Human Connections
Real moments between people living abroad: a stranger who helped, a friend you lost touch with, someone you wish you had spoken to.
Lost: straw hat with a faded red band, Malecon waterfront walk
Did anyone find a straw sun hat with a faded red band, left on a bench along the Malecon waterfront walk on Wednesday evening? Inside the band there are a few words in Portuguese written in marker. I was watching the water, which is what the island does to people, and walked off without it. I am still not sure whether...
First time hereThe downtown bus is free and I still looked for the card reader
First week working in Downtown, I tried the free bus. I stood at the stop with my card already out. The driver looked at the card, then at me, and waved me on. Nobody scanned anything. I rode three stops sure I had skipped a step. I had not. It is free, it comes often enough, and it beats circling for parking. Now I le...
A chance meetingThe Skytrain stalled and a man in a suit passed round his peanuts
The Skytrain stalled between two stations at rush hour on Thursday evening and the carriage went quiet. A man in a suit slowly took a small bag of peanuts out of his briefcase and began handing them round like a ceremony. All of us ate peanuts in total silence for nine minutes. When the train moved he nodded once and p...
Question for localsDo people here pick a higher floor because of typhoon season?
I am looking at flats near My Khe Beach, and my favourites are on very different floors. The first is on the ground with a small yard, the other is high up with a view. Typhoon season runs from September to November, and I know what the listings say, but I do not know what residents actually decide. Do long-time locals...
A chance meetingA monkey, a hat, a phone and a stranger shouting banana
A monkey took my hat at Uluwatu on Thursday afternoon, and I made my peace with it. The next day, at the same wall, the same monkey took my phone. I chased it for a hundred meters with my arms up like a goalkeeper. A stranger in a green shirt started shouting banana, banana, from behind me. The monkey dropped the phone...
First time hereThe first flood in the Ancient Town was oddly calm
In my first week here the river came up into the Ancient Town and I was the only person who looked worried. It was October, which I had been told, but being told is different from watching a street turn into a canal after lunch. The shop owners on the lane lifted stock onto high shelves, swept their doorsteps and kept...
First time hereMy first morning in Sanur I nearly stepped on a tray of flowers
On my first morning in Sanur I nearly stepped on a small woven tray of flowers outside a shop. Then there was another outside the next shop, and the next. They are put out fresh every day with a stick of incense. What usually goes wrong for newcomers is exactly what nearly went wrong for me, which is looking at the pho...
Lost and foundLost: a blue notebook with a pencil under the rubber band
Did anyone find a blue notebook with a pencil pushed under the rubber band? I think I dropped it last Sunday morning, somewhere between the Lake Eola Sunday market and the road where I wait for the bus. It looks ordinary, but it holds my list of everything I still do not understand about how this town works, mostly bus...
A chance meetingDid you see the hawk over the High Line, or did we imagine it?
On a Saturday afternoon on the High Line, a crowd of us stopped walking at the same time and looked up, the way people do when a hawk is circling. Nobody said a word. The hawk dropped over the railing and everyone began walking again, slightly different. A man next to me said, did that happen? I said, I think so. He sa...
Local tipCarry small dollar bills before you walk to the village pupuserias
Before you leave the house, check your wallet for small bills. The US dollar is the currency here, which makes life easy, but a pupuseria in the village is a small place, and a large bill at lunch means someone has to go and find change while the line waits. Then order, eat, and pay with what you counted out. I do this...
Lost and foundLost: a ring of keys on a red shoelace near the Halifax Common
Lost: a ring of keys tied to a red shoelace. I dropped it on Thursday evening somewhere around the Halifax Common. Carrying them loose in a jacket pocket was my mistake. I know that. They open doors to a building that is not mine, so I would like them back fast. If you found them, a bench or a fence post nearby is th...
First time hereI carried cash for a week and almost nobody wanted it
I arrived with a stack of zloty and carried it around for a week, because nearly everything took a card or a phone payment, even the small kiosk near the Vistula boulevards. My flat is a twenty minute walk from the river, flat all the way, which was kinder than I expected. The kiosk owner held the terminal out before I...
