I spent the past year 8,000 miles away from my best friend. Both of us had moved to a new country for a year — me taking a gap year in Israel, her spending the year in Chile as an exchange student. As anyone with long distance friends knows all too well, not seeing your friend is the absolute worst. Throw in a time difference and it starts to get really rough. We texted, called, and FaceTimed, but it wasn’t the same.
Towards the end of the year, my friend decided to stay in Chile. She loved the country and wanted to remain for another half of a year. As happy as I was for her success, I was more than a little distraught. Six more months of separation? It sounded awful!
From that situation hatched an idea. It started as a joke but soon took on some weight. Why shouldn’t I come visit her? Newly graduated, it was still a nerve-wracking concept to me to travel alone to a foreign country where not only did I know no one (aside from her), but I did not speak the language and they didn’t speak mine. Hesitantly I broached the topic with my parents, and to my surprise, they agreed enthusiastically.
Fast forward to late July, when I exited the last of the three flights (it was cheaper that way) that had delivered me to Santiago, the capital of Chile. I was nervous, excited, and thoroughly exhausted. The next ten days ended up being amazing, incredibly, and far more difficult than I had expected.
Traveling on your own seems glamorous and exciting, and honestly, it is...some of the time. What I wasn’t expecting was how isolated I felt, even as I met new people every day I was there. I had never experienced a language barrier as real as what I found in Chile, where most people speak at most only a few phrases of English. I spent entire meals trying (unsuccessfully) to understand even the general topics of conversation in Chileans’ incredibly fast Spanish. I had never regretted taking French in high school as much as I did that week.
The language barrier also meant that I had to rely completely on my friend, a scenario that I think we both didn’t love. As a usually independent person, I was constantly frustrated by the inability to do even basic things on my own, like figure out what bus to take. This was the opposite of the mobility and self-sufficiency I had experienced on my gap year, and the switch was startling.
In addition to the language, I found myself struggling with cultural differences. Despite being a vegetarian for the past five years, I decided to take a break so I could immerse myself in the most important part of Chilean culture: the food. After a few days, though, my stomach had enough of meat and I struggled to find meals that were more than just bread with jam. I had never realized how lucky I was to live in a place with so many types of food readily available to me.
At the end of the trip, I stayed with my friend's host family in a small town. Here, it was much quieter than the big cities we had been visiting, and I finally had some time to reflect on where I was. Being in Chile felt like a break from my reality - which at the time was dealing with returning home from a year abroad. But here I was, transported into my best friend’s reality. I had known about her life in Chile, but until being there, I hadn’t been able to picture it. As her experience gained a sense of reality for me, I felt further away from my own. By the time my return flight came around, I was ready to return to my comfort zone.
There were so many difficult things that seemed so important to me during that trip, whether it was feeling uncomfortable living in the homes of strangers or disagreements between me and my friend over where to visit and what to do. I remember calling my mom in the middle to complain and feeling that the visit was ruined by one thing or another. The funny thing is, none of them seem to matter anymore.
Issues that felt like they would ruin everything at the time seem so insignificant. Looking back, what I remember are all the things I managed to do. With some distance, I now focus on the delicious restaurants, beautiful museums and landscapes, and all the silly and funny experiences I had. More than that, I think back on the trip and am thankful for the opportunity to understand my friend’s experiences. I may not have done everything I had planned to while there, but I can’t help but be proud of surviving my first trip alone.
