6. India

The last time I visited India, I was in seventh grade. I went for two and a half weeks and missed the factoring unit in math class. I still don't fully understand how to factor with coefficients other than one.
It has been four years now since I've gone and I'm finally visiting again this summer. I couldn't be more excited. I'm only going for a month, though, and India visits always need more than just a couple of weeks because there's just so much to do. The streets are always bustling with little markets and poor families selling broken toys and motorcycles, autos, and cycle-rickshaws and familiar faces. When in India, there should never be a boring moment. Unless, of course, you're a teenager from America, in which case, you can't leave the house without an adult (who all prefer staying home enjoying a cup of chai all day long, so you pretty much stay home watching television all day long, but only children shows play because older kids are at school during the day and oh, my goodness, it's so boring).
As an American, I have always felt inferior to the natives there because they felt I was superior. That doesn't make much sense, but that's exactly how I felt. Somehow, through my acquired Indian accent and traditional garb, people from India are able to immediately peg me as an American. (My dad says it's because we can buy things without glancing at the price tag first.) Shopkeepers and taxi drivers take this as an opportunity to cheat me for more money because they assume I don't understand the currency system enough to realize their game. I do, though, but I'm stuck paying more than I should still because I'm hopeless at bargaining or talking back to strangers. To keep me from blowing all my money on a bar of ice cream at a nearby market, I need to bring my grandma along and it makes me feel so childish and immature. I hope I've learned to stand up for myself, so I can go out on my own this summer. I want to be able to experience everything I can without leaning on parents or grandparents for confidence.

[Sidenote: I wish bargaining was allowed in America because much of the clothes in my closet are not worth the amount I payed. Also, why do shorts cost the same amount as pants? That's not at all logical.]