Chau Mui - Travelstride Destination Expert

Languages - English, cantonese, conversational "getting around" town Spanish

Chau's first solo flight was at the ripe age of 16, when in the midst of her emo - teenage angst, her older sister bought her a ticket to London to visit her for Thanksgiving.

Nervous and afraid for her first flight alone (also placed middle row, middle seat, thank you Mei), Chau ended up having an incredible time and fell in love with the land of Harry Potter, and poshly dressed British schoolboys. 

Her thirst for adventure didn't end there. At 19, she road tripped across 38 states in the US, at 25 traversed 12 different countries around South America and Europe and has since hopped from the beaches of Brazil to the sand dunes of Dubai to the metropolis of Hong Kong.

Some of Chau's favorite memories are the time she met the US Men's gymnastics team at the Olympics in Rio, visiting old friends in new countries, scaring off robbers in Peru and hiking on volcanoes in Nicaragua. 

Solo trip to Nicaragua. I spent the entire day with my driver, Guillermo, as he drove me from the airport over 3 hours to the port of Omatepe. He didn't speak English, and I had rudimentary Spanish I was desperately trying to recall from HS Spanish class.

By the end of the trip, we had gotten to know each other very well through hand gestures, and a mix of Spanglish - he showed me around different towns and we had lunch together. It was such a beautiful experience to feel so close and become friends with someone even though we had entirely different backgrounds, languages and age.

He made my first encounter with a new country feel welcoming and warm. That first experience was when I realized the world isn't as scary as the media puts it.

You tell me!

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