I haven't seen a major city in a long time where so much wildlife just runs around the streets (just a reminder—nearly a million people live in Austin). There's no getting away from squirrels: they dash right across the roads and barely pay any attention to people. And you can't escape the bird songs either.

Austin is basically a pocket of democracy in a really conservative state. This isn't some new trend either—it was already like this back during Kennedy and LBJ. Both presidents were from Texas, by the way. I'm not claiming to be an expert on American politics, but I thought it was interesting how the state capital's views are so different from the rest of the state. Other major cities lean blue too, but not nearly as obviously.

The Mexican border is right there, and you can definitely feel it: in some places, people basically don't speak English at all. Only Spanish. Though honestly, even in New York, Spanish has become noticeably more common than it was five years ago.