Traveling far from home with limited language skills is humbling and illuminating. One thing that it allows me to do is get clarity on what is important. I can see what others from different cultures value. I can empirically determine for myself what is important. Strange how many of the things that we regularly spend our time, energy, and or treasure on seem to disappear in a foreign land.
Time, money, relationships, and food, are valued differently here in Spain. It doesn’t seem to matter much whether in the far north or the far south. I simply love sitting in a busy plaza around 7pm in Spain. Parents are sitting and chatting, kids are running around kicking balls or chasing each other, people are eating and drinking, though unfortunately so very many are smoking as well. But there really is nothing like it in the United States. I think most of the myriad differences between these two cultures emanate from exactly these plazas. Noise is tolerated. Blocking traffic is okay. Space is simply allocated and appreciated and consumed differently.
When I leave my flat every morning I check the usual: wallet, keys, glasses, phone. Phone. How invaluable you have become. The very first thing I did after getting some cash out of an ATM was to buy a local SIM card for my phone. Now I have my GPS, train passes, time tables for museums, restaurant review maps, email, directions to my next stay, and so very much more including access to the collective knowledge of the world in my pocket. Heck, one place even integrated the keys to the door of the complex and the apartment into my cell phone. After my passport I think my phone now comes second, or maybe in a tie with a credit card. Really a phone, a passport, and a credit card can allow you to go virtually anywhere and communicate in any common language. Google translate, really? No more inadvertently ordering a plate of Portuguese fat?
Other vital things include having a snack and water and change and access to a bathroom. I’ve always known that good shoes are vital, so that is unchanged now that I am walking about 200 miles a month. Knowing when I can talk next to my wife is rather important as well as figuring out where I might finagle my next hug from a newly discovered friend. This may not be as important to you as me, but it is simply vital to me. I’m still not sure how I ever lived without ear plugs. My CPAP sleeping device is important, but nowhere near the level of my passport. Clean clothes and sunscreen, the stuff of life.
Some things that are important are largely beyond my ability to affect. Being understood is one. Of course weather is critical as well. And then all the things I take for granted, shoes not falling apart (but I was able to buy new ones), refrigerators working (I just made ice daily to put in the fridge like an old time ice box), toilets not leaking (learned how to reduce our flushes to get around that one), labor strikes not occurring (made quick friends of a couple older British ladies to share a cab with to the airport in Bilbao) and so much very more. All the while, I am still me whether here or there, tomorrow or yesterday. My limitations and fears and gifts follow me from city to city. This should not surprise me, yet it does!