What I Learned From Getting Robbed in Madrid

The stunning cathedral at Santiago de Compostela

It had to happen sometime...
I've long held that theft during travel is a combination of luck and smarts. I've been traveling on and off for the last 7 years, and I've been generally careful and definitely lucky. In the few small incidents that befell me, the fault was squarely mine: I misplaced valuables that were then swiped by opportunists. But I was never outright robbed until two weeks ago, in a bar called La Morena Cantina in Madrid.

I love La Morena Cantina: it's funky and colorful, like all my favorite spots. Although it's a bit expensive, it has delicious more-or-less authentic tacos and Mexican beer that's hard to find elsewhere. Most importantly, every Thursday it hosts bilingual bar trivia, drawing a mix of Erasmus (exchange) students, English teachers, and Madrileños.

On this particular night I went with a group of a friends to trivia. Tom, Lucia, Elena, and Gianfranco are very nice people I'd met a few times but didn't know particularly well. We had met by chance at the Talavera feria (town-wide festival) in September when I overheard a group of people sitting near me speaking English -- not a common experience. They turned out to be Erasmus students from Italy and the US studying in Madrid. Bilingual trivia was right up their alley.

I had purposely chosen to make a stop in Madrid at the beginning of a long-weekend trip up to Galicia, the Celtic-tinged ultra-green region on Spain's wild northwest coast, to see my friends and squeeze in a little bit of trivia. The Cantina was still empty when I arrived, so I had the pick of seating, an unusual luxury. I was so early that I even had time to ask the waitstaff to stash my backpack (complete with computer) and suitcase in the kitchen. It was a good choice, given what happened later.

As always, I kept my over-the-chest PacSafe shoulder bag with me. It's something I always have on my person. I love it because it's a great size for day trips, allows you to keep your hands free if you are an absent-minded person prone to putting things down without thinking about it (like myself), and has all sorts of safety features. Since it's always with me, my general packing philosophy is that anything I don't want to lose should go into that bag, which meant on this particular night that virtually my entire life was inside. Prepared for my trip the next morning, I had my wallet, camera, mp3 player, prescription medicines, prescription sunglasses, house keys, favorite jewelry, a new book I was excited to read, and on and on and on. Of course, it doesn't matter how many safety features your bag has if you don't use them, and packing so many important things together was about to come back to bite me somewhere unpleasant. 

The trivia started, and we were doing pretty well. The food was delicious, the company was great, and I was so comfortable that I decided to break one of my cardinal rules. I put my bag on the ground, reasoning that it was safe nestled between the back wall, my body/chair, and my friend's body/chair. Mistake.

Then, during a lull in the game, I went to the bathroom. Mistake.

About 15 minutes later, I realized my bag, along with nearly $1000 in valuables and cash (all except my phone, which by some wonderful coincidence had been stuck in my pocket) was just gone. Disappeared. Made off with. Whatever you'd like to call it.

The scene of the crime (except totally full of people)

In the ensuing days, after my panic had subsided a little, I learned some important lessons. I thought I might share them with you:


1) Yes, it's about being smart AND lucky. And that means it's not all your fault.
As I said, I always suspected this; if you had asked me, it's the opinion I would have given. But I don't think I really knew it until now. 

My travels have included both stupendous luck and carefully-maintained levels of security with my belongings. Once on a train in Cornwall I forgot my netbook in an entirely separate train car for 45 minutes, and when I came back it was still there. In Japan I accidentally left a friend's borrowed cell phone at an ATM in a tiny village station when changing trains: when I returned no one had touched it. But I've also taken careful heed of friends' horror stories of thieves on the Madrid metro, keeping my passport carefully tucked away in an under-clothes pouch; after three visits to pickpocket-plagued Barcelona I maintained a 100% success rate by remaining constantly alert, with my bag close to my body.

What this night taught me firsthand is that luck and smarts don't operate separately. Sometimes it doesn't matter how well you care for your belongings: the thieves are just too good at their jobs. All it takes is that one unfortunate intersection, your lapse in judgement and the thief's eagle-eyed hunt. On another night, or even in another few minutes, perhaps my bag might have remained on the ground where I left it. No one else in the bar had an item stolen: I just made an easy mistake in the wrong place and at the wrong time. Over the course of that night and the nights that followed, I had to accept that. What I did wasn't smart, but what happened next wasn't my fault. I can't control my luck; I didn't ask the thief to come looking for me.


2) Sometimes you need to let people be kind to you
As I mentioned, when my bag was stolen I was with a group of very nice people I didn't know very well. We had only spent two nights together previously, a total of perhaps seven or eight hours. Nevertheless, they offered hugs and words of comfort, walked with me to the police station, helped me report my theft, let me use their phones to contact my parents, paid for my food and metro tickets, and were generally indispensable in a situation that would have utterly destroyed me had I been alone. Lucia even spent the majority of the next day helping me go to the health center to navigate the red tape of public medicine without local healthcare, as I was taking antibiotics and needed to replace them immediately.

Throughout the evening and the next day, I felt a constant, low-grade guilt. What were these people doing giving up their hard-won free time and resources for an almost-stranger? Part of me wanted to absolve them of their responsibility, assure them that I could manage on my own, and free them from this annoying and upsetting ordeal. But the truth is that, between the bureaucracy, trauma, and lack of resources (no money, no identification) I couldn't have managed on my own. I needed them around. I needed to let them be generous with me.

