A Common Language

As I began to put together the plan for my around-the-world adventure, one problem continually arose as I planned my itinerary. I only speak one language.  Communication could be necessary in nearly a dozen different languages if I wanted to eat, find a place sleep, and get from one place to the next reliably.  

It's not that I haven't given learning another language a good shot over the years. But, each attempt has unfortunately been met with abject failure. Three years of German in high school served as an exercise in futility that netted the ability to say “hi”, “bye” and, inexplicably, “table” in that language. A year's worth of French in college had me semi-conversational for about half a summer.  
But, that summer faded long ago and my French prowess with it.
In an effort to address the issue, I downloaded a number of language guides to my iPod. I could regularly be seen in my car or walking around talking to the air in various tongues. It was all I would listen to for the months leading up to my departure.  I even began to feel confident with my Spanish skills as that time neared. 

As soon as I set foot in Peru, however, all that effort was moot.  I was faced with the sad reality that no one sounded remotely like the guy from my language lessons. Almost instantly, I was reduced yet again to my monolingual self which didn't bode well for the rest of my trip. 

My concerns were thankfully largely unwarranted. Despite not being an official language of most of the countries I visited, English was prominently spoken just about everywhere I went.  I understood that English is one of the most predominant languages in the world, but it was still eye-opening to see just how prominently it plays a role globally.  

Obviously, tourist dollars serve as the core impetus for its omnipresence.  So it was not too surprising to see it employed in a retail or tourism setting.  It was among fellow travelers that I found the prominence of English to be most enlightening. Travelers from places that would normally have a language barrier between them, used English as a lingual bridge of common understanding, even (perhaps especially) when English was not native to either party. I witnessed Spaniards speak with Brazilians in Australia, Chinese with Vietnamese in Thailand, Indians with Italians in Cambodia, and Dutch with Israelis in New Zealand. All using English as a common denominator. 

But, the proliferation of English as the world's common language has a downside as well. Especially for those of us for which it is their sole spoken language. It provides a disincentive to attempt learning how to speak on locals' terms and failure to participate in what is a fundamental aspect of a specific place or culture. While you won't miss out on any key attractions, it is all too easy to get by on only a cursory knowledge of what's going on around you instead of delving deeper into the local culture. 

It is even restricting when it is spoken prevalently by locals. Even with the simplest of transactions, I tended to find myself too often at a point in a conversation where a crucial word was mistranslated, misunderstood or unintentionally omitted (sometimes there is no similar word in English).  That small piece could change my entire understanding of that conversation, exclude a critical piece of information or just plain leave me confused. It also forced me to trust, almost implicitly, what other people were telling me because of my own inability to understand or read what was plainly spoken or written around me.

Of course, when you're visiting over a dozen countries in a year's time, it's a bit much to expect anyone to be fluent at every stop. But, I have found that making an effort to learn even just one additional language can make a substantial difference in surprising ways.  Those that speak at least one other language seem to assimilate better to being in a foreign place, whether they speak the language or not. They seem to be ever-so-slightly more comfortable with, and understanding of, a place than a monolinguist like me.  They also seem to be more apt to grasp even a rudimentary understanding of other languages when necessary. Maybe it's just that a multilingual person has a greater comfort level because their chances of understanding what is going on around them are, at the very least, doubled.

Admittedly, the prevalence of English in my travels served mostly as a crutch that was a bit difficult to give up. But, the more I see people who speak in multiple tongues traveling with a greater sense of ease and comfort, the more I'm inclined to make a more concerted effort to learn at least one new language and see what new doors it might open up around the world. So, if you see me driving around Chicago when I get back and talking in tongues to the air, don't be alarmed. I'm giving it another shot.

Barker's Beauties

Bob Barker would not be happy. The third world seems to have blatantly disregarded his sage show-ending plea to “help control the pet population by having your pets spade or neutered”. Bob would likely be horrified to see the enormous number of stray dogs wandering the streets of many of the cities and towns of the so-called third world I've visited. Then again, these canines hardly qualify as pets as they are obviously sans owners and actual homes. Not to mention that I’d bet good money that none has seen the inside of a veterinary clinic for shots or a bath, let alone more invasive procedures.

