Hello… I am writing this post from Montevideo, Uruguay where
summer is about to start here (sorry to all you East coasters who will probably be digging your car out of the snow sometime in the next 24 hours)! It has been around a month since my last post
and I wish I wouldn’t have waited so long before writing this post since I have
forgotten a lot of things already!
I
ended up staying a total of 6 weeks in Cochabamba, Bolivia where I was doing
volunteer work. I was able to finish building the oven and write a manual on
how to construct it for any of you out there interested in how I built it! Here is the link to the PDF: http://docdroid.net/mi18
I
got to do a bit of testing and modifying of the oven to improve its
functionality. I kind of ran out of time and got busy with other things besides
volunteer work near the end of my stay.
| Foosball Fridays aka the local university sets up about a half dozen foosball tables on the sidewalks for students to play |
| A tattoo of one of the volunteers in Cochabamba. He explained that it is pretty much a compass for how he tries to live his life. Here is how he explained it: Love-North, Knowledge-East, Spirituality-South, Health-West |
| A swam made out of a bicycle tire.... |
I would say my overall stay in
Cochabamba will be one of the highlights of my trip. I was able to get a pretty
good idea of life in this South American city, the Bolivian people’s
customs/traditions, get to really know some other travelers and local
Bolivians, and hopefully make a lasting impact for the family that will be
receiving that solar oven!
| A typical scene on a Bolivian mountain road. A truck carrying about 10 brand new cars flipped to its side on a corner....with all 10 cars rolling down the side of the mountain |
| Some Bolivians rubber necking like there is no tomorrow |
| Desayuno Americano (American breakfast) for around $4 |
I was then off to Buenos Aires where I would meet a Swiss
friend I had met in Ecuador a few months back. Buenos Aires was a pretty big
culture shock because it really was the most developed city I had been in
around 5 months. It has a very European touch and it resembles any major
cosmopolitan city in Europe, Asia, or North America with its big department
stores, chain restaurants, etc…Apparently Argentina is having some major
problems with its currency/economy at the moment, but there wasn’t any crazy
protesting or rioting like in NYC during the Occupy Wall Street movement a few
years back. Buenos Aires also has this boardwalk near the harbor that is really
popular for runners/cyclists, along with tons of restaurants and bars.
| The boardwalk along the Buenos Aires harbor |
| Besides these Christmas decorations I would have no idea that Christmas is around the corner |
| Argentina...the land of meat |
| View from the terrace of our hostel in Buenos Aires |
| The car hit a curb way too hard and flipped over |
After a short stint in Buenos Aires, my friend and I were
off to Uruguay to try to score some waves. We took a 3 hour ferry from BA to
Montevideo (the capital of Uruguay). After that we took a bus to Punta del
Este, which is kind of a ritzy vacation destination for the well off Argentines
and Uruguayans. Our one week stay there consisted mostly of flat surf so we
didn’t get the waves we expected, but it was still a fun beach town to hang out
in for a few days. We got to see the famous statue of the hand called "Mano de Punta del Este" as well.
| The hand in Punta del Este |
My friend made his way up to Brazil and I headed back to
Montevideo to wrap up a few skype job interviews. Apparently the locals told me
that Uruguay just got super fast internet, compared to Brazil which has slow
internet, so I didn’t want to take a gamble with the internet for my skype
interviews. I’ll be off to Brazil tomorrow and ready to tackle a new
language…Portuguese!
As my trip comes to an end in around 2.5 weeks, I have had a
bit of time recently to think back to the first few days of the trip. I had
these expectations on all these different sights/environments that I would see
or be a part of. Before leaving for this adventure, some people had told me to
not plan the itinerary out too much because things are bound to change, and
that’s the beauty of traveling. I guess they were right. The magnitude of how
much this trip changed from Day 1 until now is pretty significant, but not necessarily
in a bad way either. I am very pleased with all the places I was able to see
with my own eyes; cities, towns, or sites that I would look at during internet
searches or in books or magazines. There is also a lot that I was not able to
see because South America is so big. By deciding to spend a lot of time in one
place, I automatically gave myself less time in another place, but I am
perfectly fine with that. Overall I don’t have any regrets about places I wish
I had seen or spent more time in. I also noticed that at the end of the trip I
got lazier with taking photos. It became less of a game of trying to “check
off” places from the list and rather just being able to enjoy each place with
my own eyes and not necessarily with photographic proof. In the last few weeks,
being able to walk around in a new city and not take photos was kind of a
relief and a breath of fresh air as opposed to always needing to walk around
with my camera.
Before this adventure started, I also had predictions on things I
was hoping to learn or get from this trip. In anticipation of my travels, I had
quit my job, sold my car, canceled my phone bill, sold all my furniture and
most of my sports equipment, etc… Thus,
this trip was a pretty big deal for me and I had the perception, that since I
had completely changed my lifestyle by going, this 1/2 a year journey should and
would magically give me all the answers for every question or hesitation I had
at that point in my life. This is where I went wrong.
To be honest, yes I learned alot during this journet,
and I’ll mention a few of them below. I’ll likely think of some more good ones
in the next 2.5 weeks as my trip comes to an end.
- Really getting to know a few people
and a few places is better than kind of knowing a ton of people and a ton of
places.
- It did make me realize that experiences are most
memorable when shared with others. You can be in the most beautiful place in the world and having somebody to share that moment with makes it all the better.
- I realized how much we underestimate or take for
granted our comforts and first world lifestyles back home.
- This trip gave me time to think about my post-trip
plans (going back to the workforce vs. going to graduate school).
- I was able to recognize that I really like being
busy and having a solid task list of things to do. Writing that task down on a
task list, making time to do it, and then checking it off the list is a great feeling.
But it is something that has to be done on a continual basis. As soon as all
the tasks on the list get checked off, its time to replenish that. Kind of like replenishing your bank account, after
traveling for half a year!
- Whenever you need to make a big decision, eat
first! Making decisions when you are hungry is a horrible idea! Same goes with
little sleep. Eat and sleep and then you’ll be ready to think more clearly!
- If you read the last blog post, I wrote on the 5
pillars that I think are needed to balance out one’s life. I guess this trip
was able to reinforce these pillars and make me realize how important they are.
- Having events, friends/family to meet up with,
or plans scheduled for the near future gives you something to look forward to
when you start getting bored or a little down.
- Traveling solo gives you more confidence than
traveling with others because at the end of the day, you have nobody to rely on
but yourself.
- At the end of the day, who you really are
(personality-wise, hobbies, interests, etc) ends up following you no matter
which country you are in. You won’t all of a sudden change just because you
crossed a border and got a stamp on your passport.
On the other hand, this trip did not give me special powers
to figure out all of life’s big questions. I realized that the things this trip
did not give me answers for were the things that require more patience and more
trial and error. In other words things in life that take time and are
progressive, kind of like how a bottle of red wine or Cognac progressively gets
better with time. For anybody thinking about doing some extended traveling and
has high expectations going into it, I’ll give you a heads up now that it
won’t magically tell you what all your passions are or what your dream job is. It probably won’t tell you what the
meaning of life or what the key to eternal happiness is either. But what your travels will give you is the opportunity and time to think about these things a
lot and hopefully enlighten you on changes you will make in your life post-trip to get
closer to achieving those goals.