A victory lunch with Lucia in Plaza Olavide, Madrid, after successfully recovering my prescriptions and bank information

3) Humor is key, no matter what
While we waited at the police station for me to report the theft (a key part of the recovery process in Spain is showing proof that you have reported the items stolen), Gianfranco went to get something to drink. He came back holding a can of Aquarius, a popular drink that tastes like a mix of Gatorade and piss. "Well," he announced solemnly, looking down into his can with disdain, "As I always suspected, police station Aquarius is just as disgusting as regular Aquarius." 
I couldn't help it-- although I had been holding back tears, I burst into giggles. We all did. It felt really good.


4) I'm stronger and feistier than I think
In the moment after the robbery, I considered with some despondence all the items I needed to replace immediately (antibiotics, asthma medication important to my recovery from bronchitis, bank cards, etc) and later on (ID, various technologies) and the complications those lost items would create. It seemed like I had no choice but to go back to Talavera, tail between my legs, and spend my would-be Galicia vacation putting my life back together. However, as we waited at the police station for them to take my statement, a new and unexpected emotion overtook me: defiance.

I had been a little teary previously, but now my eyes were dry. "You know what?" I said to my friends, "Screw this. I'm still going to Galicia. I'm going to figure out a way. These people already stole my bag; they're not going to steal my vacation. I'll track down the most urgent items and go tomorrow evening, a few hours late."

Elena looked at me appraisingly. "I definitely didn't expect that from you. You have cojones, lady," she said. You have balls. It's true: I do!

Looks like a painting: the stunning Galicia coast

 5) Never let your guard down when it comes to valuables in a public place. Seriously, never.
This might seem like the most obvious advice, but it's easy to underestimate the power of familiarity. I think my main fault here is that I allowed myself to become complacent. I've been in Spain almost three years; I've been to Madrid at least 15 or 20 times. When I'm in a new place with any number of unknown factors and strange surprises, I am always alert. Ironically, the moment a place starts to feel familiar is when I'm most vulnerable. However, in a city like Madrid, which is so plagued with street crime, you can never let your guard down. You can never assume that familiarity equals security, no matter how many friends are around.


6) Some things are out of your control; that goes for the bigger picture, too.
I've said that part of the lesson I learned from all this is that some things are out of my control: making mistakes is inevitable, and if your small error happens to coincide with bad timing, there's not much that can be done. Letting go of that control (and self-blame) was not easy.

Similarly, I had to work hard to keep myself from running endlessly through all the different ways the situation could have played out. I am a believer in the butterfly theory (that small things can change the direction of a course of events dramatically), and as I tried to make sense of that evening it was very hard not to lose myself to wondering. For example, that day it had previously looked like I could take a BlaBlaCar (a wildly popular car-sharing system here) directly from Talavera to Lucia's house in Madrid, but at the last moment it fell through. That's how I ended up taking the bus and going straight to the Cantina with all of my stuff. If that BlaBlaCar had worked out, perhaps I would have decided to leave at least a few of my valuables at Lucia's place. What then? Or what if I had just thought to use one of the safety features on my bag, which allows the owner to clip the shoulder strap around a table leg, making it harder to snatch? What if I had chosen another table to sit at? What if I had waited to use the bathroom? What if, what if, what if?  Who knows what those small choices might have changed?
No matter what, thinking about all that now is not helpful. Instead, I have to remember the useful lessons-- making that bag clip a habit, for instance--and then take a breath and continue my day.


7) Life goes on
I'll admit that the first twenty minutes after my bag disappeared felt catastrophic. Of course it wasn't (much, much worse things happen to people every day; I am well aware of that), but it still felt huge and overwhelming and violating and sad. And yet the next day with Lucia's help I ran around the city getting prescriptions, figuring out special bank transfers to get some cash, cancelling my credit cards, borrowing a temporary purse, finding a new way to Santiago. With all that finished, my weekend in Galicia was still completely wonderful, with highlights including a sweaty, raucous Galician music party called a foliada; a relaxing dip in the hotsprings by the river in Ourense; a delicious lunch of fresh-caught octopus by the river in Noia; and a spur-of-the-moment heart-stoppingly beautiful trip out to the Castro de Baroña, a 2000-year-old Celtic ruin in a spectacular setting on a small peninsula on the wild coast. Yes, I had pangs of regret, sadness, and anger about my loss. But I still enjoyed the weekend thoroughly. Life goes on, if you let it.

At the foliada in Santiago

 
8) In the end, people are good
I've written on this topic before, but it's worth repeating. Before I left for my trip around the world, I did not have any particular opinion on human nature. If my year-long adventure in 2009 taught me anything, it was to have faith in people. In each place I visited, it was plain to me that, with a few exceptions, people just want to understand each other, to connect with each other, and to help each other. Remarkably, this incident did not change that conviction-- in fact, just the opposite. Nearly every single individual I encountered (besides the thief him or herself) throughout this ordeal was generous or kind or patient with me, from the medical administrator who snuck me into the system so I could see a doctor to the banker who joked gently with me while he set up my money transfer to (of course, and more than anything) the group of friends who supported me through a difficult night. Who knows what motivation the thief had in taking my things? Who knows what he or she needed? These are difficult times here in Spain, and although of course it might have been about drugs or gangs or shady business, the thief might just as well have used his/her ill-gotten gains to feed a family.

I'll never know-- but I do know that, along with a little extra care with my belongings, being robbed has taught me that my faith in humanity is harder to shake than I thought.

The majesty of the Castro de Baroña

Coffee and confidence

Okay, I'll admit it. Things still aren't improving all that much. While I am open to the possibility that memories of the beginning of my year in Palencia are at this point pretty rose-colored, it still seems to me that this time around is proving a lot tougher to start out. The stress of working at two very different schools simultaneously, the complications of living in an old apartment, the seeming scarcity of students in need of private tutors, the always-challenging process of making real friendships (as opposed to social connections of convenience; "Hey, I'm here, you're here, we might as well...")-- it's all adding up to mean my first month in Andalucia has been rather a challenge.