Not only is Bob's request being ignored, but it would seem that his worst nightmare is in the offing. The scruffy canines wandering the streets don't seem to restrict their copulation urges to their own species. I’ve seen more than a few peculiar looking dogs with suspiciously swine-like features that baffle the mind as to just how such a union might transpire, not that I care to ever linger upon that thought. Others, who seem to restrict their intimate experiences to their own species, are such an amalgam of uninhibited cross-breeding that it would take the folks at the Westminster Kennel Club decades to figure out the blood lines of just one of them.

Of course, all that unrestrained reproduction means that there are a significant number of mangy mutts freely roaming the streets, scavenging for every scrap of food they can get. I can barely walk fifty feet down a street in many of the third world cities I've visited without encountering a small pack of them poking around in every nook and cranny for the slightest morsel of food. Such occurrences typically send me scrambling into the nearest storefront or giving them at least a ten foot wide arc when passing by.

Still, that's not entirely fair to the dogs as they are simply attempting to make the best of a less than ideal situation. Their scruff appearance alone does not mean that they are disease-carrying hosts waiting to infest the nearest passerby. Although given the squalid conditions they are forced to live in, more than a few have likely succumbed to such a fate. My fears are likely steeped in equal parts overreaction and prudence.

Luckily, most don't really seem to be in the mood for food of the two-legged variety. If anything, they seem to give me as wide a berth when passing as I do them. But, despite getting poked and prodded for just about everything before I departed, I remain cautious. I have no desire to withstand a barrage of shots to the stomach – or elsewhere - should I encounter a dog that decides that my fleshy ankles might just be a good snack.

Unfortunately, the fate of such dogs seems to be tied to their human brethren. When most of the local human population struggles to feed – let alone house - themselves or their families on a daily basis, concern for care of the canine population likely doesn't rank very high on the societal priority list. Of course, the irony is that this also leaves the dogs to procreate unabated which only worsens the situation.

Perhaps if the financial tides of the third world turn for the better and a few generations find themselves able to provide for their families with some assured regularity, then the issue may begin to be able to be addressed. Until then, I expect that mangy mutts will continue to wander the streets fighting for every remnant they can find, making visitors such as myself a bit wary in the process, and thumbing their cold noses at Bob Barker in the process.

Kryptonite Canyon

Superman has Kryptonite. It seems I have the Grand Canyon.

Any time Superman comes within a few feet of the celestial green crystal it manages to wreak havoc on his otherwise superhuman body. Likewise, any time I come within a few hundred miles of the giant chasm’s earthly red rock, a similar havoc is wreaked on my far from superhuman body.

After returning stateside a few weeks ago, I decided to tempt fate by returning to the canyon lands of the Southwest in an attempt to finish the trip I started there twelve months prior before it was abruptly interrupted. After six months traversing the globe, setting foot on, in or near a multitude of earthly wonders, I thought there no better way to close out my adventures than by finishing my pilgrimage to perhaps the pinnacle of them all, the Grand Canyon.

Unfortunately, my latest attempt only served to further cement the big ditch as my personal nemesis. I made it as far as the cosmopolitan mecca of Omaha - for a Mother’s Day visit to see my Grandmother on the way west (you’d think I’d get some karma points for that) - when an almost forgotten, but instantly recognizable pain began to spread across my lower back. I held out hope that it would be a quickly passing storm, but once my nearly ninety-year-old Grandmother began to outpace me walking through the local JC Penney’s I knew ten days hiking through the remote deserts of Arizona & Utah was ill advised.

It’s the fourth such attempt to visit the Grand Canyon that’s been thwarted by equally bizarre circumstances in the last decade. While a fortnight later I’m once more reasonably agile, I’m not quite up for tempting fate a fifth time and exposing myself yet again to the ominously debilitating and discouraging powers of the Grand Canyon.

So my trip ends on a bit of a whimper, literally and figuratively, yet it’s near impossible to complain in light of the string of remarkable destinations that have not managed to elude me over the last year. Plus, I consider myself fortunate to be able to designate two weeks traveling through some of Italy’s greatest cities with my parents as my de facto grand finale.

But, finale may be the wrong choice of words. I prefer to call it just a pause. While I was lucky enough to return from my globe hopping sans any exotic diseases, I did come back with one incurable condition: chronic wanderlust.

Like an addict, I’m ready for my next fix immediately and am willing to go to significant lengths, and distances, to find it. Despite setting foot in a considerable number of countries on this trip, I recently determined that it only constitutes a mere 6% of the nations of the world. Such information only feeds my addiction, but how or when I’ll be able to seek out my next fix remains a looming, nagging question as I currently find myself at a unique crossroads: what to do next?

