My Syrian Rant

A friend (and student) of mine's mom has cancer. They won't give her a visa to come get treatment in the U.S., even though three of her family members are currently doctors or medical students in the U.S. They won't give her a visa because she's from Syria...and, in Syria, there is currently no treatment for cancer.

WHAT. THE. FUCK?!

How the fuck are we systematically not recognizing Syrians as people?! They are the exact same as the rest of us...though I'd argue that the ones I know are a bit more resilient and hard-working because they've been through much more than the rest of us. I can't imagine what I would do if my mom had cancer and she could have zero treatment, just because she's from Ohio and so a large group of extremely ignorant people thought she might be a terrorist. She's the same as everyone else's mom. And what would my mom do if that were the case with her mom?? Only when we think about it this way do we remember that we're all the same.

My student is quite literally one of the hardest-working and most humble people I've ever met. She's a medical student, studying in a foreign language in a great program in the U.S. Her family (which is a family of doctors) has been stuck in a war-torn country this entire time, through no fault of their own, and she doesn't get to see them. Now, with this horrible news, she may lose everything she has in the U.S. because she'll need to go back to Syria to be with her mom.

I don't know what the fuck I would do in such a horrible, horrible situation. I wouldn't even know where to begin. This girl is amazing at life so she's already trying to work with The Cleveland Clinic where she's been studying and she's got a lawyer working with her. She's still studying, she's still doing private lessons with me to improve her English, she's still going to work every day, she's still dealing with the sadness and difficulties that those of us in the U.S. will never understand because our country is not being blown apart on a daily basis...and now she has to deal with this...a terrible illness that her mom had been cured of before in her own country but now cannot be because of the war. She needs to find a way to get her mom to the U.S., who is currently refusing to give her a visa because she "might try to stay."

I get it. Not everyone can come in. But how about the very first people we let in are those who no longer have the medical care they need in their own country? I don't think that's such a crazy idea and, in fact, I think it's disgusting that this is even a question. With such a situation, my friend's mom should be rushed into our country, welcomed with open arms and sent straight to her first treatment.

GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER, U.S.!

Couch Surfing in Colombia

My first week and a half in Colombia was all CouchSurfing. I stayed with:

Laura (who has the world's most beautiful dreads and is the best Colombian History
and Political Science teacher I've ever had),

Juliana (who has the most positive attitude, the most loving relationship and brightest traveling future ahead of her),

 and...

Angie (who is literally the exact same person as me).

 Of course we all bonded over our love of traveling, our interest in other cultures, our openness to learning from others and our craving for adventure. Duh--it's CouchSurfing. But there was something else we bonded over, too: the fact that we're the only ones who get CouchSurfing.

People who haven't experienced it all say the same thing: "What if you get robbed?" "What if you get raped?" "What if they're murderers?"

It sounds like I'm exaggerating when I list it out like that but people really do ask those questions.

Laura and her mom told me about how much Laura had to talk about it before her mom was actually convinced to do it. I believe they said it took months. Her mom thought it was dangerous, didn't think her house was nice enough and, even when she finally came around and said yes, didn't think it would be safe to invite men. She now admits she was wrong on all counts and they now accept Surfers of all genders, countries, races and the list goes on. But it took a lot of convincing.

Juliana had a similar story and Angie's parents still don't know she does it.

My mom called me on skype a few nights ago while I was staying at Angie's so I introduced the two of them. My mom said hi and then Angie's sweet little smile and wave made me burst out loud laughing. That is who is on CouchSurfing. I'm who's on CouchSurfing. The two of us are the people that everyone else is terrified of and that's just hilarious.

I understand it, though. Things sound scary before you try them and I'm guilty of this, as well. Up until this point, I've always looked for girls to stay with BUT I realized how silly that was while I was in Bogota. Laura's friend, Cristian, also just started hosting Surfers and we all hung out almost every day, whether he had someone staying with him or not. He'd come by with his car and take us to some other amazing part of the city until I got to know all the best parts! Since he's new on CouchSurfing, he didn't have many references and I got to be one of his first! He's the sweetest guy in the world and, hanging out with him, I realized how many amazing people I must be cutting off by refusing to stay with guys.

Karla (Venezuela), Me, Cristian (Colombia), Myriam (Switzerland) & Laura (Colombia),
hanging out, looking over the entire city of Bogota

I also met Karla (from Venezuela) and Franziska (from Germany), two other Surfers, while I was in Bogota. Both stay with guys as well as girls but, since the site is mostly men, Franziska told me she almost always stays with guys. She's 23 but she's been to many more countries than I have and has CouchSurfed so many times she can't count. In all those times with all those different men hosting her, how many bad experiences has she had? Zero.

I get that CouchSurfing sounds scary to people. I really do because even I have even been letting fear (the "lack of safety" in staying with a guy) influence me into taking unnecessary precautions. BUT something unknown that makes us nervous is all the more reason for us to pay attention to logic and experience and to be careful to not make decisions based in fear.

CouchSurfing is incredible because of the wonderful people you meet and the beautiful experiences you share together. I sincerely recommend that everyone tries either Surfing or Hosting at least once in your life because it's amazing!

Disclaimer: CouchSurfing is not AirBnb, just like traveling is not spending a week in Cancun or the Galapagos Islands. AirBnb people do it for the money and CouchSurfing has nothing to do with that. People Surf and Host for the love of cultural exchange and the opportunity to learn something from others. Every moment of it is incredible.

