Viajero contra turista

In being here, in a foreign land, amongst foreign people and families, I have started to realize that they are becoming less and less foreign. This leads me to my point. This is an enormous difference between a "traveler" and a "tourist".
A tourist flies into a country with a plan, a camera, plenty of sunscreen and bottled water, maps, phone numbers of hotels and travel agencies, and most importantly, a fanny pack. A tourist comes to gawk, to take pictures of themselves in front of monuments and buildings and strange people on the street. A tourist travels to look, to see, and to tell stories when they get back. A tourist, ultimately, takes from a country and sees what it has to offer, leaving nothing but some money at a souvenir shop, and eventually returning to their safe home. This sounds too critical, but you folk get my point, hopefully. Ultimately, a guest.
In contrast, a traveler comes to a country with some essentials, a camera, a return date in the future, and a will to immerse oneself. A traveler comes to observe, snap some pictures of places and people, eat at the restaurants in alleyways, make small talk with those eating. A traveler comes to form a small part of a country, to act as even less than a citizen of the country, to live there not as an obvious tourist, but from the minority instead of the visitor. A traveler is open to change and be changed by the country, to leave a small part of themselves there, not as a refridgerator magnet that says that they left their heart in Dublin, but a small piece of their mentality. A traveler internalizes the stories, and experiences. Where they are, they are.

I aspire to be like a traveler, following the idea that visiting and taking pictures is different than living with the people and going to school, following the rhythms of everyday life with my new countryfolk. Ojalá lo logre.

Sense of Wonder

I think that one thing that I keep forgetting is that sense of wonder, that sense of everything being new and interesting, and that I am really lucky and have an excellent opportunity every day.
The life of an exchange student is a strange one, to be sure. There is a line to walk between using your foreignness (?) as an excuse to act strangely, and trying your hardest to fit in with whatever group you are a part of at any given moment. After reading an excellent blog by my good friend John-Louis "Master" Pane, currently in Taiwan (Check it out here), I realized that it really is rather spoiled and selfish to feel down on myself while I'm here. Obviously almost everything in Taiwan is radically different than the US, as opposed to somewhat similar in some aspects like Mexico, there is still a lot of weight and worth that should be noted in terms of the opportunity that we have as exchange students. Even more obviously, it's difficult to adapt and live without the network of our families and friends in our home countries, but now that the seemingly infinitely long time span of a year that was initially overwhelming is turning into a rapidly diminishing window of time, I really love the fact that I'm here in a foreign country doing foreign things with foreign people that will eventually become like a second family to me.
It's all about finding the differences, taking them as they are, and retaining that curiosity that landed us exchange folk here in the first place. That being said, let it be known that the bus system in México makes NFTA look like Lufthansa Airlines, but I love it so much! pictures will follow when I find a bus of people that aren't looking at me. Chau!