For the last year, my answer to that question would be to simply pick the next destination that caught my fancy and book a ticket to get me there as soon as possible. But, with an exhausted budget and a credit card balance creating its own layer of stratosphere, it seems that it’s not so simple this time (or is it?). Prudence suggests that it might be time to look at returning to the real world.

However, I think I left my pragmatism somewhere in New Zealand when prudence was also telling me it’s not so smart to leap from a perfectly good cliff into a deathly deep canyon attached to nothing more than an over sized rubber band.

After a year like I’ve been lucky enough to experience, my definition of the ‘real world’ has changed significantly, and continues to evolve, which adds layers of complexity to such a seemingly logical decision. Not to mention that there are a myriad of personal endeavors, business and otherwise, swimming around in my head that I’m wont to at least explore if not pursue earnestly before settling back into the real world.

Where I’ll be and what I’ll be doing in the next few days, weeks and months is anyone’s gues, least of all mine most of the time. But, I‘ve become pleasantly accustomed to that lifestyle over the last twelve months. One thing that is certain about my future is that I’m not quite done with this blog just yet - ever, if I‘m lucky. I still have excursions in Spain and Italy to chronicle as well as a few other topics that I couldn’t quite get around to while I was traveling. Plus, who knows what other adventures may lay in store to be recounted here at a future date.

Should I find a moment of clarity and come to a decision about my future, - whether employment, travel, or a mixture of both - I’ll likely record that here too. So keep watching for at least a little while longer. Just don’t expect to see a post about me curling my toes over the rim of the Grand Canyon any time soon.

Remarkable Rome

I waited patiently inside the baggage claim area of Rome's international terminal for my new traveling companions to arrive. It was creeping up on a good sixty minutes since their flight's status had changed to “arrived” and that patience was beginning to be tinged with a little bit of worry. After all, these were more than just two new traveling companions. This was their first foray across international borders in more than twenty years and just the first intercontinental trip ever for one of them. As such, they were largely depending on me to serve as their de facto tour guide for the next two weeks as we visited a handful of Italy's most storied cities. That was a responsibility I didn't dare take lightly and it didn't look like things weren't getting off to a good start.

Not that they had anything to worry about. After all, I'd been to Italy before. Once. That trip was four years ago and the vast majority of it was spent a few hours north in Florence. We, however, were currently in Rome. I had visited Rome during that previous trip though. For all of six hours. It was also probably best that I didn't mention the incident the previous day when I'd managed to bungle the simple act of ordering a slice of pizza upon my own arrival in the city. To be fair, I had managed to make good use of my time in Rome four years prior, visiting a plethora of the city's best attractions during those scant few hours using just my curiosity and a borrowed guidebook. Plus, I'd almost committed my current guidebook to memory before arriving and had managed to get myself around a new city or two in the last seven months without major incident. If nothing else, the dozen or so words of Italian I'd managed to memorize were a dozen or so more than they knew.

So, when the doors from immigration swung open once more and I finally saw my parents' smiling faces bounding through it, that twinge of worry was replaced by one of relief that we'd at least managed to find each other at the airport. Together for the first time in over half a year, I was eager to show them a little of what I'd been doing for the last seven months. They were equally eager to get out and see Rome, but not before a quick nap after a long day of traveling.

After sleeping off a bit of jet lag, we set off for their first taste of Rome with what was left of the day as well as to see how well I could manage to guide them through one of the world's most celebrated cities. Luckily, Rome just might be the perfect place for a novice tour guide. Something of historical or architectural significance - or both - looms around nearly every corner. You generally just have to pick a direction, wander off and it looks like you knew what you were doing all along. Sometimes even getting lost is fortuitous as some of the most interesting places are hidden down side streets or narrow corridors. Most of all, Rome is a city that teems with life so it seems like something significant is going on just about everywhere.

I opted to start by taking my folks to two of my favorite spots in Rome betting that they'd be as fascinated with them as I was. I knew my instincts were correct when I saw my parents' faces light up with their first view of the immaculate Trevi Fountain. It's less a fountain than it is a work of art that happens to have water spouting from it. It almost seems to be hovering in the air with the statues suspended in animation, ready to return to action at any moment. Legend has it that if you throw a coin into the fountain you are assured a return visit to Rome one day. I can't recall doing that during my previous visit, but perhaps there's a caveat that still allows you to return so long as you bring a couple new people with you.

