Zambulléndome
(lit. "my diving-in")
The reason I did* Nicaragua and the reason I'm now doing India is that I must.* I've been a student for much (though, perhaps too proudly,** not all) of my life, and anyone with a lick of sense know that studying a place in the abstract is entirely different from actually having been there, done that, smelled and tasted it. So to continue studying, I have to have a real point of reference. Therefore: diving in. Getting in over my head. Not being able to step out the moment I'm not comfortable with it. Because those who live there have generally two options for mental escape: movies and sleep.*** And neither lasts very long. So being there is important for the very non-textbook reason of figuring out how to deal. With fear, with poverty, with those pathologies that are easily forgotten for those who don't have them but are all-consuming for those who do.
This is no longer about Nicaragua; it's about me.**** I hate getting wet. Not in the purely physical sense...but partly that. I'm pretty disengaged in general, and it's really this metaphorical "splashing around" that brings me to reality. Travel is a great way to do it, even though one can scoff and say that tourism is far from most everyone's day-to-day reality and that maturity (for example) is based on how far one goes emotionally and temporally, not physically.
I suppose it has to do with identifying one's own weaknesses and addressing them. I've found mine and this is right for me.
*I wish there were a better verb, but there ain't.
**I worked for two years. It was probably enough to get me where I am now, but it's not going to carry me much farther.
***I don't count alcohol & its cohorts, becuase they aren't nearly so good at this, despite what people say.
****Sorry. But the hammocks, the gallo pinto, and Momotombo will still be there.
The reason I did* Nicaragua and the reason I'm now doing India is that I must.* I've been a student for much (though, perhaps too proudly,** not all) of my life, and anyone with a lick of sense know that studying a place in the abstract is entirely different from actually having been there, done that, smelled and tasted it. So to continue studying, I have to have a real point of reference. Therefore: diving in. Getting in over my head. Not being able to step out the moment I'm not comfortable with it. Because those who live there have generally two options for mental escape: movies and sleep.*** And neither lasts very long. So being there is important for the very non-textbook reason of figuring out how to deal. With fear, with poverty, with those pathologies that are easily forgotten for those who don't have them but are all-consuming for those who do.
This is no longer about Nicaragua; it's about me.**** I hate getting wet. Not in the purely physical sense...but partly that. I'm pretty disengaged in general, and it's really this metaphorical "splashing around" that brings me to reality. Travel is a great way to do it, even though one can scoff and say that tourism is far from most everyone's day-to-day reality and that maturity (for example) is based on how far one goes emotionally and temporally, not physically.
I suppose it has to do with identifying one's own weaknesses and addressing them. I've found mine and this is right for me.
*I wish there were a better verb, but there ain't.
**I worked for two years. It was probably enough to get me where I am now, but it's not going to carry me much farther.
***I don't count alcohol & its cohorts, becuase they aren't nearly so good at this, despite what people say.
****Sorry. But the hammocks, the gallo pinto, and Momotombo will still be there.
