Holidays April 2011 ~ some considerations

I live in a large city with all that it implies: noise is at the top of the list. There are no much green spots, it´s a jungle of concrete and tall buildings that are spreading all over the city at very rapid speed. There is a river, the widest in the world, but it´s contaminated. Funny thing? the city has grown giving its back to this river. Just recently a new area was developed next to it. There are 40-story buildings with the best view but again, they add concrete to the landscape, no real gain for those who enjoy being outdoors.

Taken from the rooftop in 2007

And here I´m. The type of person that pines for open spaces, rivers that are not contaminated, lakes that are not artificial, mountains that are not made of concrete, green spots where you can hear birds chirping instead of cars honking, animals at large instead of in cages.

La Pampa

Mendoza zoo

And there I go, every time I have the chance. I like getting to know new places, cultures, environments. But I also like to spend some days in a quiet place where I can hear the music I like: nature.

I make miles and miles in hopes of finding the quietness I need but then there comes the always unexpected factor: people. I assume – and sometimes I´m very very wrong- that people who travel that far are people who have certain appreciation for nature. You don´t expect to find a person in a jungle complaining about mosquitoes or yelling because the accommodation doesn´t live up to their expectations. You know beforehand that you won´t have your creature comforts, that you won´t always find a bathroom when you need it or the food you like or a proper bed.

What you expect is to find people who appreciate what is around them and who are willing to learn, to see, to smell, to hear, to touch, to taste new tastes, to observe, to make use of the senses in a way that you don´t normally need to.

When I was at La Pampa (that will be the next post) the bathrooms where outside the bedrooms and you needed to walk on a plank to get there. There was no electricity so you needed to adapt your eyes to the darkness. And you needed your ears too because there were crocodiles that you could hardly see in plain daylight because their color was the same color of the water so imagine at night. You needed to hear them to know they were there, that was your alert. And that was one of the many things you learn while being in a foreign environment.

if you look hard, you´ll see it in the water

Now imagine that you cannot hear because there is someone with a radio at full volume in the bedroom next door ? And believe me, it happens more often than you think. And you cannot understand why a person goes that far to hear the same sounds they hear in their daily life. Why don´t they want to try a new music? the music of the place they are in? Why do they complain about the lack of comforts instead of enjoying what the place does have to offer? If they miss so much their daily lives, why traveling?

When I was in La Pampa I spent a morning in the hammocks while my group went for a walk. It was about to rain, you could smell it in the air, you could tell from the sky. And I decided to stay in the camp, not because of the rain if not because of a burn in my leg that had me in pain. And then the rain came and it was just beautiful to hear the drops and to feel the breeze (a blessing since it was extremely hot) while swinging in the hammocks. Then the group came back and I waited for them at the dock, helped them with the ropes and we had a nice coffee while chatting about our experiences.

One of the topics we dealt with was precisely what I´m telling you now. And we all agreed. We all had found people in our travels that should have chosen a different experience for their holidays and not one in which they miss so much their homes.

Dón´t get me wrong. I was lucky because I met incredible people who made me feel very comfortable. Sometimes I think that I´m getting old and that´s why I´m bothered about certain things. Then I meet people half my age who are bothered about the same things and I feel better. It´s not an age thing if not the way we perceive things regardless the passing of time.

Sorry about my ramblings but it´s what it´s in my head while I travel and in that sense, part of the story too.