Europe
- United Kingdom
- France
- Italy
- Germany
- Poland
- Spain
- Portugal
- Belgium
- Netherlands
- Hungary
- Austria
- Switzerland
- Czech Republic
- Denmark
- Ireland
- Greece
- Vatican City
Life to me is all about connections and relationships, so it is no surprise that I love to travel. The chance to meet new people, see amazing sights, taste new food, and build lasting memories is almost addictive.
But travel is more than a collection of sights. Every border I cross widens the lens through which I see the world. A market in Marrakesh, a temple in Kyoto, a late dinner in Buenos Aires — each one quietly rearranges what I thought I knew. You learn how differently people can live and still want the same things: dignity, belonging, a good meal shared with someone they love. Assumptions you did not even know you carried fall away, and in their place comes a humbler, more generous way of seeing.
That is the real souvenir. Travel expands your mind because it forces you out of your own reference points, and it expands your world because the people you meet become part of how you understand it. The map fills in slowly, country by country, but the deeper change is internal — you return home a little larger than you left.
This page shares a piece of that journey. Perhaps one day we will be in the same city, enjoying a new cultural experience — and perhaps we will create a shared memory.
The Goal
The world today holds 193 UN member states, plus two permanent observer states — Vatican City and Palestine — for 195 recognized sovereign states in all. Add the dozens of non-self-governing territories many people count as separate places, and the map of where one can go grows quickly. My goal was fifty — and I have reached it. Now the aim is to keep going, and to go deeper.
The Map
An interactive map of the countries I have lived in, worked in, or visited, colored by status — UN member states in gold and observer states in green. Drag to pan, scroll or pinch to zoom, and hover a highlighted country for its name and standing. Smaller territories and microstates — too tiny to draw at this scale — are listed in the panel just below the map.
Some places are too small to draw on a world map at this scale, so they live here. Each keeps its status color.
By Region
My fifty-country target requires, at a minimum, a meal or a meaningful cultural experience in each place. In all but Belgium, I have also spent at least one night.
The Approach
A place counts if it is a UN member state, a UN permanent observer state (such as Vatican City or Palestine), or a territory currently on the UN list of non-self-governing territories. And I have to have shared a meal or had a real cultural experience there — layovers and drive-throughs do not.
Reach fifty countries first — then go deeper, with longer cultural stays built around food, people, and place.
Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.— Gustave Flaubert