A Humbled Traveler

I've been in Tanzania for about 14 hours now, and it has already challenged just about everything that I thought I knew about traveling outside of the U.S.

1. Things aren't cheap here

I always thought, and I believe other people have been on board with me on this one, that if you are traveling anywhere outside of Europe, your US dollar can get you pretty far. Sure, there is a serious investment in the flights, but the cost can be more than made up in ground transport, accommodations, and activities.

This couldn't be less true in Tanzania. A taxi from the airport is US$50. A night at a hostel -one that warns of water shortages - is US $47. To climb Kilimajaro is a whopping US $1500.

It wouldn't be that hard to go for broke here.

2. You actually need to plan in advance

My previous experiences has always been that planning ahead for international travel is almost uniformly a bad idea. The price tour operators from the US charge you is far more expensive than if you go with a local operator. You also lose the flexibility of learning from fellow travelers and changing your plans when hearing advice from real people in the moment, instead of five year old guidebooks. Besides, it's always nice to not get locked into something awful because you didn't really understand all of your options.

So here I go into the "tourist town" of Arusha thinking there would be lines of small shops offering safaris, treks and flights to Zanzibar. I imagined I'd see tons of people like me -solo travelers looking to pick the best of a bevy of options for guided tourism. I basically was using the Asia paradigm of travel in Africa. And it totally failed.

Tour operators looked at me like I was insane when I told them I wanted to climb Mt. Meru tomorrow. They were even more confused by this question I had of wanting to join an already existing group.If it weren't for the persistence and know-how of my friend Lisa, I might have been holed up in a hotel room all week.

3. No one cares about me.

This sounds much more dire than it actually is. Whether it's been in Asia or in South America (my two most traveled continents), I've been stared at... a lot. And people were uber-friendly to me all of the time. Not the genuine kind of friendly. The curious sort-of friendly that people put on when they are talking to someone who has a third eye or is a bearded lady. I've grown used to being like some strange alien dropped into a homogeneous land.

And the truth is, no one here thinks I'm special. Not in the least bit. Which, all things considered, is a pretty sweet pill to swallow.