Internal Tourism with Freelance

On the morning of November 14, 2015, the group of Freelancers from the English class, Journey in Literature, and I, went as part of an adventure, hiking to "El Arbol Solitario" or The Lonely Tree, located at Salinas, Puerto Rico. We had been planning this hike for a month now. I wanted to share some cool spots with the group and with this being a traveling class we decided to make it happen. 

The Lonely Tree is a recently discovered spot of local tourism that has lately been explored and enjoyed by many locals and outsiders from all over the island and different parts of the world. Thanks to social media, mainly Instagram, more and more people decide to do this hike as part of their bucket list. I can see it becoming a must-do at Puerto Rico. It is located between the municipalities of Cayey and Salinas just after the Jíbaro monument. An off the route trail that goes up a mountain to where a flag, a tree, a swing, and a majestic view are. From there you could see the whole valley to the south coast of Arroyo to the wind mills of Santa Isabel. It's not the the tallest mountain here, but it does offer an amazing view and it does inspire calmness and relaxation. You get to separate from the fast and tiring things of the city. And for all those adventures and nature loving individuals this will highly be on their favorite spots from the island list.

Days before the actual hike we decided to do the trail on sunrise. That meant to wake up around 4 o'clock in the morning to catch dawn. The spot is at least 45 minutes away from the metropolitan area and the hike to the top of the mountain about 30 - 40 minutes - depending on the stamina of the person or group. Which can be intense at the beginning or if you are not an active exercise person, but it can be done. Sure, a little bit exhausting, but possible. So it is important to bring water. Once we reached the top everybody was astonished by the beautiful view. There even was a rainbow receiving us at the very end of our trail. Honestly, It was a very unique milestone and we got to enjoy it together as a group. We were all taking pictures like crazy at the beginning, but once we settled we just let the moment fill our memory part of the brain with how amazing everything looked. To just enjoy the cold breeze, the sound of wind, and the view while sitting on the rock at the top.

It brings me great pleasure in showing and seeing peoples faces when they get to see the stunning places Puerto Rico has to offer. I always try to bring friends along my adventures and share memories together.

You ARE NOT an Ugly Person

“You are not an ugly person all the time; you are not an ugly person ordinarily; you are not an ugly person day to day. From day to day, you are a nice person. From day to day, all the people who are supposed to love you on the whole do. From day to day, as you walk down a busy street in the large and modern and prosperous city in which you work and lie, dismayed and puzzled at how alone you can feel in this crowd, how awful it is to go unnoticed, how awful it is to go unloved, even as you are surrounded by more people than you could possibly get to know in a lifetime that lasted for millennia and then out of the corner of your eye you see someone looking at you and absolute pleasure is written all over the person's face, and then you realize that you are not as revolting a presence as you think you are. And so, ordinarily, you are a nice person, an attractive person, a person capable of drawing to yourself the affection of other people, a person at home in your own skin: a person at home in your own house, with its nice backyard, at home on your street, your church, in community activities, your job, at home with your family, your relatives, your friends - you are a whole person.” (Kincaid, Page 14 - A Small Place) 

Nowadays, with all the advances in technology and all the misguided conceptions we have about ourselves and the rest of the world thanks to social media we get so caught up in all that drama. We start rating ourselves and those around us based on trivial things like how many likes this that post, status or photo got; how many comments a photo we posted reach online. We categorize people's beautifulness by how many interactions they get on all this social platforms. How popular they are online is how "popular" they are in real life. Which is a wrong conception. We get to feel alone in a fake world where everyone is connected by no one is connecting. To not get a notification online is to believe that you have nobody cares about you. To receive not one single text or call in one day means that everybody dislikes you. Because of how cybernetics has influenced us lately we surround our life  on untruthfulness.

Tourist for a Day

For an English assignment, all the students of the course where supposed to play the role of a tourist for a day. I went to the city of Old San Juan in order to experience first hand what's like to be on the shoes of a non local. That way, see how people treated me positively and/or negatively. By having looks of a North American I easily blend in with the tourists around the area. It was also cruise day, so they where everywhere. It was around 11:00am. A friend of mine tagged me along on this fun and interesting experiment.

First, we walked around the area for a while with camera on hand and some backpacks. We where looking for a map of the city, so we entered this gift shop where all of the tourist restaurants where and we asked for one. This was our first experience of the day. The cashier, a woman in the mid forty's, was suddenly surprised that we came into the shop asking for a map. She didn't know how to act or say at the beginning, but then she remembered she had an old touristy map of the fort San Felipe del Morro just below her purse. She gave that one to us. My friend decided to open it immediately. We exchanged some uncomfortable glances when we started speaking english. The woman didn't know how to respond to us and in a broken not so perfect english she told us to keep the map. But no sentence was used. Just a "kept it" and some hand gestures. We could obviously see how uncomfortable she was with our presence there.

