(dear john)

my dearest darling,

ahhhh, we’ve had some good times, no? you lured me into your embrace with your supple sand, your luscious ladies, your minty mouth watering mojitos, your curvy cobblestone streets, your sweet sound of salsa on every corner. you let me get cozy in your fancy hotels, spend my tourist dollars in your premium cigar shops, drink your high end rum. you gave me no choice but to fall in love with you. my sun drenched skin, gazed upon by some of the finest latinos, my aquamarine eyes fixed upon with every glance, my laughter coming out of many an establishment where the $8 daiquiri’s flow freely. sigh, what a time we had.

now, many months and numerous visits later, i am sorry to say mi amor, our love affair is starting to wane. my lust for your sultry socialism just ain’t cuttin’ it anymore.

now, i certainly can’t deny that you have helped me grow, that’s the truth. i can now drink havana club rum with gusto directly from the bottle and pee on a tree. i have learned how to take a shower from a bucket, eat rice and beans at every meal, use an empty tuna can as part of the interior design and look over my shoulder whenever i want to express an opinion. i have most definitely developed my skills as a keen negotiator (i was an agent after all) to not pay $2 for a few tomatoes when it should only cost me 12 cents. i have learned how to walk on the street and not fall into each pot hole on every corner and to dodge the crumbling buildings falling on my head as i go on my merry way. i have trained myself not to pick up and bring home every single baby animal that’s crying, starving, furless and diseased. i am now an expert at eating from the street without utensils and am likely the foreigner with the best ability to rip off a piece of greasy cardboard box and use it like a spoon. you have afforded me the opportunity to train my digestive system to be able to ingest anything i want, including the skin of animals fried into fancy shapes. when once before i may have said “hmmm, that might make me barf” now i say enthusiastically, “si, por favor!”. i have gained a better appreciation for how amazing my tits and ass can look in clothes that have Playboy logos on them and now fetishize lycra. i have acclimatized to the fact that most people here know very little of the outside world and don’t look at them in shock & disbelief anymore when they say things like “what’s a big mac?”. i am completely aware as i walk down the street, that i will very likely be hit in the head with a baseball made of string, hit by an excited kid with a bat made of bark or that someone will pour a bucket of their ‘bathroom water’ from their balcony on me because they have no running water. i don’t feel frightened anymore when my stomach churns because i treated myself to a $10 box of raisin bran so old that the 100s of bugs inside have buried themselves into my intestines. i just think, ‘shit, i’m super lucky to have been able to afford that box of cereal that’s so old because i’m likely the only one who can afford it and that’s why it’s been sitting on the shelf for the last 6 years’. no longer do i cringe when the plumes of black smoke from the 65 year old cars fill my lungs, i have just accepted the fact that i will feel horrific for as long as i remain in this city.

all that said, i also can’t deny that i have gained a newfound understanding for how lucky i am to simply hold the passport that i hold. i have a deep appreciation for everything in my life that i had and continue to have. not just the fancy job, leaside condo or comfortable leased car i so enthusiastically tossed aside but something more profound than that…..my freedom. the fact that i have the freedom of speech, to express my opinions about whatever i want and wherever i want without the fear of someone arresting me when i am sitting having a drink with my friends. the freedom to have a job that allows me to make a salary, no matter how meager, that will pay my rent and feed me. the freedom to move into a new apartment, travel out of the country, rent a DVD. i have gained the most amazing insight into how empathetic i can feel when there are people around me who have so little, who struggle so much, who would literally do anything to have what i have. and at this very moment, i really don’t have much - i have no home, no job, no car and here, no friends. but what I have is my freedom and my ability to have those things again, very easily. i, like so many others around me at home, spent most of my time trying to fill a void with a better job, more clothes, a nicer apartment – looking to some higher power in a yoga studio, a meditation retreat, a self help book, a shrink’s office to try to help me find much needed clarity. now, and with the most admiration, all i have to do for clarity is look around me. look at people trying to survive, not just in poverty but in the most extreme oppression. intelligent, creative, resourceful people who have no opportunity to grow in the way north americans are so desperate to (and with anything they need at their fingertips) because they simply have no means to do so. although i feel no need to run home and live in squalor out of solidarity, i certainly feel the need to embrace my newfound perspective on survival, my new understanding of the difference between what I ‘want’ and what i ‘need’ and my ability to seriously appreciate the opportunities available to me that so many others have no access to.

so, my darling, i do love and appreciate you but soon, i will have to take said opportunity to get the hell out and you know….get the hell out. and as my parting gift, i shall leave to you my lyra so you will always remember me. as much as i love it, i can’t deny that it really doesn’t breathe nicely in 45 degree heat.

yours, most sincerely,
elanita