It's improving little by little, however. I've started feeling out Linares (watch for a more detailed description of my new town in the coming days), discovering the theater, some local flamenco social clubs (called "peñas"), and a mountain of delicious--and free!-- tapas. I'm gathering acquaintances, including the son of the principal of my elementary school, that school's gym teacher, a handful of other American teachers, a group of women who want to do a language exchange. I've ventured out to see the nearest big city, Jaen (verdict: Prettier and more engaging than I had hoped and than its reputation suggested) and a nearby smaller Renaissance town, Baeza, which is a UNESCO world heritage site. So, the hope is that things will start looking up soon.

In fact, I met for the second time with the exchange group this week. We had coffee together at Rosario Cafe in the "old town" of Linares, a compact web of grey-brick streets lined with a strange combination of crumbling palaces and formidable 19th century homes passed generation-to-generation. We talked about our cultures, our jobs, and our hobbies over coffee and hot chocolate, and as we drank I was reminded of a tiny frustration--one of the mountain of minute culture clashes that crop up in the daily life of an expat--from last summer.

One of the women ordered a "cafe con hielo"-- coffee with ice. This is a typical summer drink in Spain, although some people enjoy it year round. However, unlike American "iced coffee," the waitress brings the usual tiny cup of piping-hot lava, accompanied by a glass of ice. It is up to the drinker to combine the two as he or she wishes.

Therein lies the problem: for the longest time last summer, I couldn't get the hang of it. I would lose my nerve half way or incorrectly estimate the necessary angle and somehow there would suddenly be coffee all over the table or ice cubes in my lap.

I brought up the topic with the group at Rosario, and they showed me the trick again-- a deft, quick flick of the wrist and a smooth, unhalting pouring action. "It's all about confidence." They told me. "You have to decide to do it, boldly, without stopping. If you doubt, that's when you get into trouble."

As I note the passing of my first month here, I can't help thinking about this "coffee confidence." When things aren't going perfectly at the beginning this way, it's hard to know the best approach toward improvement. Is it better to flick my wrist and pour, diving headlong into whatever opportunities await me in Linares, feigning confidence and happiness where I lack it and waiting for reality to catch up? Or is that approach naive, and I should try something more pragmatic and proactive, looking for activities and friends more aggressively? To bring the metaphor to its slightly nonsensical extreme, at what point is the coffee so bad that it's worth spilling all over the floor and going back to buy something else; maybe tea this time?

A week or so ago I was talking to a friend on Skype in the afternoon. "I don't think you have to worry. I'm sure that in 20 years you'll look back on this time positively, without regrets" she told me.

A pause.

"Well, or maybe at that point you'll know that it was the worst choice you could have made," she said, then laughed. I did, too, perhaps a bit uneasily. In the next room, I could hear my afternoon coffee start to boil.

A tasting of home in Valladolid

Spaniards love their holidays-- it seems that almost every day is a Saint's Day (or recently, All Saints Day.) Perhaps the only thing they love more, besides ham, is Columbus, who is something of a national hero. There are streets named after him in most cities, statues in town squares, museums, and even a national holiday. It takes place around the same time as the American Columbus Day, and to celebrate I decided to go check out Valladolid, the medium-sized (population 350,000) city to the southwest of Palencia. Valladolid also happens to be the place where Columbus lived his last years, and where he died, so it made the visit's timing especially apropos.

It's not a city with a good reputation: the people are said to be cold and closed, and someone once told me it was the "ugliest city in Spain." But at the same time, people say the same about Bostonians--who I adore--and about Parisians--who I had no problems with in the course of an eight-day visit. And no one could call Allston, my beloved former Bostonian neighborhood, anything but homely. So, I approached with both trepidation and skepticism, and after several months of hanging out virtually in the couchsurfing group there, watching a close-knit and welcoming community getting together for dinner or to go camping, I felt encouraged to meet them and their city.

In Valladolid, I stayed with Carlos, an enthusiastic host and beer connoisseur/collector with a very impressive collection from all over the world. The first day we walked all around the city, which I found to be quite lovely, although scrappy and unsightly on the edges (but no more than any other Spanish cities I've seen). It has a stunning main plaza, a pretty zone in the center full of old architecture, a university feel (it houses one of Spain's oldest universities), and a lovely big park full of (strangely enough) peacocks. The second day I stayed with Elizabeth, a fellow teacher in the Language Assistant program, and she showed me around further, leading me on a stroll through the city's shady riverside walk, its "beach" (of sorts), and a few old neighborhoods.

Valladolid Plaza Mayor, the model for the Plaza Mayor in Madrid

Twilight in the park by the river

I spent the first evening acquainting myself with the Valladolid couchsurfing crew, who were just as warm and friendly as I expected. We had a small party at Carlos' house, a beer tasting, sampling beers from Carlos' collection (Ireland, Germany, Netherlands, USA, etc). The tasting was fun and low key, and we spent several hours chatting and sipping.

I was impressed with the way my Spanish held up over the course of the evening. But I've also found that after a certain period, it's like a thick plate of glass goes up between me and whoever I'm talking with. I can see the other person speaking on the other side, but it's all hitting the glass and sliding off, and I can only look at him or her with blinking incomprehension and give that universal "I can't understand you but I am trying to pretend I can" smile.