Some time passed before our next experience. We were walking around the city with stops along the way for pictures and confirming locations with the map. After minutes of intense walking on the streets we asked two police officers where "Señor Paleta" was. A new establishment where they sell artisans popsicles. One of the guards didn't know where it was. The other one knew, but he was scared of speaking in english or giving us directions in that language. They took our map and kept talking between them in Spanish. Of course, we knew what they were saying but we kept the act going. They were seriously struggling with trying to give us directions in English. We could see they were trying to help us. So we acted we understood everything they told us. They police officer that was pointing us in a direction was speaking in both languages. He was really bad at it though. But he was trying to help us. We said our thank you and off we went to where we told us.

On the streets, we came across this store where they sold lots of souvenirs that changed colors with the sun.  It was pretty cool. The girl who worked there spoke perfect English and she eagerly showed us around the store. We didn't wanted to buy anything - a lot of the things were kind of expensive - but we tried and looked everything they had. We happily said goodbye to the lovely woman and we kept on our way.

Finally, by mistake, we found "Señor Paleta". As locals we also didn't know where it was. It was our first time there. Before we entered we decided to end the experiment, but once we entered the establishment the employee greeted us in English. So, we went with the flow. We ordered the most popular popsicles they had. The strawberry mojito - which was delicious by the way - and a coconut one for my friend. When we finished eating our popsicles we wanted more. To this day we still want more. I really loved how they tasted. That is a must now overtime when visiting Old San Juan. Oh, it's located at Teutons street, just near the Fortaleza.

The experience went pretty well. Around the city, locals looked at us differently rather than when we are dressed normally. The energy we felt was completely different around the streets. We could obviously feel the stares and the looks passing by locals gave us. But we didn't care. We where on the zone, and we wanted to get to know how tourist felt. As the person conducting the assignment, I was shocked about how weird the energy was. I have never felt that way before in San Juan. I am normally comfortable there, but with a slight change of language big differences were experienced.

Life is a Trip

Traveling can really change who you are. This is the case of Judith Fein, an award winning travel writer, speaker and videographer who lives to take journeys around the world. Author of the book, Life is a Trip: The Transformative Magic of Travel (2010), where she narrates her adventures and the complete changes she has went through with her readers. 

Judith Fein

On three stories Fein seem to have learn some valuable life lessons. Three anecdotes that would not have been learned if she haven't traveled to these places. On a trip to Vietnam, she learned that forgiveness is something to live for - live in the present, not in the past. Where in account of the American War she thought Vietnamese people will dislike the Americans, but it was not like that. At first, she tells, that they were angry with the north americans, but once they realized that they were in on the same boat, I mean that both parties had young men on the field battling a war that was not entirely for theirs. A battle that was the cause of many deaths. They preferred to put things behind and forgive the Americans. They now live focusing on whats on their day to day, their present. This was a well acquired information for Judith. 

Another lesson, was in a trip to Guatemala. Where she learned of a deity that is compared to humans by the locals because it also sins. As presented in the text it smokes, and drinks. So, in a different way, it gives humans or anyone who pray to this god, the ability to be forgiven as a result of imperfectness. It somehow gives people the ability to feel at ease with themselves in order to continue life without the martyr. That one, as an individual, can overcome any adversity if you think as the Guatemalteco deity as the god you pray to. In other words, your beliefs are attended by the god you serve and that no matter the culture or faith the figure of your worship you can also be forgiven of your sins.  

The last of the three lessons, is one obtained in El Camino de Santiago de Compostela, or the Way of St. James - a place of pilgrimage. Where she discusses how people from all shapes, sizes and ages come to do the walk in order find some answers. It's just the person and his/her backpack. She additionally talks about how people also come here to volunteer and help those in need (with the walk). Its to escape all sorts of things in the real world and do the challenge for any purpose.  Spiritually, emotionally, physically and mentally.

Here's a TedX https://www.ted.com talk "about why authentic interaction is the best way to travel. But how do you get beneath the surface and meaningful, memorable, and unique travel experiences? How can you be a peacemaker, goodwill ambassador and deep traveler every time you hit the road?" (TedX Talks, 2014).

Carl Jung Brief Summary

Carl Jung begins the chapter narrating the story of how he ended up traveling to Africa. A friend of his invited him along to Tunis, where his friend had some business to attend to and he just wanted to get out of his normal day to day customs. To just forget for a while about his nationality (European) and experience a different type of culture, which he could do in that country. He then, in form of details, recounts everything he did. Where he went, what he did, who he met, what he encountered, and what he learned and experienced about this new reality. Jung, got to face particular types of situations and events which confronted his beliefs and his point of views in all sorts of ways. Personally and mentally. Involving his conscious way of interaction with the world in front of him and his unconscious way of his brain reacting to this fresh knowledge and involvement.

The author expresses his shock, and later on understanding, of how his unconscious acknowledge everything more intensely than his conscious viewpoint. Including almost entirely his surroundings and the people he saw or met. He tells the example of an Arab guy he saw passing by at the Sahara and on his dream this guy was trying to kill him. A reflection of how this Arab country affected his Europeanism.