Ah. And so begins the post-travel stress: the routine you have to get used to, dealing with the weight you gained while you gorged yourself on 5 weeks of blissful carelessness, the friends whose lives you have to catch up on and the dealing of insect bites that just won’t seem to go away!
It feels so mundane to return to the life you left so eagerly in the first place.
Still, I’ll be grateful for small pleasures. I’ll never forsake my bed ever again. My body is currently covered with about two dozen bed bug bites that itch like crazy. I actually look like a science experiment gone wrong: I have white splotches everywhere where I applied Calamine lotion to stop the itching. Ugh, I have bites on the knuckles of my fingers which make it hard to bend when I write.
I will always be grateful for home cooked meals. As ritzy as it is to eat at restaurants three meals a day, it’s a drain on not only your money but your taste buds. I texted my dad and put in a specific order of my favourite homecooked meal: Filipino arroz caldo, and as soon as I got into my house I dove straight into a bowl of that yummy goodness.
I will never take people’s honesty for granted, even if it hurts me. Too many times in India we were lied to and pulled into the charade of being “helped”. Too many times were we hassled by touts insisting they’re innocent bystanders and trying to aide the lost and naive tourists where the only end goal was to cheat us of our money. Honesty earns its weight in gold.
I’ll always be grateful for growing up in a multicultural and egalitarian society. Being a “westernised” woman travelling in India is incredibly hard. They say in several guidebooks that the locals don’t mean any harm in their staring and is their way of expressing interest in you, but no. No. As much as I tried to get used to the stares, it didn’t help that the locals would openly gawk, some with hostility in their faces and without any discretion. It also didn’t help that when you’re walking on the streets, the gender balance is at about 98% men. Even in lingerie and women’s jewelry stores the clerks were all males (imagine our discomfort when the clerk leered at us when Nancy and I asked to purchase sanitary napkins).
I go back to work next Monday. Triple sad face. I hope to spend the next few days well, however. I have so many books to finish reading!
