Month: January 2024

Living meta

January 31, 2023 by Cassandra Johnson

Status: Translating Mexican documents and currently in Mexico (next trip, leaving Merida, Mexico for Oaxaca, Mexico) and noting that the next document to be translated is from Oaxaca.

It’s hard not to feel I am where I should be when past experiences and fantasizing about seeing more of the world are now mixing again. Still I can’t say it’s all fun and games, being the life I want it to be is definitely still to come between working nomadically and feeling comfortable and secure all the time. It ebbs and flows. I note the current reality as a beautiful struggle.

So, I wanted to be a freelance translator when I took up traveling again. I had traveled with my non-profit job and had a hard time forgetting I needed to be back and what still needed to be done once I did get back. Though I had fun, those thoughts lingered. This time is different. I don’t have to be back and sometimes I worry that I have to come back. Sometimes, I miss not being back.

For now, I am liking my changing schedule. Not so random days can include lunch with a one-day roomie from France in which speaking the language we have most in common is Spanish, having lunch in a restaurant with larger than life pictures of Gandhi and Amy Winehouse, stopping into the University of Yucateca in Merida and eating green curry Asian and European food with a Mexican spin while listening to US/British American rock and pop like “Maniac”. Yet, this is still nothing to say of what the current city is most notable for including the cenotes, Mayan ruins, Mayan traditions, colonial influences and Yucatecan food. Taking everything in is magnificent and occasionally a feat.

Recall the adventure book where “you choose” the ending as you go if you will. My less than dramatic version means: I take a break here, hit up a museum there, have lunch with friends, hit up a bar, go to Cantina Negrita, go to Tropico to watch Karaoke and have the best margaritas I have ever tasted, go to the nicest most economical Cuban restaurant (La Cubanita) in the area and lavish a bit more on an establishment here in there on the street, Paseo de Montejo. Still, there are shows all weekend, festivals, events, an abundance of pets and strays in a dog and cat friendly city complementing a focus on biking, roller blading, skateboarding, abundant park spaces, and working and studying friendly people all around. Where I am still fitting in is through working, touring, relaxing, stressing, luxuriating and appreciating. That is all for me and that is everything.

Am I? On Vacation?

January 30, 2024 by Cassandra Johnson

My thoughts in mid-December: “This feels really good”.

Christmas had proven easy. I had the best taste of family time ever when my brother and friend came to visit in December. They arrived right before the holiday and there was a true sense of mainland USA arriving from back home during my time in Puerto Rico. Life with them was fun, nice and complete, so much so that I knew I was also mentally ready to move on to Mexico.

I had been excited about going but was feeling really sentimental and accustomed to San Juan, Puerto Rico, and not so resource ready for my next move. With them there and more resources, I felt a little more settled.

I was finally getting back into traveling. I didn’t think it would be so long following 2019 and it just seemed even more right to start back up in the same place again. I had revisited Pisco, Peru not too long before that and Guayaquil, Ecuador leading up to that. Still, this was a bit too long for my taste. A lot was also based on the need to request vacation time from my former employers.

Now that I tend to majorly get contract work through an agency, I realized that come Christmas, I was pleased not to have assignments given to me on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day and in turn realized I enjoyed the prospect more than working through the holidays as I had done previously. It was just okay for those times I was not on the road and in the air visiting family and traveling. Sometimes I easily convince myself something which is not so bad is welcome or a minor inconvenience,  but these days I am learning to be even more real with myself.

Following my everyday decisions and deciding regularly how to spend my travel days encourages me to choose what really fits me and let go of what I actually no longer want to deal with or at least how I can work on changing things like working through weekends or holidays. Those breaks are a nice reset.

Showing my brother and friend how some of the different neighborhoods connected, showing them my favorite spots and spending time chatting and hanging out in the main excursion areas, attraction areas and restaurants/bars put the period I felt I needed to the end of my stay in San Juan. As much as I enjoyed the connections I made, there was an added comfort to having family and long-time friends around that I had been missing since I left for the island. Mexico would prove to be the next place.  I assumed there I could get about to making more permanent plans (continues tomorrow)