Nevertheless, it was a very pleasant time. I met a lot of kind, interesting people; they asked me about American politics and culture, we talked about couchsurfing, they made sushi and ordered pizza. Along with the beer, I felt like I was tasting a bit of What Could Be. Uprooting your life is hard in any circumstances and is perhaps hardest in a new country with a new culture and language. I had been feeling lonely and frustrated with the pace of my friendship development. (It's one thing to understand that building relationships takes time, and it's another thing entirely to live it.) But this was one night to have a built-in group of friends, ready-made and waiting. It was heartening, and I took that strength home with me to Palencia to keep on with the work of life-making.

But when they finished their party at 2:30 AM and got ready to go out into the city, I couldn't say yes. Spaniards have amazing party endurance, the kind that an American girl has to train for the way she would a marathon, little by little. They got home at 7:30 in the morning; I slept soundly.

Carlos' collection, including beer from the Congo and a Pilsner from 1960 Czechoslovakia

Valladolid Plaza Mayor by night
(More thoughts on life-building, language frustrations, and a return to Valladolid for a ballet-flamenco performance of 'Carmen' coming soon....)

REWIND: Japan

Continuing my recent blogging vein with a tantalizing taste of my Japan adventures.... Some highlights:

Osaka
*I was lucky enough to have a university friend, JJ, to stay with during my time in Japan. JJ even trekked out from Tottori (a small city where he was teaching English) to Osaka to meet me at the airport and spend the weekend in Osaka. That meant that instead of affording a sense of deep, overwhelming anxiety, jumping head first into Japanese society was exciting, fascinating, and generally great.

The Osaka skyline
*To start with, we had a fantastic night out, trying all sorts of delicious Osakan foods, wandering the streets of the city's ultra-trendy neighborhoods, stopping in a British-themed bar where I had my first umeshu (totally delicious plum wine), admiring the crazy out-there Japanese fashions at a particularly notorious intersection, and capping the evening with--what else--karaoke

*JJ convinced me that I had to experience a "capsule hotel," a unique Japanese experience where in a hotel-goer stays in what is essentially an enclosed train berth (but much more high-tech and futuristic feeling) in a huge hall full of said berths. The hotel had an extraordinary otherworldly feel to it (more on this in my later post on Osaka), replete with super-high tech gadgets (don't get me started on Japanese toilets...). In the women's bath I met Violetta, a Romanian mathematician with a Japanese husband who invited me to come see her in Matsue, a small city near Tottori

An awkward photo of my capsule* JJ and I splashed out on tickets for the semi-annual sumo wrestling tournament (which is held only once a year in southern Japan.) It was spectacular, a complete cultural immersion, an event which in many ways felt like it could have been taking place centuries in the past. Completely worth the money.

At the sumo tournament
Nara

*JJ and I took a day trip to Nara, where there are some temples and lots of tame deer walking around. The temples include both the oldest and largest standing wooden structures in the world. They are soberly gorgeous examples of Buddhist architecture (and, thanks to a course on the topic, JJ was able to regale me with the wonders of that architecture)

The largest wooden structure in the world (the dots are people)

JJ feeding a deer
The one on the left is the oldest standing wooden structure in the world

Tottori

*Tottori is a little city about 2.5 hours northwest of Osaka. To say it doesn't get much in the way of tourism is an understatement. In fact, I met a Tottori-ite in Australia and told him I was planning to visit in March. He looked at me and said, "Why?!" Nevertheless, I spent more than a week with JJ just soaking in everyday Japanese life. I met his fellow teachers, tried lots of delicious Japanese food (including sushi, for the first time!), went to a local onsen (Japanese bath), explored the fabulous local toy museum, and relished the feeling of being in one place for awhile.

Going to "kaiten sushi" ("conveyor belt" sushi)
Octopus at a fish market in Tottori
At the fantastic toy museum in Tottori
*When JJ wasn't working, we went sightseeing together. He showed me his favorite tea house/garden, and we went together to the 'famous' Tottori dunes and on a lovely boat ride on the coast. I also got to see his taiko (traditional Japanese drumming) troupe preparing for a big performance.

The coast near Tottori
JJ practices with his taiko troupe
Matsue

*JJ had long-standing plans to go to South Korea for a long weekend, so I made good on Violetta's invitation and took the train to Matsue, a city a few hours from Tottori. I stayed in a ryokan, or old-fashioned Japanese inn, and during the days Violetta showed me around her favorite Matsue sights. We took a walk around the lake, visited the castle (one of the largest in Japan), went to a beautiful temple complex/tea garden, ate at an incredibly charming 9-seat restaurant and splurged on a pre-set menu with all the delicacies from the lake, and went for a drive with her husband to the stunning Sakaiminato coast.

The most adorable restaurant
Mother and daughter who work at the restaurant
Sunset on the Sakaiminato coast
Matsue castle by night, complete with cherry blossoms and people having celebratory drinking parties (called "hanami") underneath them
Mochigase
*I was lucky enough to have a few chances to visit Mochigase, a picture-perfect where JJ taught part of the time. The first time I visited the school to watch JJ teach, the second time for the Mochigase doll festival, and the third time to give back to the school and help JJ make a giant English-language poster including several of my travel photos from the trip thus far.

*Visiting JJ's school was great fun. In each class he introduced me and had me tell the students a little bit about my trip. Then I helped them play a game of English grammar battle ship. During free periods we chatted with the other teachers and sat in on a music lesson.

