The other day I was walking home from the market, bag of fruit in hand, dodging motor bikes, playing human frogger in the street. Dust was blowing all around me, drivers honking in all directions, and a huge truck filled with who knows what was barreling at me. As I reached the sidewalk, baby chicks swarmed my feet at the local gas station while I waved off the offer of five different tuk tuk drivers to take me to my destination. All of this happened in a matter of minutes, maybe seconds, and I didn't think twice about it. Rewind to 5 months ago, where if all of this was happening, I would have shrieked and commented and been to my breaking point on the overwhelmed scale, but between that time and now something has happened… My life has become normal. While I'm grateful for a sense of normalcy in my ever-changing nomadic lifestyle, a part of me was a bit sad. When did I stop noticing (or maybe simply acknowledging) the unqiueness of the life I live? When did the once-strange become normal? The once-exciting become mundane? In an effort to reclaim a mindset of appreciation, I started to make a list… Of all of the weird yet now normal things I experience on a pretty regular basis on The World Race. These are things I don't want to look past, because they're worth acknowleding and remembering. And while some of them will make you laugh, others you could probably have gone through your day without knowing. Either way… enjoy a glimpse into the crazy, strange, exciting, blessed life that I live.
You know you're on The World Race when…
You have an entire conversation with hand gestures and weird noises
You fall asleep listening to cats chasing rats in the ceiling above your head without giving it a second thought
Sharing a (small) room with 9 other women is commonplace (and actually not that bad!)
You haven't quite mastered the art of using a squatty potty yet so you take the extra time to take off your pants every time you need to use the restroom. (TMI?! Nah.)
Every bike you ride in Asia is built for someone half your size so you're chewing on your knees
You don't know what you're eating, but it tastes really good so you keep on eating it
You freak out (and feel guilty!) when a meal costs more than a couple of dollars
Eating at McDonalds is a big event
You cram as many people into a tuk tuk as you can, just to save a dollar
You actually know what a tuk tuk is
You pass up using a washing machine to wash your clothes because you've learned how to wash them better by hand
You have to wear shoes every time you go to the bathroom
Instant coffee becomes your best friend
You're overwhelmed with too many choices of… anything
You play real life frogger crossing the street every day
It's a big event when you see another white person… And you ask them a million questions
Traffic jams are caused by cows in the road
'Fixing' the radiator on a car consists of chewing gum to plug the hole
You walk through a slum in Haiti and comment on how beautiful the houses are… And you realize it's because they have real roofs
Finding chocolate is like finding buried treasure
A meal never goes by without someone asking, "Are you going to finish that?"
You start forgetting the names of your favorite restuarants at home and they come to you when you're sleeping
You spend so long in a particular part of the world that you forget you don't actually look like the people there
You almost fry a lizard for lunch because the pan you went to use was actually his home
You seek out the Duty Free perfume shop in airports to cover up your travel day(s) smell
You can't remember the last time you showered
Alone time consists of putting on your headphones and turning away from your teammates
You leave the house without looking in the mirror… Because there isn't one
Your ATM card never works because you're constantly changing countries
You're walking through the market past all of the skinned animals, and you're completely grossed out but can't stop staring
You're woken up by the sounds of chickens, pigs, cows, or sometimes even gongs
You forget to bring toilet paper with you to the bathroom… So you flip through your journal to find a blank page
You finally realize your life is not your own
You fall asleep to the sound of the Carribean ocean
You swear you heard the sound of a chicken on the public bus and it's confirmed when it runs over your feet
You start asking your team to give you things to work on
Your heart aches when you think of your family at home
You're forced to rely on the Lord for the smallest of things… Taking the bus, going to the store/market, etc
Stay tuned as I update this list throughout the next 6 months!
