Encounters

Forced Solitude

luizasalazar — Tue, 27 Feb 2018 11:07:00 GMT

As I looked at the sign that indicated the start of a section of the Pacific Crest Trail I could practically hear the Indiana Jones music. I could see my six months training unfolding into this big adventure, me and my fifty pound backpack, all alone in the wild, sleeping under the stars. I could picture the awed expressions and endless questions I would answer after my triumphant return, the book I would write, the carreer I would start. As usual, I pictured the end of the journey before taking my first step and I think it’s where it all went wrong.

Like most people who decide to jump headfirst into danger and discomfort, I was bored. Bored with my repetitive work, with my lack of drive, with my past trips, with myself. I didn’t want to face the things I would have to do at home to change where my life was heading, so I decided to physically head somewhere else. The Pacific Crest Trail, a path that streches from the border of Mexico all the way to Canada seemed like a perfect destination.

I didn’t have six months to attempt the entirety of it, so I picked a stretch I could do in one: from just below the south border of Washington back home to Canada. I trained for months before the big adventure. I was commited to this. It would be the spark that lit the fire of my new life. I was looking forward to being alone and having that burst of inspiration, of newfound love for life that these adventures give people in the books and movies I devour.

The beauty and novelty of that first day soon gave way to the realization that I saw row after row of identical green trees for hours as I walked and walked and walked. This would be it, I would be doing exactly this for thirty days and all I would have for company would be my thoughts.

I burst into tears. I cried for hours, cried until I had to stop for fear my blurry eyes would send me walking off a cliff. I sobbed into my hands, wiped my eyes still holding my walking sticks and realized, in that moment, that there is a very big difference between chosen and forced solitude. I had toned my legs, lost weight, prepared my body to carry that pack, but I hadn’t prepared my spirit to carry the crushing weight of the silence I once found so beautiful, the peace of the woods now more oppressive than anything I had ever faced.

After two days I gave up. My body would have carried me to the moon and back, but the last thing I expected was that the scariest thing in those endless, beautiful woods would be my mind.

Beach Body

luizasalazar — Tue, 21 Mar 2017 18:13:00 GMT

Beaches in Vancouver can't really be called that. They're more of a collection of thick, gray dust and small rocks bathed by an ocean so cold, the only way to survive a dip is screaming at the top of your lungs for the fifteen seconds you'll manage to stay in just to prove you can. Still, it was my first summer since moving to The Great White North and after one of harshest winters the rainy city had seen in a while, I was looking forward to some lounging time in the sun.
The look of the beach wasn't the only thing that deflated my summer spirit. Where were all the snack vendors shouting over each other, the beer filled styrofoam containers surrounded by cheap chairs and the tens of speakers playing overlapping music that made any individual one impossible to identify or listen to? But I was from Brazil and determined to prove this, the beach, was my turf. Yes, I was born and raised in a mountain town over two hundred miles from the nearest ocean, but no one needed to know that! I was from a tropical country, and therefore, a beach bum at heart. Right?
After getting over the shock of this lack of familiarity we found a tight spot on the packed sand – Vancouverites soak up every ounce of sunshine they can get – and settled down. When a friend suggested we go for a swim and all of us got up to move toward the ocean, the strangeness became too much to bear in silence. "Wait, who's gonna watch our stuff?" I said, fully expecting them to congratulate me for my caution and savvy. Instead, they just stared at me for a full minute, dumbfounded. "Watch it for what?", came the reply. At this point my confidence had deflated somewhat so I kind of mumbled; "You know, for the people stealing them."
The genuine confusion in their faces following that statement is something I'll never forget. "Why would anyone want to steal our stuff?", very canadian Larkyn said, and with shrugs and smiles, they proceeded to the frigid waters. I looked back at our belongings strewn on the sand, at the lack of interest people around us showed in them. Here, my so-believed "street smarts" perfected over twenty-two years of living with urban violence weren't just unimpressive. They were unnecessary.
I was definitely and happily, out of my discomfort zone.

