Kira and I have been on the road, bouncing around Central and South America, for over five weeks now. We’ve been away long enough that both of us have had moments of wondering if, maybe, we’re starting to miss home enough to head back sooner than we planned.
I’ve also started to think seriously about the point of travel, and asking myself why we, and a lot more other people than you’d probably think, pack up to spend a few months seeing the world.
Read on for more.
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Our taxi driver stopped outside a plain, heavy wooden door. Google Maps told me we were in the right place, but it took me a minute to find the tiny sign that read “Villacandelaria Hostel,” hidden next to the top corner of the door frame. The door was locked. After several hard knocks, a buzzer sounded and we were allowed in. We crammed ourselves into the tiny, dark entryway. Any further progress was barred by a heavy steel gate. A middle-aged man, the sour expression on his face hidden by his white surgical mask but still apparent in the eyes behind his glasses, stood on the other side, asking if we had a reservation. I saw a nightstick on the desk at his side, within easy reach. He only let us in after I showed him the email confirming our reservation, holding my phone up to the bars.
At least the security is good, I thought.
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The residents of Medellín have developed a type of community that’s visible in the example of the metro, but also in the little corner stores that, for most of the day, sell bottles of water or energy drinks, but at around 5pm turn into hangouts for local folks to drink beer and catch up. Everyone seems to know each other and, more often than not, by 6:30 or 7:00 someone has brought out a grill and is cooking hot dogs in the street. It’s the atmosphere of a backyard Saturday barbecue in the States, but here it’s on the sidewalk where everyone is welcome, including a pair of gringos watching from the periphery.
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18 days and three countries later, armed with little more than a cheap black surgical mask and a partially torn vaccine card reflecting my three Pfizer jabs, I’d like to think I have current knowledge on the state of travel in 2022. Bottom line, it’s better than you think. But it’s certainly not normal.
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As soon as she sits, she begins nursing her child. Most of the windows on the bus are closed, and the air is stifling. Just like in elementary school, I don’t think to open them til an “older kid”—in this case a Belizean man in his early 20s wearing a Kobe Bryant jersey—brusquely reaches around Kira to open the window in her seat. I sheepishly open mine, hoping to avoid his obvious disdain. Why wouldn’t we think to open the windows, especially to make it more comfortable for a young nursing mother? As cooler air rushes in, I can’t think of a reason, and that makes me feel guilty. What a moron, to sit in a bus with closed windows, wishing for air conditioning.
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The best trips force you out of your comfort zone, and sometimes that means getting off the beaten tourist track. In this post Andrew recounts his experience spending a week in Senegal in September 2013.
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