view of the capital of Switzerland and let it serve as a reminder to be thankful for every waking moment that I am alive and well in this intriguing world."

I love you all.