I have a great period of my life coming up; I worried I’ll squander it. I have the financial resources and familiarity with the world to live somewhere cheap for quite a while and devote myself to writing.
I agree. You can do what few people can: leave Taiwan and travel through South America. You can write in the mornings, wherever you find yourself, study Spanish and see the last human continent you haven’t visited yet.
I’m wondering though. Perhaps Mexico would be better than Argentina.
We’ve already been to Mexico. We spent seven weeks there a few years ago.
I know that, of course. But, this side of myself was much less developed then. It would be different now. And I remember a country full of wonderful towns and ever-changing scenery. Great food, low prices in the South-
Remember how pricy the North part was, though!
Low prices in the South… Interesting people. Very interesting people. Bustle, yet peace would be easy to locate.
Why are we considering a backward step? Wasn’t the whole reason to leave London to grow, to learn about the world – to see the world? Why are you stopping the plan, when we’ve become so different to how we were, when we’ve still got so far to go? You think you’ve finished expanding?
Maybe it’s time to expand in a different way.
You mean in a writing way, but why can’t you do that in Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia? What will stop you writing there, especially as you’ll be surrounded by so many new sensations, new cultures, new experiences?
Maybe I should seek out tranquillity. And I know Mexico has that. I remember lots of little dusky, sweaty towns with divine fajitas and imperial churches.
Remember that Mexican culture is a bit reminiscent of Taiwanese culture: the same mix of joviality and poo-faced seriousness, the same concern with exteriors, with family the same regretful temperament? Think of liberal South America, out in the corner of the world, awaiting your visit. Think of Bolivian red faces. Lakes as high as the peaks of mountains.
Why do I need to explore more? Why can’t I just focus on a new life, a new life centred on writing? I know that it’s hard to find work in Buenos Aires; I know that it’s relatively easy to find teaching slots in lots of places in Mexico, if I start to go low on my cash.
What an adventure it’ll be, though… You alone, arriving in a new place once again, undefeated, unsure, slowly curling the city into the palm of your hand. You are so much stronger than you were when you arrived in Taiwan. And within a few weeks you’ll be chatting away in Spanish, too.
Mexico will much cheaper to fly to from Taiwan. I can get a ticket to LA then bus down to wherever, rather than having to fly all the way to Buenos Aires.
Aren’t we going to be starting a new life there? Why this obsession with conserving your savings? Quickly you’ll find work if you need it. We can beat anything, I’m sure.
Do I need to be cracking a nut? Isn’t that going to be a distraction from my real work? How can I write a novel while surviving on bread and soup for lunch and dinner? Also. I worry I’ll become a bit like the other foreigners in Buenos Aires: the locals invisible to them, discussing only each other’s new expat lives.
And Mexico will be different?
Maybe.
You don’t need to compare yourself to anyone else. You know that you’ll figure out “Argentinidad” as quickly as you need to. Your blog can be the one with actual conversations with locals in it.
A song from the mosque rises. I still dream of Marrakech. I dream of Rabat’s fortress city. A return, a house with a door made of patterns. The high window looking over spires you have remembered even through waking.
Who’s this?
Not sure.
Remember grilled fish on the Atlantic coast? Remember the abandoned French colonial hotel with no toilet paper? Ah… Morocco. Place of true fantasies. That is our next destination.
I don’t like this idea. Moroccans speak French and Arabic, right? We want to learn Spanish. We want a good life, surrounded by local people we can relate to, not nightclubs where only men can dance. Remember that guy who grabbed our hands and started doing a jig to Kylie?
Yes! And the enormous forty year old woman in a full length dress offering us a belly dance. And the two children on a donkey on a waxen blue road in a perfect wasteland to the horizon. What shocking shimmering thoughts would emerge in this crossroads…
I like Mexico for its proximity to America, its confused politics, its drug wars and revenge filled feuds.
I like South America for its old dictators and new protests. Down with Globalisation!
Morocco is Muslim. What is more important, to understanding the world as it is today than understanding Islam? Plus, there would be none of the gringo wasters and tango tourists that your two dream cities are filled with.
Can I speak?
Do you have to?
You are destroying your life. There is no magic pot of gold. You will never be the expert writer you talk about. In the future, you will be like you are now, just older.
So, what should we do, then?
Ideally, go back to London. But probably it is too late for that, already.
Any other advice?
Take your disaster of a life seriously! I want you to accept that you’ll be raking the dirt for pennies while everyone you knew at University is retiring to their second homes. Perhaps you should stay in Taiwan, invest your savings in Chinese stocks, and pray for forgiveness.
I hear a song running through my ears and out through these walls. I am not what I was. I can hardly go backwards through the eye of the needle. I would not fit those old clothes. My toes would split firm leather shoes.
I can’t get out of this confusion. I know things are great, I know I am lucky. Still, I feel awash with all of you.
Better to be lost in Argentina…
Or Oaxaca…
If you were truly serious about writing, you would stay in Taiwan. Is giving up your stable teaching job surely not a subliminal desire to fail?
I (additionally) dream of Jerusalem’s stone steps. And the courtyards of Athens. I seek a lush mother. A reunion.
I want peace, and sunlit ease, and a waiting computer keyboard each morning. I want a tower with a locked door opened only by one key. I want a pile of books being devoured.
I want an interesting, non-English teaching job in Buenos Aires, a tango class, a room in an apartment block with vines crawling up the side, a writers’ circle, and a train ticket to the Andes. I don’t see why I can’t get it, with effort and intelligence.
Pity us! Pity us! Financial doom!
