I wanted to introduce a project I completed while traveling during Spring Festival here in China.
I completed my first ever travel journal. I started it while I was traveling in India. I continued on my trip to Thailand later that month. Then I filled the rest of the notebook with my journal entries from my month traveling around China.
Every day while traveling, I wrote about what I did, people I met, and how I felt each day. when I got back I printed out my favorite pictures and glued them in the first and last few pages.
During the day, if I got a ticket or any small piece of paper related to something I did, I would stick it in my journal with a glue stick or washi tape. These are nice visual reminders of the things I did and places I went.
One of my favorites is from hiking near Jiuzhaigou. Just as we arrived at the trailhead, we found all these prayer papers, which are traditionally scattered to the wind.
I quite like collecting ticket stubs and such, so it was also a nicer, more organized way of keeping and displaying my ticket stubs. I also used my Chinese seal to ‘sign off’ at the end of my entry every day. It’s a small red square, which you can see in the picture below. It has my Chinese name, 姜淑纯, in the ancient Chinese script.
I really like this page of things I collected on my trip to Shanghai at the end of the holiday.
The last section is my favorite part. I glued in my favorite pictures and added notes about the pictures.
I really love my travel journal. It’s a fantastic memento from the trip. After I finished it, I wrote a reflection about my trip. I’m really proud of myself for actually journaling every day. All the hand cramps and extra few minutes of sleep I missed every day staying up writing were worth it!
