Where are you from?

by Valentina Fontoura Kuhn (Brazil)

Making a local connection Brazil

“Where are you from?”. This is how it all started. She was from Germany and this simple question made me meet this woman named Gina and her dutch friends who gave me a lot of traveling inspirations. This happened in 2018`s winter in an exchange program’s meeting. I went there with a friend, sincerely not expecting much. When we arrived, there was a table with savory and sweet from their host countries. I started eating of course. I was a bit shy because I didn't know anyone, but I was there for it, so I took courage and started up a conversation with Gina, the german woman. By the time that happened, I got to know a bunch of other guys and conversation went through the night till someone had the idea to go eat pizza. In the pizza place I had the possibility to listen a bit more from the foreigners thinking about some topics. For example, sustainability: some of them really cared about it and even had academic projects and others didn’t. Nowadays I have connections with people from Germany, Mexico, France, Angola, Netherlands. This all provides me a real exchange of ideas, a lot of listening and sharing. You have the conception from locals of their countries and not only by global media. Also, you become a host, their local connection, and can present your city and represent your country, showing your nation’s good and bad visions, and listening to their thoughts to learn how other countries can be different in many cultural ways we have no idea how they work out their problems. I believe this can be a conception of a trip. It has nearly as much cultural exposure as a real trip. When you’re traveling abroad or being someone’s local connection you need to have the same giving and willingness for exploring and discovering. It's crazy how you learn about your city and culture too, while hanging out with foreigners you pay more attention around, and run away from day to day life style. For example, when I did a guided tour through porto alegre for some french girls, I went to museums I hadn't gone to and walked much more than I've ever walked in my city, and that's the best way to explore anywhere. Your own city gets more interesting and you feel like exploring it even better, we realize how much sometimes we don’t prize what’s around us. With all this experience in being a host and hanging out with foreigners, the desire to be one of them has gotten bigger. I wish I could travel to see beauties I haven't seen, to explore details and tourist stuff. I wish to connect with locals, to see beyond tourism how it is to live somewhere else and be included in another culture. By the way, I have been doing that on my last trips. In 2020’s summer, I went to Floripa (SC) and I was really into exploring its nature - thta’s really different from ours (RS) at least in the beach - going to trails, talking to locals to get tips, learning about sea behavior. Basically, I tried to take the most experience from what the city and locals had to offer. For example, I had my first time piloting a boat and diving. It made me super happy. I visited various different beaches, and places, which one with its singularity. I went to Disney when I was 10 and 12 years old. I remember that everything impressed me. The language, the automatic cars, the different and various brands, the food, the money. People trying to talk with you in english or spanish. I also went to New York with 14 years old. In this trip I experienced train transportation and walked a lot in the streets. Now, with 18 years old I notice how I changed my feeling about traveling and stuff. Basically, even with a lot of things still impressing me, after I had experiences with foreigners I learned how I want to travel. I wanna get cultural exposure; know natives who can teach and tell stories about the city, those you can’t learn anywhere; explore nature, culture and history.