Getting to Know You #2: Cathy from Latin America Expats

This is the second in my new series of interviews of fellow travel lovers.  Click here for more interviews.  I hope that through these interviews, we will build community and just have fun getting to each other.  I also look forward to learning from other people’s perspectives since we all experience the world differently.  I’m so happy that Cathy agreed to do this interview; I actually didn’t know much about her before, but I loved getting to know her a bit and found her story of traveling and moving to another country with her beautiful children inspiring.  Cathy writes about expat experiences in Central and South America on her sites, www.expatdailynewscentralamerica.com and www.expatdailynewssouthamerica.com,  and you can find her on twitter: LatinAmerExpats.

1. How did you start travel blogging?

Synchronicity. I moved to a new town, was a little bit down, and wanted a change of pace. I had always had a passion for both travel and writing, and for some unknown reason never put two and two together. Literally, a few days after I decided to be a travel writer, with zero idea how to start, I met a woman who lives right down the road from me in the middle of nowhere in rural Argentina who is the editor of one of the largest expat sites there is. She was wondering if I would be interested in taking over the Latin America segment, hahaha. Okay. Thanks, universe!

2. Can you give us a brief summary of your past travels?

Road tripping and ski bumming it across the US when I was 18. (Insert 10 year interlude here where I got married, had three kids, and somehow ended up in suburbia only to realize that I hadn’t travelled in years.) Decided something had to be done about this, pronto. Figured if I took my two daughters to Peru it would get it out of my system. Um, or amplify my need to travel is more like it! The year after Peru, we hit Mexico, then Tanzania, Zanzibar, I had a whirlwind, blurry few days in Amsterdam, then a year later I decided to sell or give away everything and move the family to Argentina. And here we are.

3. What was your favorite trip or favorite travel experience?

Hitchhiking Patagonia with my kids. It’s how hitchhiking should be. The rides are quick, the people ridiculously friendly and helpful, the landscapes surreal. Pure freedom. I am so grateful that my kids got to experience this mode of travel and human connection at an early age. It is something I never would have dared to do in the US. It’s not even the same thing here.

4. Is there any place that you have been but don’t really want to return to? Why?

Cozumel. Cruise ships make me cringe. As do large hotels. As do large masses of Americans getting in all of their vacation for the year into 3 days of which they never leave the resort pool area. I was fine when I rented a Jeep one day and escaped to the East side of the island, but everything else was a little too touristy for me.

5. What are some of travel lessons you have learned recently?

Chill out. This is always relevant. The things you think are problems really aren’t. They should just be seen as part of the adventure. Stay open. Try to travel with the loosest plan possible, and more than likely your trip will end up way more interesting than you ever could have planned it out to be. Of all of the coolest things I have ever done while traveling, not one of them was ever mentioned as an option in Lonely Planet.

Backpacking with her daughter Ava

6. What are your travel plans for the future?

This December I am climbing Aconcagua for a charity that keeps Guatemalan kids from going permanently blind. http://www.expatdailynewssouthamerica.com/2010/05/how-you-and-i-are-going-to-keep-200.html. I am trying to line up some writing projects for a women’s rights non-profit in Bolivia. I will live in Colombia, Mexico, Greece and Turkey some day. I want to hitchhike a boat somewhere, I don’t even care where it’s going to, lol. I want to return to the Amazon. I want to play music with real gypsies in Eastern Europe. And, and, and, and…..

 7. What is one way that you can make a positive difference in the world while traveling?

Don’t live up to the stereotype of what a large part of the world thinks that travelers from the US are like. (Loud, drunk, ethnocentric, and rich). Try to speak the local language. Eat the local food. Ask questions. Make connections. You have the opportunity to make people realize that they can’t pin North Americans into a stereotype. But that goes both ways. You have the opportunity to see that you may have more respect for and more in common with a rural Bolivian farmhand you meet than you ever thought possible. You can start to see people as people, not just their nationality or how you expect them to be. This can cultivate so much compassion and tolerance in the world, and that’s no small thing!

Bariloche

8. What place would you recommend most and why?

It all depends on the person. What I would recommend to my adventurous friends is not at all what I would recommend to someone, oh, like my sister. But to keep as many people as happy as possible, I would say Patagonia. For the people who like fancy tourism, it does not get much better than Bariloche. Backpackers and hikers, gypsies and hippies just need to venture a couple of hours further south and they will find the most remote wonderland of mountain trails, open roads, artists, etc. The scenery is unreal. Everywhere you look, it’s like a postcard. The Argentine peso is almost 4 to 1, so it’s still a good deal.

9. What place really surprised you?

Zanzibar. This might sound totally stupid, but before I went I couldn’t have even found it on a map. I had no idea the Muslim and, in general, Middle Eastern influence on an island off Africa. It was like traveling 500 years at least back in time. It was a spur of the moment decision to go there, and I ended up loving it.

10. How do your travel choices reflect who you are as a person?

If you are willing to travel lightly with a loosely knit plan, and let the travel experience change and mold you for the better, great. To me it reflects that you have an open mind, an open heart, an open spirit. If you can’t travel somewhere without five pairs of shoes, a suitcase full of electronic gadgets you are permanently attached to, and less than four travel guidebooks…well, that says something entirely different to me about you. Not judging, but we just probably wouldn’t be good travel buddies. I would drive you as crazy as you would drive me.

Thank you again to Cathy for this interview!