Lara through the mirror

If I had to name two characteristics that have remained more or less intact since my earliest childhood, I would talk about my eagerness to help and a certain sensitivity to perceive what surrounds me.

If I had to name two characteristics that have remained more or less intact since my earliest childhood, I would talk about my eagerness to help and a certain sensitivity to perceive what surrounds me. I remember myself on the daily walk to school (and also to the institute), collecting with a stick the worms that I found on the road after a rainy day, and putting them aside to save them from being crushed. Those beginnings were followed by the conviction that “when I grow up, I will be a veterinarian”, to end up opting, finally, for Environmental Sciences (something “similar”, but without scalpels, I told myself).

Costa Rica was my first great destination. There I spent the last year of my degree, writing my final project on ecotourism in Monteverde. I was passionate about the vision of tourism as a means for sustainable development. That led me, a few years later, to study the European Master in Tourism Management, halfway between Denmark, Slovenia and Spain. Seething with desire to apply everything I learned, I landed in Southeast Asia. And I've been here ever since, trying to help with what I know and like to do: responsible tourism.

The sensitivity in the perception of what surrounds me sometimes borders on fantasy. I love reading, and one of my favorite books is Alice in Wonderland; hence the name of my section. In her second adventure, Alice goes through the looking glass and lands in an unexpected world, sometimes absurd, but always stimulating. This is how I like to see what surrounds me: as something that always awakens sensations, but that sometimes requires us to jump to the other side of the mirror to see beyond what seems to be there.

I think the whole results in an explosive mix: travel, experiences and learning with a touch of fantasy... or hyperrealism, depending on how you look at it.

Shall we jump?