Lost and foundDid anyone find a green notebook near the Los Muertos pier?
Did anyone find a small green notebook near the Los Muertos pier? It has a rubber band around it. Inside the front cover there is a pressed leaf. I think I left it on a bench on Tuesday morning, around nine. It is not valuable. It holds three years of notes on how things work here. I would like it back for that reason...
A small kindnessI lose at dominoes in Little Havana and still get a coffee for it
I stopped at Domino Park on Calle Ocho on Tuesday and watched a game for twenty minutes, completely lost. An older man waved me over, put a domino in my hand and played one round with me while explaining each move in a low voice. I lost four times in a row. He gave me a coffee as a prize. He said I was improving. I was...
A chance meetingSplitting a hammock with a stranger at Mercado 28
I was haggling for a hammock at Mercado 28 when a stranger started haggling for the same hammock with the same vendor, in a language I did not know. For three minutes we bargained against each other, the vendor turning his head like a tennis fan. We ended up shaking hands and splitting the hammock. I get weekdays. The...
A chance meetingWe all thanked a turtle at Gran Cenote
About a dozen of us stood in the water at Gran Cenote watching a small turtle swim slowly across the pool, all trying to be completely silent and failing in different ways. Somebody sneezed. Somebody apologised to the turtle. Somebody's stomach made a noise like a door. The turtle did not care. When it left, a man whis...
Lost and foundLost: a snorkel mask with a mended strap, somewhere near the muelle pier
Did anyone find a snorkel mask with a yellow strap, mended with black thread along an edge? I think I left it on the sand near the muelle pier on a Thursday morning, about a ten minute walk from the plaza. The mask is old and not worth much to anyone else, but it is the mask that has ever sealed properly for me, and th...
A chance meetingDid anyone else see the goose at the Echo Park Lake reunion?
A goose walked into the middle of a family reunion picnic at Echo Park Lake one Sunday and sat on the cake table, staring at all the relatives. Nobody moved. The grandmother said, he can have one slice. The goose took one slice, thanked no one, and left. The reunion started singing. I was jogging past and applauded for...
A chance meetingNobody understood the announcement at Union Station, and we all walked the same way
A garbled announcement came over the speakers at Union Station at 5.15pm and nobody understood a word of it. The whole crowd looked at one another, picked a direction, and started walking the same way. We ended up on the right platform, I think by pure accident. A man next to me said, democracy. I said, it works. He sa...
Overheard"Relax, nobody is late today, the whole street is"
Overheard on Jalan Raya Ubud in March, near the end of the rainy season, when a procession had stopped everything. A woman on the back of a scooter leaned toward the driver and said, "Relax, nobody is late today, the whole street is." He turned the engine off. They sat there like everyone else, a plastic bag of fruit b...
Question for localsWhen can I stop walking at dawn and walk at a normal hour?
Heat. I was told to walk early and I do, in Papago Park, before the sun gets going. Habit. By the time I leave, the car park already has a few cars, all belonging to people who look like they have done this for years. Gap. Nobody told me when the early start stops being necessary. Now that the winter visitors are start...
First time hereEveryone on the Congress Avenue Bridge was waiting for bats
In my first month I walked over the Congress Avenue Bridge near sunset and found a crowd standing along the rail, all looking down at the water, saying nothing. I assumed something had gone wrong. Then the bats came out from under the bridge in a long dark stream, and the crowd made a small sound together, like a sigh....
Question for localsHow do residents know which camion goes where?
I have lived here three years and I still travel mostly on foot, which the cobblestones make an honest choice. The camiones, which is what residents call the local buses, remain a mystery to me. I see them pass near Parque Juarez with hand written signs in the windscreen that I cannot decode. Do residents learn the rou...
First time hereThe corner store sold wine and lightbulbs and I felt slightly guilty
My first week in Montréal I went looking for a supermarket late at night to buy wine and a lightbulb, and ended up in a corner store in Mile End. You know what surprised me? It had both. Why was I surprised? Because where I come from wine lives in one shop and lightbulbs in another, and you do not mix them. Here the dé...
