August 2018. I had taken three trips so far this year by myself and had found some confidence in traveling solo. Feeling the swagger and adrenaline of having successfully not just survived, but thrived on these previous travels, I booked this getaway on a whim, now addicted to the feeling of knowing I would soon be exploring a new place. I was itching to hop on a plane and fast forward to my destination. This time, I had pushed myself even further outside my comfort zone by setting my sights outside the European continent, and heading somewhere more tropical, Costa Rica. I’ve never done beach vacations or been a sun worshipper, so choosing a hotter, more humid, rainforest-based vacation seemed like the next push for myself to try something new.
I took the advice of a fellow traveler I had met in Portugal two months before, and packed all my sweat-wicking clothes along with my hiking boots. He warned me it would be very humid, and I soon found he was right. As my trip teetered on the edge of the rainy season, the moisture levels were high each day, with beads of water quickly condensing on my skin everywhere we went, even in the mountains. Each night as the humidity finally spilled over into thunderstorms, the sky would open and sheets of rain would fall, pounding into the earth but thankfully cooling things off enough to sleep.
His advice hinted at something that I think so many of us first-world humans dread…being “uncomfortable.” We live so much of our life behind walls of privilege, sheltered from worry or stress about acquiring life’s basic necessities. But beyond that, we are driven by a constant desire for immediate gratification, a pressure to have the best of everything – brand new, of course – and a strong compulsion to avoid any type of discomfort. We treat material possessions like they’re all discardable, constantly swapping out something slightly worn for the newest, shiniest version. We stay holed up in our fortresses of air conditioning, with deliveries at our doors within hours or a few days of purchase. We live life hermetically sealed.
I’m certainly guilty of this. I have often taken the easy route of buying something new instead of mending, and being willing to pay more for convenience, at the cost of social interaction, or sustainability. In my every day life, I don’t venture often beyond the worn trails of work, home, and one or two other key places. I take a lot for granted. After all, I’m able to support myself through my job as a teacher and I always have a safe place to sleep, food on my table, gas in my car, and even have enough to buy myself an air conditioner for hot summer nights, fun extras like a photography class or tennis lessons, and on top of that, I can afford travel.
However, I don’t feel that I’m blind to my own privilege; in fact, teaching English Language Learners in a city that has one of the highest child poverty rates in the nation keeps my eyes open daily to how “lucky” I am. Home visits to meet my students’ families have shown me kids using free phone books as pillows, rooms bare with no furniture except a hand-me-down mattress, refugee families whose landlords try to take advantage of their newcomer status by renting them apartments with bed bugs, broken glass windows, and refrigerators that can’t even function enough to keep milk from spoiling. I do what I can to help my students and their families, but I also often feel an intense sense of guilt for the life I live simply because I was born into white, middle class life in America.
I would love to someday travel to all of the countries that I have had students from, and get a true sense of their home countries and cultures. Unfortunately, most of these places are rated too dangerous for travel – Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq, Yemen, the Congo, Nicaragua, and many more. Costa Rica is certainly nothing compared to the struggle of my students’ lives lived in refugee camps or fleeing war and persecution. Yet, I think that even the slight discomforts I experienced in Costa Rica were invaluable to me, and to all travelers, to remind them of the ivory towers they live in. And not just for the purpose of some “feeling thankful – #blessed” when you get homeand then forgetting about it later bullshit, either. I mean, really, truly, putting your consumerist entitled life choices into perspective.
The first night I arrived in Costa Rica, I felt travel tired and decided to grab dinner at the hotel before crashing. As I was eating a comida típica, the electricity suddenly went out. I finished my dinner in darkness and shock. Apparently electricity could be intermittent. I had other moments of inconvenience that annoyed me beyond belief, and in retrospect, are embarrassingly trivial – cold showers, very limited WiFi, motion sickness as we drove through the mountains, sweaty struggle as we hiked through the rainforest, inability to eat dessert because of all the nuts I’m allergic to, hotel rooms with no air conditioning or water pressure.
Long story short, it’s so easy to stay cocooned and never leave your bubble. Or, it’s easy to look down on other places when traveling there and simplistically reduce a people or society to “less than” because they live in poverty or aren’t at the level of privilege you are. It’s easy to come in, take photos, and leave, without ever letting the experience give you the perspective to make a shift in your own life.
If there is one way that travel has made me a better person, it’s greatly lessened my value on material possessions, and greatly increased my capacity to tolerate discomfort and inconvenience (while staying fairly calm). For one, living out of a suitcase for even just one week makes you realize how little you really need in your daily life – so why accumulate “things” just for the sake of owning them? What purpose do they serve? How much happiness do they truly bring you? Do you need them? My point of view now, is, I would always rather have an experience over a thing. Memories over stuff. And I’ve tried to be more conscious of the gifts I’m giving, as well. I try to give things that are consumable/usable (a candle, some nice soap, tickets to a show) rather than items that sit around collecting dust. When I reach to buy something impulsively, my instinct is to really analyses whether it’s a want or a need, and usually, I end up putting it back on the shelf. Secondly, in a more surface-level shift, I’m much more grateful for my life and I try to not be the annoying complainer who can’t handle a delayed flight or a hot day without AC. There’s too much in my life to be thankful for, and small inconveniences are just that – small.
There’s a common saying, that travel makes you modest. I can think of nothing better. We should be modest, stay modest – because living extravagantly seems not just unnecessary to me, but also irreverent. And being spoiled by the good life only leaves you unhappy and unprepared when you encounter life’s inevitable difficulties. Instead of just spending money, spend time. Instead of gathering things, gather memories. Instead of whining or complaining, think of what you’re grateful for. Instead of buying something new, go somewhere new. Cliche to say? Yes. Cheesy? Maybe. Completely rewarding? Absolutely. So, thank you, Costa Rica, for reinforcing an invaluable lesson for me. Una vida simple es una vida feliz. As the ticos say, Pura Vida.
Jill Came Tumbling After 