Christmas Eve 2025 was special in the most unexpected way.

Picture this: two Germans, one Austrian, an Indian, and an American—complete strangers—sitting around a dining table in a hostel in Lagos. Plates half-full, stories overflowing, laughter bouncing off the walls. By the end of the night, we were no longer strangers, just humans sharing pieces of our lives with open hearts.

The Austrian man was elderly and proudly analog. No digital gadgets, no constant scrolling—just a man carefully planning his travels the old-school way. He worked at a ski resort in Austria, and there was something deeply grounding about how he moved through the world. Watching him made me wish I’d lived in that era… or at least inspired me to seriously reduce my digital footprint.

One German girl was three months into backpacking across Southern Europe—curious, fearless, and full of stories. The American girl was making the most of her one-month summer break, traveling across Europe with a kind of joyful urgency. She was from Minneapolis—yes, the irony! Of all places. After working with AMPF, I never expected to meet someone from there at a hostel table in Lagos. She was genuinely surprised I even knew the place.

Another German guy was traveling too—cooking, chatting, and casually smoking weed (which, let’s be honest, felt very on brand 🥲).

And then there was me. Listening. Laughing. Sharing.

Our conversations drifted effortlessly—from how each of us travels, to the strange familiarity of grocery stores around the world, to why analog still feels incredibly cool in an overwhelmingly digital age. We talked about how America is changing, how there’s still hope (Mamdani), and how we imagine watching the sunrise—like an egg yolk slowly spilling out of a sky-blue pan over the ocean.