Walking back from school through the adorable streets of Mochigase
*Happily, the annual Mochigase doll festival, a spring fertility festival which celebrates women's strength, took place about half way through my time in Japan. During the festival, all the houses in town put out beautiful displays of traditional dolls, people float similar dolls down the river to pray for their daughters' growth, and those daughters dress up in their best kimono for the same purpose. The day itself was beautiful and warm, and I was maybe the only Westerner in all of the proceedings. I wandered through the scene taking pictures, ate some delicious homemade mochi (pounded potato-flour candy), and set my own doll off down the river to pray for strength for me and any daughters to come.

A beautiful example of the traditional doll displays


Everywhere I looked there were little Japanese girls wearing kimono and having a cute-off contest. (They all won.)

Floating the dolls down the river
Kyoto

*I spent my last long weekend in Japan exploring the wonders of Kyoto. First I met up with a fellow Boston couchsurfer, Mike, and we explored the fantastic Shinto shrine-filled mountain of Fushimi Inari and walking the geisha district in awe of the beautiful tea houses.

Shinto gates at Fushimi Inari
The stunning beauty of Gion geisha district tea houses in cherry blossom season
*For a couple of days after that I stayed with Mami, the Japanese girlfriend of one of JJ's co-teachers, and we spent an exhausting and amazing 11-hour day walking all over the city exploring temples, a Zen garden, and the Temple; celebrating the sakura (cherry blossom festival) with harp music and traditional food; and capping the evening off with a mountain temple complex, the Kyoto castle, and an exquisite (if expensive) meal in the Pontocho bar district.

The golden temple

A shinto shrine complex with its sakura in full bloom and its festival booths up to celebrate
The mountain-top temple by night
*Finally, JJ arrived in Kyoto, and we spent a couple of days exploring his former home (he had studied in the city for a year during University), going to a traditional fan dance performance, having our own hanami with some other Wesleyan students on the same program, and splurging on tickets for the miyako odori, the semi-annual dance performance put on by competing geisha houses in the city to showcase the talent of their new students.

The fan dance performance

Our very own hanami
A scene from the miyako odori
A geisha spotted on the street near Gion

Last Aussie Days

Remember Tony and Ceal, from my first time around in Sydney? They were kind and generous enough to offer to put me up for a couple of nights when I came back, en route to New Zealand. Ceal was with her daughter north of the city for the first night, so Tony picked me up from the airport when I flew in from Cairns. He was his usual dry, funny self. We ate eye-watering curry for dinner, and then I asked him about the local pub. In response, he offered to take me for a drive around Paddington, the suburb of Sydney in which he and his wife live. We ended in Five Ways (named for the five way intersection), a charming place, with several little twinkly restaurants and bars. It was mercifully cool and lovely weather, especially after the humidity of Cairns.

On a whim, I asked Tony to let me off at Five Ways, and I spent a pleasant hour outside a tapas place drinking sangria on the sidewalk, then walked back relishing the comfortable air. I briefly found myself lost, and Debbie, a very drunk but friendly Aussie, offered to help me find my way. She was very happy to meet an American, and I wondered fleetingly if she was going to murder me as she led me through a shortcut in her apartment building's basement. Instead she drunkenly kissed my cheek by the sign for Roylston Street, and I made it safely home.

In the morning, Tony took me to The Gap, a stunning area at the mouth of Sydney harbor which is unfortunately also a common suicide point. We admired the scenery, and then he dropped me at the New South Wales art gallery, a great museum filled with interesting Australian and other art and an especially good exhibit on Aborigine art.

The Gap


An interesting piece at the gallery. It depicts Lake Wakatipu, which is a beautiful lake I've been to on the south island of New Zealand

At 3 I walked through the intensely green, steamy Botanical Garden to meet a friend-of-a-friend, Naomi, who was a Wesleyan grad a few years before me. So far away, out in the Real World on another continent, it would seem that graduating from the same school and knowing someone in common is enough reason to meet. And it worked out excellently.

The following tidbit says something about just how much Aussies drink. Naomi went on a lunch date with an Aussie guy that afternoon directly before she met me. He took her to a very chic bar and bought a bottle of wine, then proceed to drink four beers while she drank the wine. Neither of them ate anything. Naomi texted me apologetically all afternoon as she got tipsier and tipsier. When she came to meet me, the Aussie guy went back to work!

Alcohol or none, we got along great. It was really refreshing to be able to talk America, to be able to discuss Wesleyan related topics--professors we'd both had, campus politics, social theory. We chatted all the way through a scenic ferry ride around the harbor to Balmain, which I had heard was a charming village with good cafes. This ferry didn't stop at our desired stop, unfortunately, so we were forced to walk up an enormous hill in the intense afternoon sun to get to central Balmain. We finally gave in to thirst as we passed the London Hotel, a beautiful old hotel pub out that looks, as many Australian pubs do, like something out of the Old West. Damian (remember him from my first stop in Sydney? He treated me to Spanish chocolate and showed me around Glebe?) met us there, and we drank and chatted with some middle aged Aussie men who wanted to know about life in America. Naomi, who is black, told me she gets a lot of attention for her skin color there. Well, she's also gorgeous, so that might help as well.

Eventually we did strike up the rest of the hill to get Damian coffee and find Naomi some food to take the edge of the remnants of her lunch wine. We found a delicious Thai restaurant, eating with Damian's friend, Jacqui. She was sassy and salty, he nerdy and clever, and we drank wine (even Naomi) and enjoyed each other's company greatly.

Eventually, we all repaired to a pub for a celebratory "wedges with sweet chili" (a traditional Aussie snack, which is basically fat french fries with spiced mango salsa) and a couple of drinks. It was a festive, suitable way to finish off the first chapter of my round-the-world trip: after Naomi generously showed me how to take the the bus back to Paddington, I chatted with Ceal, packed my bags-- and in the morning I was off to the airport again. It only took a few hours to deliver me to my next destination, a fresh culture and a month ready to be filled with adventures. After a few years away, I was ready to rediscover New Zealand.

