bit by the travel bug

after a truly magical first day, we learned that two other airbnbers had re-routed their turkey trip and were coming to barcelona. spencer and dave (h) are in what i call, my 40 closest friends at airbnb. i haven’t actually created this list, it’s just something my team teases me about since i have so many “close” friends at airbnb.  spencer used to live with sean. sasha just moved in with sean. spencer moved out to live with dave. and dave and spencer went to college together. during our time in barcelona we also discovered dave and i were on birthright in israel at the same time in january 2009. crazy small world.  anyway, we were super stoked to have them join our trip.  we all met up for some lunch… more jamon (thinly sliced cured ham), some weird and delicious potato thing, calamari, etc. all delicious. while spencer and dave went to check into their airbnb, yat, heather and i ventured to park guell, what barcelona calls it’s disneyland. park guell is a...

today was an absolutely magical day. the kind of day we needed. after paris. we woke up pretty late which was really nice because neither of us have slept much in the last several days. we met up with another airbnb employee, yat, who i haven't spent much time with but we run in similar circles at work and i knew he'd be a good one. we met up at sagrada de familia, which is a church designed by gaudi that has been in construction since 1883. it was so cool to see the progress since the last time i went in 2006. we had a lot of fun taking selfies and talking about what the state of it was when we were last there. selfie sticks are so necessary. this is one of the most beautiful things i've ever seen. the detail is so unique and so interesting. in some ways it reminds me of the grand mosque in abu dhabi, but better. the stained glass pours in colors to the main area, it's really breathtaking... a must-see. from there we wandered to find some food and stumbl...

i arrived very early to the airport for concerns of traffic, security, etc. and honestly it was a very early check in. this provided a lot of time to reflect on the last 36 hours. the amazing texts i received, the friendships that have been bonded stronger, the pride i have in airbnb and the fright that continues to exist during my time in paris. we learned through company communication that many people were extremely close to the events and i am saddened and feel sorrow that these people experienced these events. people were under tables, escorted home, saw the gunman run by. i get chills thinking of this and grieve for the families who weren't so lucky to get a safe check on facebook. so many lives lost. so many injured. so many witnessed and their lives will be forever changed. as my best friend pointed out, low tech, low cost, high impact. while i see people change their profiles to french flags, i can't help but be frustrated that the media is so closely following the...

i'll get back to the normal events of day five later and get to the update on the paris attacks. friday, november 13: paris (day five) it was a long day at the conference and a few of us (kim, sarah and laura) decided to grab dinner near our listing in pantin (about 2 miles from central paris) and i was deciding if i was going to go out to meet other airbnb people since friday was a free night but we also had a big party planned for saturday night. our waiter was taking FOREVER and right before we got up to leave, sarah checked her email to see there was an email from our head of security that there were incidents in paris. we looked at the news and saw that there were shootings in central paris and decided it was safest to go back to our listing that was about 4 min walk away. we got home and started accounting for everyone on our immediate team. within minutes we had everyone accounted for except one person, who finally responded two hours later that he was sleeping. dur...

today was fucking crazy. i got up early since breakfast started at 7am and walked to the venue... a crisp morning dressed in our beautiful branded sweatshirts. they're light grey and i'm terrified i'm going to spill food on them. i've fallen down the stairs once at the venue and once at my listing so my record isn't great here.  this morning we started with a really awesome keynote session with our founders and stories of home sharing. it's obvious our hosts are so excited to be here and i teared up hearing some of their stories.  along with my work twin kim, i am helping to lead the trust and safety information booth with our team at the conference. we had a lot of technical issues today so it was a lot of running around and helping hosts with various non-trust and safety things. it's really amazing to spend time with our enthusiastic hosts and see the delight in their eyes to meet airbnb employees. i remember when i was just a host and talking to...

today was day 0 of the airbnb open, a conference airbnb is throwing for 4,300 airbnb hosts from 110 countries. really unlike anything else. the venue is like a giant public amusement park... we got a tour and it's so cool that such a cool place is public to everyone. this is the parc de la villette. we took tours and learned about what to expect over the next three days. also, i fell down the stairs during the tour in front of a ton of other employees and scraped my knee. classic shonna.  it's so nice to be with all these amazing airbnb employees, meeting new people everyday and getting to know others even better. today was about connecting and getting excited for the conference. i've been working on this project since may so i'm definitely excited for it to start. we ended the night with a family dinner for the 630 employees. this is a tradition of airbnb. before the dinner i was fortunate enough to go to the superhost happy hour since i myself am a superhost. s...

day 2 got a slow start... headed into town via metro (love the metro here!) to meet up with my friends sean and spencer in bastille. sasha just moved into's sean's place so it's super fun!! we had lunch at a super french cafe,  relais du massif . the waitress spoke basically no english and we struggled ordering, but the french soup was yummy and it was very classic paris. we then walked to  Cimetière du Père-Lachaise  which is this beautiful cemetery in the middle of france. we took some silly pictures and talked a lot about how we want to be buried or cremated. i am super morbid and i forget this sometimes but hopefully i didn't scare off my new friends. shonna + spencer sean + shonna ILY tuesday night a bunch of us had planned to go see CHVRCHES... ahhh.... so good! the venue was so cool and it was amazing to be dancing with coworkers/friends just having fun and enjoying the dancy music. right before the show i got a baby bottle from a grocery sho...