Traveling "By Myself"

This is the first time I'm actually backpacking around a country by myself. But on my flight from Bogota to Cali, I had to stop to ask myself...Can I really say I'm traveling "by myself"? Yes, I'm the only one on the plane and, yes, I'm alone in calling the shots...but I'd be a complete disaster if I were actually by myself. The week I spent in Bogota at two different families' houses was spent almost completely with new friends.

There was a day, though, that I was left to my own devices and it was a total disaster. First of all, I was trying to make plans with Franziska, a lovely girl from Germany who was couch surfing with a friend of Laura's (my host) but, because of a lack of wifi on both ends, I wasn't sure if we had officially made our plans or not. I decided to head that way and show up at our meeting place, just in case she came too so, even though it had started to rain, I went out to hail a cab. Once I got in, though, it started pouring and the streets immediately started to flood. The water rose quickly and it got to the point that I started to wonder if it was really safe to be driving in it. The driver said it was fine and that it was actually normal; because of corruption, he told me, whatever money was supposed to be used to fix the drainage system magically disappeared each year so they essentially have no drainage system now. The water only goes away when the sun comes out.

Anyway, the more it poured, the less likely I thought it was that Franzika would be showing up at our meeting place because our plan was to go up Monserrate, a giant moutnain that overlooks the city. I was starving and everyone had told me there wasn't food around the entrance to the mountain and I didn't think there was much shelter either so, after changing my mind at least three different times, I asked the cab driver to just drop me off in the Centro somewhere where I could eat. He dropped me on a corner and pointed to a place that he said had lots of restaurants inside. I ran through the rain and went in the door that (I thought) he had pointed me to.

Lots of restaurants? No. It was a place that sold nothing but chicken but I saw that you could order it grilled so it seemed fine for me. Still, I didn't understand the menu. There was almost nothing on it and it didn't explain what each meal contained. There was a poster on the door that advertised a promotion of one chicken and four arepas for 14 pesos. That actually seemed like a lot for a meal in Colombia so it didn't seem like a good promotion but what choice did I have? I wasn't gonna walk around in the rain to look for another place.

So I ordered and the guy asked if it was to-go. He gave me a weird look when I said no and told me to have a seat then. Unfortunately, he told me they had no wifi so I still wasn't going to be able to get a hold of Franziska or anyone else. A few minutes later, the waiter came out with a giant tray containing eight fucking pieces of chicken (four legs, four breasts), four potatoes and four arepas. My mouth dropped open and I looked up at him. He looked at me as if to say, "exactly" and told me, "That's what you ordered."

"Well I'm not from here!" I told him, "I've never been to a place like this and I have no idea how it works." Luckily, he was super nice and let me switch my order (although I still ate a pretty obscene amount of chicken)...and he even ended up giving me the wifi password that they're not supposed to give to customers. I think he just felt bad for my soaking wet, 8-pieces-of-chicken-ordering self.

When the rain had finally slowed a bit, I went out to try to get a cab home. As I walked by the next building, I looked in and saw that that was where the cab driver had meant for me to go. There really was an entrance to a place with tons of different restaurants. Oops.

I stood in the rain and tried to flag down a cab driver for what seemed like forever. I kept moving to different corners and asking people where a better place to catch a cab would be. I was pointed to a few different places but people also told me that it's just tough to get a cab in the Centro. After half an hour or so, I was freezing and pretty wet so I decided to take shelter in a cafe and at least take a break from being outside. The waiter, a super sweet guy from Venezuela, told me he'd order a cab for me after.

However, after my amazing Colombian coffee, when he tried to call a cab, no companies answered the phone. It was apparently a busy hour of the day. My friend tried to order me an Uber but none of those were available, either. The waiter sent another waiter, who was wearing their short-sleeved uniform, into the street to try to hail a cab for me. That made me feel like a lazy, shitty person but they kept saying it was fine and I thought maybe he'd have better luck than me because he's Colombian and knows how things here work. He stood out there in the cold rain for probably ten minutes, thought, and all the cabs were full. I didn't want him to be outside in the rain because of me so I told them I'd try to find a cab on a different street. They told me to walk three or four blocks down the road but, even there, every single one was full. Finally, luckily, I saw one pull over to let people out and I sprinted over! Success! I was finally on my way home.

Later, everyone asked me what I'd done with my day and all I could say was that I'd taken an extra-long cab ride through flooded streets, ordered a family-sized meal for one and stood in the cold rain for an hour, trying to hail a cab. (Although I could also mention that I'd had nice conversations with the waiters in the coffee shop and my cab drivers.)

The other five days that I spent in Bogota were spent with the sweetest new friends. We successfully arrived at all intended destinations and found places with good and cheap food in normal-sized proportions (and it barely even rained on those days).

So it seems wrong for me to say that I travel by myself. As much as I love my "independence," I rely on friends, family and strangers all the time to help me get where I'm going. I think the reason I love helping other people is because I'm aware of how much others help me. Traveling keeps you vulnerable; you need help all the time. People you've just met drop everything to help you and that, in turn, makes you start paying attention to other peoples' needs. You're just automatically looking for a way to give back to the world in the way that it's been helping you. I think if everyone traveled, rather than being so scared of strangers and running the other way when someone needed help, everyone would be more willing to help whoever was around them. Traveling, you are beautiful!!!!