We are over the 12-week mark and, as a family, this is the longest we have been away from home. And given that we have visited 8 countries and moved over 14 times, we are starting to feel like seasoned nomads! In this time, we have learned so much from the cultures, history, and natural resources of the different places we have visited, but the most interesting learnings have come from how we, as both individuals and a family-unit, have adapted to this lifestyle. We have developed a whole list of learnings/observations but I will serve them to you on a drip system…for fear that the entries will become way too long! Below are our first four traveling maxims:

1) Maintaining routines while traveling, is not impossible, but improbable.

It is very hard to keep any standard routine because our experiences in each country vary greatly. From working on volunteer projects (e.g., coffee fields, beach clean-ups, etc.) and structured activities (e.g., Spanish class and tours), to general exploration and living, no day looks like the next. We have tried setting daily checklists around school and wellness, but the practice lost its luster after week 5. So aside from some level of hygiene and meals, the rest of it is fluid. We do “school” a few times per week, and I assemble portable packets that get done in random places, from plazas and beaches, to planes and restaurant/bars. Kapil tries to do some level of exercise and I try to read and write, both at least 1-3 times a week…but it is tough. With a lack of consistency, there are just some mornings that we can’t get up early enough. With school, we now set a list of things they need to complete over the course of the day or week, and we try to get ahead of the curriculum so we can align the teaching to our natural exploration. It helps that (when we have Wi-Fi) the kids can see their subjects and progress on the K-12 website (for more on school, see “What About School?” post).

2) Change is tiring.

While moving to new cities and countries is super exciting, it can also be draining. We’ve gotten pretty good at living out of our suitcases and maintaining the organization of our packing cubes, but without fail, when it is time to pack-up all of the following will occur:

a. Someone will stuff their packing cube without folding the clothes inside and the zipper will threaten to rip.

b. Someone will be “done” and ask to get onto some form of electronics, which will make the others jealous.

c. Someone might start singing or playing music from some device and another person will want to cover his ears and listen to his own music, which will cause distraction and momentary chaos over “finding” something—earphones, charging cords, etc.

d. A second person will be “done” and will start bothering the person who was previously done—think sharing hammocks or getting in each other’s personal space—this will cause someone to yell “stoooooop” loudly, at which point the back and forth between them will get super annoying.

e. It will be sweltering hot and there may be occasional swear words murmured under breaths by adults as we break nails trying to zip suitcases and carry pieces of luggage down numerous stairs.

For Kenza, she has become very attuned to an anxiety that manifests as stomach aches at least the day before and day of travel to a new place. She knows when it is coming and she is vocal with us about it. She is learning how to cope with this anxiety and start to mitigate her fears (i.e. writing herself notes, self-talking affirmations, and celebrating when things she was afraid of didn’t happen, like “oh see, we didn’t miss the flight” or “yay, our plane didn’t crash”). We found that showing her places of our accommodations or of the location helps, but mostly, she needs a lot of tenderness and hugs.

The note Kenza wrote to herself in Colombia. She also wrote one with all of her fears and ripped them up to help “acknowledge and disappear” them.

3) Expectations are always surpassed, if you don’t have any.

Our most memorable experiences have been when we had very little expectation, or even in some cases, excitement, in visiting. Two examples come to mind—The Panama Canal and Palomino, Colombia. In both cases, the family energy in visiting or traveling to these locations was pretty low. For the Panama Canal, it seemed like a boring “mommy” idea that we just had to check off the list; and we had very little info on Palomino, but the kids were not too keen to travel for hours to the beach when “the waves probably won’t even be good.” Yet both of these days knocked our sandals off! After literally spending 30 mins watching a ship pass through Miraflores Locks (a long and slow process where the water levels change in a holding cell so that ships can navigate the uneven parts of the canal), the kids opted to watch another one pass! And Palomino, where we surfed (body and board) in the ocean until dark, was one of the best days we have had on the trip. Conversely, some of the parts of our trip we looked forward to the most, Turtle Rescue Project or even Tayrona National Park, didn’t quite meet our expectations in the way that we conceived of them. We have yet to truly be disappointed—I mean, c’mon, that would be super lame and ungrateful—but we are starting to learn to be a bit more even-keeled in our expectations.

4) “It is a lot easier to be present when you are a smoker.”

This was line that a fellow traveler and I laughed about, as we questioned whether we should start smoking! The conversation was about how it is hard for us to sit still and be present, but that smokers tend to have a great excuse to stop what they are doing and enjoy themselves and their surroundings at least a few times a day. Of our whole team, I am the one who struggles with this the most. I am learning (ever so slowly) and have used tools, like photography, to keep me involved in the present moment, but a ticker tape of “to dos” constantly streams in my mind…unless I turn it ALL off. I have yet to find the right balance of “present” and “productive,” but luckily, I have a lot of role models to show me how, and to remind me to enjoy the moment. I’ll get there…without nicotine 😊