It is funny how when you travel you find yourself lieing more than you would if you were in your own country. I don’t mean like huge lies to people that matter, but like little exaggerations to taxi drivers or random people at a bar.
I think it started when I visited Cindy in New York before either of our careers took hold and she successfully and non-chelant explained to a taxi driver how she was a famous model and I was a famous ballerina visiting from Europe or some far away, exotic sounding location.
Through traveling, you quickly come to discover pretty much everyone does this. Not always with motivations of grandeur, but more often just to make conversation more simple. For example: With the education system in Peru being so different from that of Western Education I have found myself saying, “ I am a psychologist” In stead of, “ I went to a university for four years studying psychology, and while that is the same amount of time Peruvians go to school to get a license to practice psychological counseling, in the united states I would have to go to school longer and study more to get a graduate degree in order to practice. So, I know a lot about psychology and the brain, as much as any psychologist you have ever met, but I can’t actually call myself a psychologist yet.” One might say leaving the truth out gives the conversation more of a ‘flow’.
Is gets slightly more interesting when you decide to entertain yourself and say something completely overboard like, “No, I won’t pay that much for a taxi ride to the hot springs, I live here and I know it only costs 70 centimos”. To which the taxi driver responds, “You are Peruvian?” to which I respond, “Yes, now give me the correct change.” He looks at his hand uninquisitively and counts out my change.
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