Boston Academy

Last week, the American Academy of Optometry held their annual conference in Boston. Since I'm currently living without commitments, I decided to head east less than a week before the conference commenced. I purchased a ticket out of Chicago on Spirit Airlines (a US budget carrier) and arranged to stay with my friend Xandra (Alexandra) who I met in the south island of New Zealand and now lives in Cambridge. It's a delight and surreal to re-meet people who I met on the road in their hometowns. On the road we are sort of floating about, so seeing someone indigenously helps to complete the picture of who they are.

The conference offered a wide variety of education and I surely benefited, picking up some new things and catching up on changes that have occurred in my profession during my last four years abroad. Also fun was seeing old friends and roommates from optometry school, a colleague from New Zealand, old professors, and making new friends. I was glad to go, and it's also good to be home.

Allston (below) is a suburb of Boston where Xandra and I had dinner. It's Portland-like with heaps of coffee shops, a few second hand stores, and vegetarian restaurants. I grabbed a bus there from the conference center to meet Xandra. Boston transport is very simple to figure out. I bought a one week unlimited fare pass for $15 on arrival, which covers all modes of transport in the metro area.

The last time I was here was when I was 14. My cousin Jenny and I would take the hotel shuttle down to this area, where we spent many hours shopping at Gap, which was something I did not have in North Dakota. The square looks the same but back then it seemed so amazing with possibility.

Inside Quincy Market.