One of the best things that travel gives us is the memories of the places weve visited and the special experiences we had there. In order to hold on to these precious memories, we often bring home souvenirs. These souvenirs tend to be objects like postcards, fridge magnets, and key chains. However, a souvenir doesn't have to be s something purchased in a gift shop. In fact, the word souvenir means "memory" in French, so whatever brings back memories could be called a "souvenir." Then what can we keep as souvenirs to preserve our travel memories other than ordinary gift shop products? Let's look into what other travelers do to make their travel memories last longer.

Buying souvenirs and taking photos can be good ways to remember a trip, but most of the time I would store these things somewhere and hardly ever look at them, and thus they would be slowly forgotten. So I came up with my own method of preserving memories in a more interesting and visible way.↵
I started doing this two years ago when I got an opportunity to travel around Europe with one of my best friends. It was a spontaneous trip, so we relied mainly on paper maps from hostels or tourist information offices. Every day, we planned our route and sightseeing stops on those maps. When I returned home, I realized↵
I had accumulated lots of these maps, and suddenly I thought I could make a souvenir out of them.↵
I began by cutting out some landmarks from the map that showed the best parts of our trip, such as the Eiffel Tower, St. Peter's Basilica, and the Colosseum. Then I got an ordinary plate and pasted the map pieces onto it using special glue. Finally, I put a layer of sealant over the whole plate so that the paper wouldn't fade or wear out over time. The result is a wonderful decoration that I can look at every day. It is also a terrific reminder of every place I visited.