The 2-in-1 Maxi Dress costs $148 on the

The pop of color caught my eye while strolling through "Amazonia." In an outdoor space between Amazon buildings in South Lake Union, the bright yellow trailer is hard to miss.I got a closer look and saw boxes full of bananas beneath the awning, and a sign that read, "Take one — not just for Amazonians but for anyone in the community."

I didn't expect to find ain the middle of a city. Amazon previously told Business Insider that founder Jeff Bezos came up with the idea to provide a complimentary healthy snack with no wrapper. The stand first opened in 2015.I wasn't expecting to see an active volcano so close to a major city.

From a hotel's rooftop deck, a local pointed to a mountain in the distance and told me it was an active volcano.I could hardly see the volcano through the haze, but they told me

, which last erupted in 1894, was more visible on clear days.

I was shocked to learn that this city, home to nearly 800,000 people, is so close to what could be a natural disaster. According to the, cut our expenses to the bone, and used our savings to fund this adventure. We tracked every dollar and vowed to live with a lot less. After a while, we realized we missed having a "home base" when we returned to the U.S., and the cost of renting Airbnbs was adding up. So we bought a small condo, which we use when we're in town and rent out on Airbnb when we’re not.

, where we rented a villa with a private pool for $900 a month. We swapped Target runs for market stalls, dinner dates with $1 noodles at warungs, and errands in the car for scooter rides through the jungle to discover waterfalls. At first, it was unnerving. We didn’t speak the language, we had no plan beyond the next month, and we didn’t even know if we’d like it.But in the stillness, something shifted. We were living with less—and somehow feeling more.

Travel didn’t just change how we saw the world—it changed how we moved through it., we woke to the sound of birds, the air thick with jasmine—a simplicity that felt more profound than anything we had ever known back home. We learned to ride scooters (barely), take off our shoes before entering temples, and how to spot the best