Gone Adventuring

I noticed something during my time in Costa Rica. I noticed that Westerners (I'll refrain from the generalization of Americans) believe that the entirety of Costa Rica is a jungle to be conquered. I say this because everyone, and I do in fact mean everyone, was wearing either hiking boots, Tevas, those newfangled toe-shoes, or athletically inclined high-tops... ON THE PLANE. It's an airport folks; made of carpet and cement which leads you to an airplane where you sit still like a mannequin for 5 hours. You're not scaling anything, you're sitting still. You're then ushered off the plane and into yet another airport, albeit this airport is in the exotic mystery-land of Costa Rica, so perhaps it will have dirt floors and the customs office will be in a giant tree house. But wait, it's not. It's a regular old airport with regular old floors and regular old customs officials. You'll be shuffling along a laminate floor with the rest of them.

Just cause there's lots of trees on the brochure for the place doesn't mean they're not a developed country with roads and paved pathways - you're gonna survive even if you're in more delicate footwear.

Everyone Looks American

The tricky thing - and really cool thing - about traveling the world as an American, is that every person in every country looks American. I was in the San Jose city center the other day and I needed directions to a business I was trying to find so I scanned around for someone who looked like they spoke English. What does that even mean, "looked like they spoke English"?

Americans come from everywhere so everyone looks american. I remember from my travels a few years back, I was in a hostel in Istanbul and my brother and I were cooking a big spaghetti dinner for a bunch of people. We knew, because we'd asked, where each of the people was from and they ranged from Germany, England, Spain, and Romania, to Russia, Singapore, and Japan. We were all sitting around the table together engaged in conversational topic-hopping but my brother and I were the only ones speaking our native language; everyone else was speaking their second or third language. We were talking about subjects like how to open a beer with a piece of paper, what's the best Greek Island to visit, our favorite foods from home and deeper topics like the world's economy (it was early 2009).  Each of them spoke perfect english (albeit slightly accented) and could have passed for an American in every instance.

I love being American. I love that my friends are "from" countries like India, Sweden, Mexico and Germany. I love it because it means different viewpoints, different values, different ways to 'skin a cat', and the benefit perhaps most often reaped: yummy yummy different foods!

So there you go, everyone looks American, and while that may not be advantageous when seeking english-speakeing direction-givers, it's pretty awesome in almost every other way.