Right, well… I am not so good at blogging, clearly. I’ve been in Buenos Aires for over a month and still have many saved drafts of halfheartedly written thoughts about my month in Patagonia. So here goes one big recap/reflection/story-telling/babbling.
My month in Patagonia went like this: Santiago, Pucón, Bariloche, El Chaltén, El Calafate, Puerto Natales, Ushuaia, Punta Arenas, Puerto Varas, Santiago, Buenos Aires (criss-crossing back and forth over the border between Chile and Argentina many times). I have, for the most part, already posted about every stop I made. Check em out. Afterwards, a lot of people asked me the same few questions: where was my favorite place, and how did I manage traveling alone?
I’ll answer the second question first because it’s easier, honestly. To put it simply, my month of backpacking through Patagonia was hands down the best month of my life so far, and I think doing it by myself was a huge part of that. I am a person that enjoys spending time alone and doing things by myself. I like to think I’m not a very dependent person, which was key to the success of my month in Patagonia. There were only a couple times that I felt lonely, and in both circumstances it passed very quickly. If I wanted to talk to people and make friends, which I often did, there were almost always people around for me to do that with. Obviously, speaking Spanish made the trip much easier as I could easily figure out my transportation and lodging without a language barrier. But the best parts of the trip were the parts I spent by myself, enjoying the incredible beauty of the places I was in. You learn a lot about yourself when it’s just you and the mountains and your thoughts. I learned that I like long bus rides and spending time alone and talking out loud to myself. I think it may even be possible that I like hiking by myself more than with other people. That’s not to say that I’m not down for big group adventures, because they’re also a blast and a half, but at the end of the day it’s good to be able to do your own thing and enjoy it.
Now, the harder question: where was my favorite place? Well, the problem is, I have three favorites and they’re all favorites for different reasons. I loved El Chaltén, Argentina, because that was where I spent my most alone time fully hiking and camping, next to the impressive Fitz Roy massif. Torres del Paine, in Chile, would top anyone’s list because of it’s incredible beauty; the four other girls I spent five days backpacking through the park with made it even better. I spent my most awesome birthday yet trekking on the Perito Moreno glacier, which makes the list for its other-worldly landscape.
Here follow the random bits of thought that at some point got scribbled down and eventually were typed up and kept in some saved draft that I am now publishing so I can be free of them:
Chilean on a Bus
I took a bus from Puerto Varas to Santiago, a long ride, sure, but not compared to what I’d already done. I finished listening to the seventh Harry Potter on tape and exhausted my supply of unheard RadioLabs. Towards the end of the ride, a Chilean man who looked to be in his late 20s who was sitting behind me tapped me on the shoulder and spoke to me in accented English. “Excuse me,” he said. “You speak English?” I nodded. “I was wondering why you are taking this bus in the day and not overnight? In the day is bad. The night is better.” I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to this, as he was questioning my decision to take a bus that he himself was on, hence his ability to currently be asking me questions. “I don’t mind long bus rides,” I responded. He didn’t seem to find that a very satisfying answer but continued talking to me. He asked if I spoke Spanish and when I said that I did, he said, “Oh, really? I heard you hesitate when you gave your phone number.” He was referring to when the bus attendant took down my passport info and an emergency contact number. I had been in Patagonia for a month and hadn’t thought about any kind of phone number since before I’d left, so of course I hesitated a second, come on dude, back off. First, I wondered why he had been paying attention to that, but also found myself annoyed with his surprise that I spoke Spanish. If he had apparently been listening to me during the ride, he would have also heard me ask the bus attendant, in fluid, confident Spanish, about the length of the bus ride, and heard me have a conversation with the middle-aged Chilean woman seated next to me about where I was taking the bus to and about my being by myself. He went on to ask me about my travels and such. Many Chilean people seem to be surprised when they ask me if I’ve enjoyed Chile and I say yes. I’ve also been asked many times if I’m enjoying the food. (Like, many, maaany times.) Come on, Chileans! Your country is beautiful and you are very kind people!
The Israelis
There are, to put it scientifically, a butt ton of young Israelis in South America. They come on vacation after doing their compulsory military service, and by the swarms of them, you’d never know that Israel is a tiny country. There are so many Israelis in South America that hostels and travel agencies have signs in Hebrew. Now, the next thought that I am going to articulate is immediately going to be perceived by someone as anti-Semitic or anti-Israeli. Let me assure you that it is not. I am Jewish and have family in Israel and am in no way trying to pass judgement, but, that being said, I have to make the following statement: the VAST majority of Israelis that I met while backpacking for a month were utterly obnoxious and very rude. Sorry about it, but I’m not the only one to make this observation. They travel in packs, drop cigarette butts everywhere, are perpetually loud and obnoxious, and make zero effort to socialize or meet other people. I thought maybe if I could meet an Israeli on their own, separated from the pack, they’d be more easy going, but alas, when the opportunity came, he really dropped the ball. At first I was happily surprised because he was friendly and talkative with me, but upon learning that I was American and was going to be living in Argentina for four months he turned brash and obnoxious. His immediate response was that he couldn’t possibly understand why I would leave the US to be anywhere else, even for a short amount of time, because, and I quote, “the US is so awesome, it’s the best, why would you leave?” I tried to politely say that it’s always good to go to other countries to get other perspectives but this guy had obviously never had to live with someone contradicting me and he shouted me down immediately. I tried, man, I tried. This also made me wonder about American Jews who make aliyah, who move to Israel. If the Israeli attitude is that the US is “the best,” what do they think of the Americans who leave to live in the homeland? Obviously, this was just one Israeli guy’s opinion, and I shouldn’t assume that his fellow countrymen have the same opinion. But it made me think.
Keep it Crunchy 