Naomi, Damian, and Jacqui at my Australian Last Supper

Sea Turtles and School Teachers: Bundaberg, part 2

I spent my unexpected extra day in Bundaberg wandering the town and waiting for the train, which was not without its charms. I had breakfast at a cute little cafe (my favorite kind) called Fresh On Earls recommended to me by some people on the street, then in my shortsless panic bought two pairs, one overpriced and one very cheap, because I couldn't decide between them. I Skyped with my parents; I looked in a craft shop. In the afternoon I went to a teeny zoo near the down-at-the-heels hostel. There were wallabies there, which are essentially mini kangaroos, many varieties of exotic birds, plus baby emus (cute!) and an ostrich named Olly. Olly was very, very large.

Wallaby!

As I looked at the bird display, an affable older Aussie who was also wandering about introduced himself and told me he knew one of the parrots from before it was taken away from its owners by the authorities. He claimed that if you asked the bird to walk with you it would follow you along the confines of its cage, speaking to the parrot in a very silly high voice--but, sure enough, it responded. Later he was shat on by a pigeon as we watched the wallabies. I was amused then, but little did I know that I, too, was destined to be shat on by a pigeon, albeit a month later and several hundred miles away.

After he cleaned himself up, Gus invited me to his house to see his birds. I didn't have anything better to do, so I agreed. When we reached his house, in the outskirts of Bundaberg, he introduced me one at a time to all of the birds in his garden (in cages)--there were 10 of them at least--and let me hold them. All of their wings were clipped , and when they, half-lame, tried to fly away he laughed at them, which struck me as oddly barbaric.

It got weirder when we went inside. The house was basically carpeted with bird art. Murals, sketches, paintings (he was careful to point out the originals), and limited-edition prints, of probably 50 different bird species. He also showed me his collection of trophies from his shooting club, about which I said vague, appreciative things. As we admired the trophies, he told me that his wife is second-generation Dutch and doesn't tolerate the Queensland heat well. She spends much of her time during the summer in her air conditioned bedroom, watching movies. As she was that day, which was about 35 C and quite humid.

I asked why they didn't move if she became so ill in the heat and needed to be on so many medications. "Well, I grew up here, I have my shooting club and my work," he said, adding that his wife is thinking about going to live with relatives in Melbourne 4 months out of the year. Or, he added in an oddly detached tone, "perhaps we'll part company forever, after 16 years of marriage." He insisted that we barge into the bedroom to say hello, and I wondered why he brought me back to his house. Maybe they had had a bad argument that morning. Maybe he was thinking of leaving her.

Gus with one of his birds


He dropped me back at the backpackers and I checked my luggage, fighting anxiety about whether I should have opted for a sleeper car. Feeling decidedly scattered, worried about plans for Airlie Beach and Cairns, I boarded the train, and things immediately improved. I celebrated my single seat, a window and aisle in one, and was happy to find that the chair itself was quite roomy and comfortable.

I spent the dwindling evening exploring the saloon and diner cars. I had just sat down with an overpriced beer (to make up for the lack of horizontal sleeping surface) and opened my computer to do some writing when I heard gasps of "Cool!" and looked up to see two dark-skinned boys grinning at me.

"Is that little thing really a computer?" one wanted to know. Then he heard my accent and demanded to know where I was from.

"Well, America," I admitted. His eyes lit up, reflecting off his dark face. He punced his friend lightly."Hey, let's talk to the American!"

Their names were Masi and PJ; Masi was a Fiji Islander and PJ a Torres Straight Islander, which means he comes from the area between Australia's northernmost point (Cape York) and Papua New Guinea. They had met on the train earlier in the day coming up from Brisbane and were really, really excited to meet me-- again, I was surprised to encounter such fascination with America and American culture. They asked me if I brought anything from America with me, went through my outfit-- singlet? earrings? bag? shoes?-- Yes, I said, everything was from America.

They wanted to see American money, and I gave PJ a nickel, dime, and quarter to keep. "What's it like to have an American dollar?" he asked. I said that it's about like having an Australian dollar, but I think he meant a bill instead of a coin-- Australian money includes $1 and $2 coins and starts bills at $5. "We like your Obama," he told me solemnly, with little transition. "We want to be like him."

We filled the next half hour with me sipping my beer and them telling me scary stories, some from "Ghost Hunters," which they saw on TV, some of crime on the streets of Townsville (which is near Cairns) and elsewhere. PJ told me his cousin was raped and talked graphically of other crimes. He also claimed that in the Torres Strait Islands when people who are from outside come, his family and relatives paint themselves, dance around, give the visitors necklaces, and then when the visitors aren't looking a witch woman beats them over the head and then slices them up to eat. Well... maybe, I guess. I'm sure these stories are embellished the way 11 year old boys embellish the world over. It's a nice story and it probably has some basis in truth in a distant past. Or who knows? Maybe there are cannibals in Torres Strait.

The train had stopped for some unknown reason, and rain was running down the black windows. PJ offered to escort me back to my seat in car H.

When I had gotten comfortable and opened my computer again, I put in my earphones and toggled iTunes to random. "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?" filled my ears and I almost laughed. Tell me where in the world, tell me where can she be...

Traveling up the coast of Australia at 75 kph to a new place with crystal clear waters, maybe?

As I typed Masi and PJ passed me, back to their train car. They tapped me on the shoulder and grinned as they passed.