Four Wheeled View

luizasalazar — Sun, 26 Jun 2016 05:14:00 GMT

Since moving from southeastern Brazil to the West coast of Canada, I have gotten used to long flights on a regular basis. Visiting family and friends in my homeland means at least three flights and around 24 hours of waiting, layovers and air time.

One time, my itinerary was to take me through Panama, home of the world’s most famous canal and, from what I knew, not much else. I had never considered visiting Panama, to be honest, but my layover would put me in the capital city for over eight hours and that’s about five hours longer than I’m willing to spend sitting in an airport.

Stepping outside, I was hit by a wave of humid heat, the kind that makes you feel like you’re walking through molasses, to see a group of cheerful cab drivers leaning against their yellow cars, sweating under the sun and chatting in Spanish. I walked up, asking if anyone would be willing to take me to the Panama canal and bring me back in time for my flight and several of them volunteered. Upon asking if any of them spoke english (and informing them I spoke a little Spanish), the excitement turned to mumbles and most of them looked to the sky.

One man however, his skin wrinkly and tanned, his back a bit arched and his thin lips spread into a smile, volunteered saying he didn’t speak a lot of english, but if I spoke a bit of spanish, he’d be willing to try his best. I hopped into the cab and, as we made our way through the crowded streets away from the airport, my driver told me a bit about him. His name was Ramon and he was a 77 year old retired history professor. When I asked him why he was driving cabs if he was retired he simply stated “because I don’t want to grow old.”

Ramon did take me to the canal and waited outside as I visited it and the museum of its history, but the enthusiastic cab driver was not done there. As we drove back to the airport, Ramon took me to the Old Town, to an interesting street with the ocean on both sides and to a lemonade stand by a beach filled with locals, narrating the history of the country, peppering it with fun facts and stopping so I could snap photographs. I discovered a bit of Panama City in those six hours, discovered some of the nooks and crannies of a place I never thought I’d see. And I was lucky enough to do it in the company of a man who will never be old a day in his life.

Maldiving Memories

luizasalazar — Mon, 11 May 2015 17:19:08 GMT

In 2010 I embarked on a journey to the Maldives with my diving group. The logistics was very familiar: we would be staying for a week in a "live aboard", a boat specifically made for divers, where the routine consists of five daily dives with meals inbetween. It might sounds insane, but there is nothing like enjoying the type of quietude you can only get by being in small vessel in the middle of the ocean. I had been to many amazing diving locations by that point, had seen the colorful majesty of the Red Sea, the deep darkness of the Blue Hole in Belize and experienced the exciting fear of shark diving in Nassau. Arrogantly, I figured nothing could really surprise me anymore. But I guess the Ocean felt insulted and decided to prove me wrong. One early morning, when I was still a bit groggy and the sun was more silver than gold, we went in the water and I felt that shock that only comes from being thrown in cold water before you have a chance to think. We had been instructed to find a reef formation and clip ourselves to it, since the current was so strong and wait for the manta rays that normally travelled that way. I was excited to see them, but nothing could have prepared me for what I saw, majestic creatures, flying slowly toward us, with the confidence that showed maybe they knew how incredible they looked. As I lay there, in awe, one of them turned my way and started to approach. I got anxious. She was twice my size and there she was, less than a hand away, evaluating me and must have liked what she felt, because in a second she was parked right above me, the bubbles from my regulator tickling her belly and making her sneeze from time to time. We stayed there, unmoving, for forty minutes until I felt confidente enough to reach up and touch her, scared that she would leave. But instead, her eyes closed and she swam lower as I pet her, satisfied and in that moment I felt so alive, so separated from everything above the waves, I started to cry, sobbing with diving mask and regulator on. When the time came to go back up, she left slowly, giving me time to say goodbye and as I felt the sun on my face again, not knowing the difference between tears and sea water, I knew that I had emerged changed.