Let me preface this post by letting you know that the term "rumbling" has been 100% swiped from the book Rising Strong by Brene Brown, the qualitative researcher who studies shame and vulnerability. I read her book Daring Greatly a year or so ago, loved it, and thought Rising Strong (about the process of getting up after you've taken a risk of vulnerability and fallen hard) could be a useful source of strength, reassurance, and faith in myself to push forward when things inevitably go awry during my travels. (It's a pretty quick and easy read; I finished it my second day in Cartagena, I think.) Anyway, she uses the term "rumbling" for when we're grappling with some uncomfortable thoughts, feelings, or behaviors that we want to get curious about so we can learn what's going on and what needs to be addressed or confronted in order to move forward as fully integrated humans ("integrated" = not repressing or denying important chunks of our truth or story, but owning it all), and I think it applies pretty well to what I'm experiencing regarding expectations for my experiences traveling, however ill-defined or deliberately-kept-to-a-minimum they may be.
My first full day in Medellin, Friday, was a little rough. People kept telling me how much I would love Medellin -- it's such a beautiful city, it has the fascinating Pablo Escobar history, the people (especially the women) in Medellin are the most attractive in all of Colombia, etc. -- and I think I expected things to have a different feel or energy than they have so far. I spent the day walking around but not feeling much of a connection with Medellin.
I went for a walk to find the park where Oktoberfest would be held over the weekend, Aeroparque Juan Pablo II, and stopped for some traditional Colombian food for lunch -- bandeja paisa -- on the way. I found the park without much trouble, and anytime I try a new dish I feel like that counts as an accomplishment, so those things were good. However, some not-fun thoughts were bouncing around in my head, such as:
"I don't know what to do with myself."
"My Spanish isn't good enough to try to connect with locals so I will just have to hang out by myself."
"I can't just keep trying new restaurants when I'm not hungry to give myself something to do."
"All I really want to do is go back to the AirBNB and watch Netflix, but that's terrible... I have this amazing opportunity and I'm blowing it, getting lazy and ungrateful."
"I bet the other Bonderman fellows are having exciting adventures and aren't feeling deflated like this."
On the way back from the park, I stopped by the supermarket and picked up some healthy food (greek yogurt, apples) to help balance out all the fried food, meat, and arepas I have been living on, as well as some coffee to make at the AirBNB in the mornings. And a donut... I was in need of some comfort food.
In the checkout line, the cashier said something to me that I didn't understand -- it seemed like she was telling me I had to use a different line, but I didn't know why that would be. However, she started scanning my items -- everything except the donut. Then I figured it out; I was supposed to buy the donut in the bakery area, but everything else was fine in the normal checkout line. Although I was able to figure out what to do, not being able to understand her actual words to me definitely triggered some I-should-know-the-local-language-better-than-this shame. At some point, my detective skills will fail me, and I will end up making a fool of myself because I can't understand what someone is telling me. Then again, so what? So what if I feel foolish? That's certainly not the worst thing, and not a reason to stop trying. In fact, maybe I'm just feeling guilt and shame about the language barrier because I know I could be doing better and trying harder to learn Spanish. If I was already giving it 100%, I don't think I would be so sensitive about it. It's harder to feel bad about the outcome of something when you know you've put your best effort into it, ya know? So if that's the case, I just need to rev up my Spanish practice regimen, which includes not just more time with Duolingo, but also not giving weight to that voice trying to intimidate me out of connecting with locals and practicing conversational Spanish as much as possible.
Around 7:00, I met up with the other AirBNB guests, Jesus and Daniela, to walk to a restaurant where we were meeting the hosts, Julian and his wife Julie. The restaurant was Mondongo's, famous for its mondongo (go figure). The primary language at dinner was Spanish, which was a great opportunity for me to practice my comprehension skills. I really didn't pick up much of the conversation, but on some level it just didn't matter -- everyone was so friendly and wonderful, and sometimes just absorbing positive energy is enough for a good time. Plus, the food was fantastic. The mondongo (tripe soup) was served with a side of rice, banana, and avocado. I figured the avocado went into the soup, because avocado goes into everything (no complaints here about that!), but when they did the same thing with the banana, I wondered whether I wanted to follow suit. But.... what the hell. I sliced up the banana into my trip soup and it was surprisingly delicious.
I wish I could take you all out to some international food sampler restaurant and have you sample these dishes I'm talking about. I even tried looking up "mondongo in Puget Sound" on Yelp, but it turns out, there aren't really any Colombian restaurants in the area. I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose -- Colombia is not really known for having great food, aside from ajiaco, mondongo, and arepas, so it makes sense that there would be a dearth of Colombian restaurants in the States.
In any case, going out to dinner with everyone was a much needed reminder that I do have some people here who would be happy to help me find my way around and give me advice about what to do and to keep me company. In fact, the next day (which I will outline in another post), Jesus showed me all around the city and helped me get a grip on the Metro system, so now I know which stop I'll need to use to get to the bus terminal for my day trips to Guatape and Santa Fe de Antioquias later this week.
I may end up loving Medellin after all.
Here's a photo of one of the walls in the AirBNB.
Not the most eloquent, or even profound, but I appreciate the simplicity and truth in it.