Slice of Life: Adventures in Brisbane 2

The last of the Brisbane days: Karl and I had an Eggstravaganza in which we discovered the house was alarmingly low on groceries and cooked eggs all the ways we knew how; I played late night Scrabble with Sven, who couldn't quite believe that Americans really do spell "colour" without the U, and found this hilarious; Karl told me great stories about traveling through Eastern Europe; the fourth roommate's father showed up to collect some of his things, and I hid in my room. I did laundry, helped with dinner and dishes, played the piano for the first time in years, sounding out a copy of "The Scientist" by Coldplay that I found in the piano stool. In short, it was a brief, fleeting home.

On one of the last mornings before he was to start medical school, Karl threw a "Hey, I'm Back!" party at his house. The drinking lasted from 4 PM until 2 AM (well, I had been out in the city by myself, so for me it was 5 PM until 2 AM.) The evening consisted of loads of Karl's friends coming around to make sausages, welcome him back, and drink steadily into the night. As I've mentioned, Australians drink a lot. This particular night represented the most alcohol I've ever consumed in one sitting, although to be fair that sitting lasted nearly nine hours. And I would like to say (if I haven't already) that the sort of drinking in which Australians regularly parttake did not, at least under my watch, result in any of the obnoxiousness and generaly disgusting behavior I associate with those amounts of alcohol. Everyone is just the same, only better and more animated. In short, they can hold their liquor.

The party was great fun. I enjoyed the sausages and the company; at one point I attempted, slightly bleary with champagne, to explain the basis of the Revolutionary War and American race relations to several interested Aussies. It actually reminded me a bit of the simplified explanations I offered Lisu people when I lived in China, although in this case my handicap was liquor rather than linguistics. At one point late at night, once those who would depart early had "piked" (Aussie slang for bailing early), we and the remaining partygoers, including most of the Traveling So and So's (see last entry) repaired to another house about fifteen minutes walk away. There we spent a few hours in the aptly-named Shed, a converted garden shed at the back of the house now outfitted for video games, jam sessions, and general hanging-outage. Again I was struck by the overarching familiarity of the setting; the Shed was somewhere I recognized from my own adolescence, the kind of place we frequented when we wanted time all to ourselves, in basements, garages, and parks.

Against a background of Wii bowling (I did better than I expected), the So and So's had a great time jamming using the available instruments and with Karl joining in on guitar. Between bowling turns I sat back and listened, watching the jam turn from slow experimentation to a rollicking dance party (I took a video that I wish I could post , but it's unfortunately too big.) Around 2 Karl and I walked back to the house carrying his fire twirling staff, and he taught me some basic tricks as the suburbs slept around us.

Eventually the day came for departure, and my regrets about lack of time, about the walls that don't come down and the connections that aren't deepened came back full force. I started to face a newly-built fear of the nomadic existence I'll lead for the rest of the year. Making homes throughout the world sounds (and is) wonderful, but the reality of leaving them was, and continues to be, formidable. My ability to bond with and get attached to people is something I like about myself, but is it a practical way to live during this year? What would be the consequences of purposely turning that instinct off? I'm really not sure.

In any case, I went to bed the last night with knots in my stomach and slept perhaps the worst sleep of my life. I left Karl with a copy of Roald Dahl's "Going Solo" from the used bookshop we'd explored in the West End and pushed on, packing my things and leaving this one home for Bundaberg and a new advenure. (I'll give you a clue, it includes sea turtles.)

Karl, Woody, and the lead singer of the So and So's in the half-light of the Shed

Slice of Life: Adventures in Brisbane 1

In my array of travels, some trips end up being about places--enjoying architecture, exploring neighborhoods, seeing what there is to see -- and some trips end up being about people. For me, Brisbane was very much about people. I got to see a chunk of the city, but my time in Brisbane was enjoyable and, even more, important to me, because of the people I met and the parts of their lives I got to experience.

I stayed for five days in a beautiful, rambling house in Sherwood (which is funny because the place I stayed in near Sydney was called Burwood) with Karl, his younger brother Sven, and their friend Ed, three guys roughly my age. The house belonged to Karl and Sven's parents, who moved to Singapore a few years ago and left the house for their sons to inhabit. Evidence of the family that once lived here was everywhere, in the high shine of the floors, the decorating choices (very much an Asian theme), the photos of younger days. Sometimes it was evidence in absence--the lovely pool was pretty much unswimmable, as no one "could be arsed" (as they say in Australia) to keep it clean. I don't mean to say that it was a messy house. In fact, it was much cleaner than I would expect from three guys ages 19-21.

Besides the highly-polished floors, the E boys' house featured a great open balcony/porch, a large, very fat cat called Attie, two turtles, and a small white mouse called Octavius. I later learned that this mouse once belonged to a fourth roommate, who tragically died of a brain hemorrhage about a month before I arrived, while Karl and Sven were in Singapore visiting their parents. As it turned out, the room I stayed in was once the roommate's. This was a little weird/creepy, but not as much as I was expecting, maybe because Sven didn't mention it until a few days into my visit.

Top: The living room and my host; you can also see out to the porch.
Below: A "family" dinner. From right Karl, Sven, one of their friends (reaching), and Ed (face partly blocked)

But I'm getting ahead of myself. I took the commuter train from the Gold Coast to the city, an unremarkable ride except for one stop, Olmeau, which sounded like "Almost" when paired with the announced "Olmeau Station." Maybe you have to be an English nerd to appreciate that.

