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Sometimes travel is not what you expect. The simplest things remind you that you aren’t at home. I go to the corner store and buy a bunch of stuff, milk and whatnot. It’s kind of heavy and the counter clerk put each liter of milk in an individual container. Immediately my sense of guilt kicks in, let’s not waste too much plastic, and I am about to tell her just to put them all in one bag but she’s already done it so I don’t bother. I felt guilty about this, and walked out over-bagged. And then one of them broke on me anyway. Moral? You can afford to waste plastic if the plastic is crappy. No that doesn’t sound right… There’s something to be said for not trying to do the right thing. Nope, not that either. How about: Wait and see if something is broken before deciding it needs to be fixed. Meh. Not much better but it’ll do.
Some things that are different here that are not so good:
1. Lots of cars don’t even have seatbelts. Or taxi drivers remove the seatbelts from the back seat. I may start a trend of rejecting cabs without a back seat belt because: 2. Nobody stops at stop signs. At intersections they drive through and look both ways. If someone is in the way they will probably slow down, but not stop. 3. Dogs poop on the sidewalk or on the grass. People seem to clean it up only if they feel like it. They mostly do not feel like it. 4. You can’t get a big cup of coffee. Ever. And when it comes it’s dark and they put a drop of milk, or worse, a kind of cream that is the consistency of yogurt into it. But the cappuccinos they make here are great. Just in small glass. 5. The houses do not have screens on the windows. I really can’t understand it. They can be gotten here, but nobody uses them. So instead the solution to mosquitoes is to put a mosquito bomb tablet into a little plug in device and sleep with the toxins in the air all night. It’s mind boggling. 6. People have less respect for personal space. Good things:
1. medical treatment is fast and cheap for minor injuries/illnesses. More complicated if you are hurt badly in another type of situation, like a serious accident. Antibiotics can be gotten over the counter. 2. At the beaches in the south parents can let their kids go out to the clubs until 5am, and not worry that they will be kidnapped, raped, killed, drugged, or otherwise harmed. It’s just very safe by comparison. 3. If you hear the crowd at the beach applauding someone as they approach, and you look up to see some man carrying a child and walking through the crowd, no you haven’t seen a celebrity, it’s just the system they use for helping lost children find their parents. And it works well. Everyone starts clapping and the kids quickly find their way home. 4. Popcorn in theaters comes salted or sweet. I find that with time I actually prefer it sweet. It’s very lightly sweetened and goes down way easier than salty popcorn. You don’t a 6 gallon soda to be able to finish it. It’s like eating kid’s cereal out of the box; you can eat it all day and not get enough. 5. Free delivery of almost everything under the sun. Pharmacies, supermarkets, video stores, anything you need can be delivered for free.
Until next time, much love. posted by goat hill dreamer @ 9:01 AM |