From Rome '07

I think my parents would've been content to hang around admiring the Trevi Fountain for hours, but the daylight was fading so we decided to walk a few blocks over to my other favorite spot, the Spanish Steps. While the steps certainly have an unmistakable aesthetic beauty, their charm might be tied just as much to the vibrant air surrounding them, given off by the multitudes of people bounding around them or taking in the panoramic views of Rome from the top. Either way, it makes for an invigorating, if not contagious, atmosphere that you can't help but enjoy and my parents (and me) were far from immune to that charm.

Once the sun set, we settled in to a local restaurant for a fantastic dinner (pizza, of course, at my parents' request), followed by a leisurely walk through the streets of Rome. Strolling through Rome's often cobbled streets is as much a part of the allure of Rome as any of the numerous historical monuments it holds. The streets come alive at night with jovial locals and tourists alike out enjoying a fine Italian meal, imbibing more than just the night air or simply enjoying the city's intoxicating atmosphere. We decided to sample some of it for ourselves by stopping in at the nearest gelato shop, a treat that instantly became my parents favorite Italian treat. As we consumed our creamy dessert with zeal, our meanderings took us by a host of historic sights like the Pantheon, The Roman Forum and the granddaddy of them all, the Colosseum. Standing in the shadows of the Colosseum illuminated against the night sky, we decided that there was no more perfect ending to a near-perfect first day in Rome. Eager to get a good start the next day, we reluctantly, but excitedly boarded a local bus back to our hotel.

The following morning, I figured it was best not to tinker with success, so we followed a similar template to the one employed on the previous day. Pick a direction, wander off, stare in awe at the myriad of sights and experiences we encountered, then repeat. That formula was implemented with equal success throughout our four day stay in Rome. We explored all of the city's greatest attractions including return visits to a few of the ones we saw on our first day (the area around the Pantheon being a favorite), this time seeing them in daylight and in greater depth. But, we found just wandering around the streets was as interesting as any of the attractions. Perhaps each enhanced the other. In that regard, the sights in effect came to us as we were never in a rush to get anywhere, content to simply ramble around and see what we could find. When we did find something of interest it made it even more extraordinary.

Somewhere along the way during those four days, I noticed that a change had quietly taken place. Much as they'd done for me on numerous occasions during the first decade or two of my life, I was now the one doing the leading as they took a turn being the ones to stare wide-eyed and gap-mouthed at all the incredible and exciting things surrounding them. Like eight-year-olds some fifty-five years removed, they were brimming with equal parts fascination, curiosity, and unbridled excitement. They were eager to see and do everything they could, eagerly anticipating what the next minute, hour or day might bring. And, much like those instances years ago, afternoon naps were required and if they were good, we'd stop for gelato.

ROME PHOTO ALBUM (click photo):

Rome '07

Catching The Late Show At The Vatican

I had no more set foot into St. Peter's Square at the Vatican than I nearly bumped into the big man himself.

Nope, not the Pope. David Letterman.

Who knew that after six years of living within a few dozen miles of Big Dave's house (supposedly somewhere near Greenwich, CT) that it'd take a trip to Rome to bump into him. He was ambling up my direction a few yards away with what I think I can safely assume, having never seen them before, were his son Harry sitting on his shoulders and his longtime girlfriend at his side.

It was pretty cool (better than seeing the Pope for me) to see the man who's provided the entertainment to close out many of my nights over the last couple decades wandering around as a tourist just like I was. I actually think I'm a bigger fan now after seeing him strolling through St. Peter's Square sans entourage, special escort, or any sort of fanfare and headed to stand in the line for the basilica with the rest of the tourists.

I didn't take a picture, approach him or even nod my head his way in recognition (like he'd care anyway). Since he seemed to be enjoying some quality time with the family away from the throngs that could easily recognize him stateside (I don't know if the Late Show plays in Italy), it didn't seem appropriate.

My parents did manage to snap a quick picture from a distance, although I can't post it here as proof now that their camera is in the hands of some nefarious Roman thief. Returning my attention to checking out St. Peter's, I eventually lost him in the crowd as he wandered inside the basilica long before I did.

But, if you catch his show over the next couple of weeks and he works Italy into some of the show's bits, now you'll know why.