Back home, things I'll miss and things I won't.

Back home in the USA, and there's a lot more to continue with. In the meantime I offer up the following look at what I'll miss, and won't miss, about South America.

Things I’ll miss about South America:
1. The food. The meat, the veggies, the fruits seem to be fresher and taste better.
2. The sense of joy, family, community that seems so central to their lives. It’s difficult to explain the difference, since I can easily admit these same elements are very important in the U.S. You’d just have to be here to experience how it all plays out a little differently south of the border.
3. The unique and fascinating history.
4. Art and music are more common features of life on the street.
5. The beautiful buildings, parks and public spaces.

Things I won’t miss:
1. sidewalks. There obviously isn’t enough money to keep up with al l the sidewalk repairs. Walking city streets requires an alert eye and keen sense of balance.
2. Dogs. I love dogs and there are a lot of them here. The problem is there are just too many dogs living on the streets. I found this true practically everywhere I was. I’m somewhat surprised that stray dogs are allowed to populate and roam so freely. They certainly can contribute to the garbage problem, plus they make another type of caution for walking down the sidewalk.
3. Being charged a “set up” fee, or a “bread fee” from the moment you sit down in a restaurant or café.
4. The bathrooms. I’ll put this near the bottom of the list, since overall the experience was not so bad (nothing like that opening scene in “Trainspotting”). Still more than once I went into a sort of sensory shut down just to get through it all. Yeah, we got ‘me beat on plumbing.