When I arrived in Brisbane it was mid-afternoon, and Karl was busy at a first-aid seminar he was required to complete before he began medical school in half a week. So my first impression of the city was a very brief meet up with girl from Canberra (pronounced CAN-bra) and a local named Adrian. Adrian had seen a post I'd made on the local couch surfing group saying I'd be coming into town, and cruised up randomly on his bike, giving us a spin around the center of the city nearest to the train station, including a cool but touristy walking area called Queen Street Mall.

The Casino, a fancy building near Queen Street


Adrian left fairly soon after, and I had a coffee and enjoyed a copy of the local newspaper. Again, Bill Bryson puts the joy of Australian newspapers wonderfully:

"It always amazes me how seldom visitors bother with local papers," he says. "Personally, I can think of nothing more exciting-- certainly nothing you could do in a public place with a cup of coffee-- than to read newspapers from a part of the world you know almost nothing about. What a comfort it is to find a nation preoccupied by matters of no possible consequence to oneself. I love reading about scandals involving ministers of whom I have never heard, murder hunts in communities whose names sound dusty and remote, features on revered artists and thinkers whose achievements have never reach my ears, whose talents I must take on faith.
I love above all to venture into the colour supplements and see what’s fashionable for the beach in this part of the world, what’s new for the kitchen, what I might get for my money if I had A$400,000 to spare and a reason to live in Dubbo or Woolloomooloo... Where else can you get this much pleasure for a trifling handful of coins?"

In any case, it was a great way to pass the time before I met Karl at the train station and wandered off into suburban Brisbane and a fantastic stretch of days.

I arrived at the house and immediately felt that I had met some of my tribe, as they say. Sven, tall and striking, was into death metal and rock climbing. Ed loved similar music but preferred to hang about the house drinking beer and making droll comments. That first evening was spent eating spaghetti, drinking wine, listening to music, and playing Jenga and Guess Who?, two board games I hadn't thought about in years. A few of Karl's friends came around to visit after awhile--he had just gotten back from a six month jaunt in eastern Europe and so his presence back at home was a matter of some excitement.

In the course of the evening Ed, Karl, and I walked down to the "bottle-O" (that's what they call liquor shop) and I learned that Australia has, wait for it, drive-through liquor stores. Also I saw some possums (we know them as flying foxes.) Double plus bonus. The rest of the night was equally silly, fun, and low-key: it felt like a day at home with my friends. Except that every few minutes, as another song I loved came on Karl's iPod, I would pull out my mental map and remember exactly where I was. That made it all the more miraculous.

Quite a bit later, after an interesting conversation about gay rights in Australia vs. the US with a friend of Karl's called Woody, I ventured into the realm of Vegemite. Making me Vegemite on toast was a huge deal, apparently, and Karl and Woody made much of the right amount of butter and spread that was applied to the bread. I didn't hate it as much as I thought I would, but the salt was intense and built with each bite.

I snuck it into the waste basket after a few tries as we chatted about this and that, and Woody grinned, "I saw that." I shrugged, admitting it.
"That's okay," he said, "We'll ease you into it."

I spent the next several days alternately exploring the city and environs with Karl and hanging out with him and his friends. Karl told me that his favorite hosts on his trip in eastern Europe had been those who took time to explore with him and really introduced him to their world. His approach was the same, and the effect was great. We pushed through the considerable humidity and heat of mid-January Brisbane to walk the Botanical Gardens, take the City Cat (the commuter ferry that runs on the river) to South Bank to wander, and look through used bookstores and great coffee shops in West End, including one called The Three Monkeys with fabulous ambiance and great chai.

One morning I had the chance to experience Australian bureaucracy, which gives the American version a run for its mony, at a central office similar to the DMV, where Karl had to drop some papers. Another afternoon we gave ourselves up to the heat and sat on the false beach by South Bank, eating ice cream from Cold Rock (I guess they can't call it "Coldstone" down under) and watching small children flounder in chest-high water. In the background an enormous TV screen played "I Come From the Land Down Under" by Men At Work (I mentioned my surprise that Australians love the song) over the tumult of shrieks and splashes.

Brisbane skyline from the City Cat


Path through the Botanic Gardens

Bridge from the Botanic Gardens to South Bank


Chai and record shop in the West End

Nights were busy as well, fat with humidity and friends to see. Once we ventured into an area known as "The Valley" (proper name Fortitude Valley) near Brisbane, a warren of clubs and bars, to see The Travelling So and So's, a band made of up several of Karl's friends. We had drinks before on the street, revelers streaming past us on the way to another alcohol soaked night (have I imentioned that Australians drink a LOT?) The Traveling So and So's played in a dive called The Globe, which spotted an odd but cool characteristic: a dance floor tilted at 50 degrees. The So and So's music was heavy on the saxophone, and their singer sounded like Gwen Stefani: I felt pretty good about them as they tossed party noisemakers and plastic mini tambourines into the crowd (I still have mine), although not totally excited.

The lack of excitement was partially because I was having a realization. As I listened to the show, I watched the people I'd gotten to know over the past week enjoy themselves, dance, lean against each other laughing. I remembered, although the days before and after made me forget, that I was only a brief blip on their screens. Couch surfing affords incredible experiences and allows you to meet wonderful people. But put appropriate emphasis on "meet," because to dig deeper to the connection I generally prefer, well, that's not so simple, especially when your window of opportunity is only five days.

Even if you're staying with a person all the time, there are still walls that stay up, and I wanted them down. This made Brisbane both a wonderful experience and quite painful. The painful part came first as I watched the concert, then again later as I realized I was leaving and the walls I wanted down weren't there yet. Give me more time, I thought. We can make this work. The potential is huge. I just need more time. But there was a whole world waiting.