Goal: Withstand death for a night at the Icehotel
     There are approximately ten ice hotels in the world, with the majority of them located in Norway, Finland and Sweden. In this week’s bucket list article I decided to focus on a single hotel, known simply as the ICEHOTEL - which is based in the village of Jukkasjärvi in the most northern part of Sweden. The ICEHOTEL isn’t simply rebuilt year after year; it’s promoted as an art project - where year in and year out, they have folks from all over the world and even a large population from the polar caps to provide their own influences as well.
(photo by Big Ben / ICEHOTEL)

Goal: Visit the last remaining wonders of the ancient world
     With the other six of the seven wonders of the ancient world destroyed, or just simple myth passed down through the ages, one definitely existed and still stands to this day. The Great Pyramid of Giza is still standing on the Giza Plateau on the west bank of the Nile in Giza, Egypt. It’s the oldest of the seven wonders, with construction dated between 2560-2540 BC. It's a monstrous piece of architectural history, with dimensions of 481 feet in height and 756 feet across the base.  (photo by R-O-M-A / iStock)

     It was a suffocating, dark night, accompanied by muffled city silence - which surrounded us on a secluded empty patio of a bar in the arts district of the city. After months of futile effort to make a relationship work - and simultaneously fail - everything was culminating into the same empty nothingness where it ironically had started. I had realized the day before that I'd lost my family and in an unbalanced move, I attempted to finally have her accept what we really were - perhaps out of my own selfish need to feel like someone cared. Or maybe I was just over the up and downs; the roller coaster ride of uncertainty; the daily anguish. But since we'd never figured it out officially, I knew I couldn't fake it anymore. I hadn't been fully happy with her for months - because I’d always wanted more.
     It was a long, drawn out talk of unsteady, slow-moving words; a conversation where I finally revealed my secret - I had fallen for her months ago. Isn't that so damned cliche? Just like a movie. Insert big, drawn out sigh here.