Chapter 13

 Truthfully, I'm not the best traveler in the world.

I know this because I've traveled a lot and I've met people who are great at it. Real naturals. I've met travelers who are so physically¹ sturdy they could drink a shoebox of water from a Calcutta gutter² and never get sick. People who can pick up new languages where others of us might only pick up infectious diseases. People who know how to stand down a threatening border guard or cajole an uncooperative bureaucrat³ at the visa office. People who are the right height and complexion⁴ that they kind of look halfway⁵ normal wherever they go--in Turkey they just might be Turks, in Mexico they are suddenly Mexican, in Spain they could be mistaken for a Basque, in Northern Africa they can sometimes pass for Arab . . .

I don't have these qualities. First off, I don't blend. Tall and blond and pink-complexioned, I am less a chameleon⁶ than a flamingo⁷. Everywhere I go but Dusseldorf, I stand out garishly⁸. When I was in China, women used to come up to me on the street and point me out to their children as though I were some escaped zoo animal. And their children--who had never seen anything quite like this pink-faced yellow-headed phantom⁹ person--would often burst into tears at the sight of me. I really hated that about China.

I'm bad (or, rather, lazy) at researching a place before I travel, tending just to show up and see what happens. When you travel this way, what typically "happens" is that you end up spending a lot of time standing¹⁰ in the middle of the train station feeling confused, or dropping way too much money on hotels because you don't know better. My shaky sense of direction and geography means I have explored six continents in my life with only the vaguest idea of where I am at any given time. Aside from my cockeyed internal compass, I also have a shortage of personal coolness, which can be a liability in travel. I have never learned how to arrange my face into that blank expression of competent invisibility that is so useful when traveling in dangerous, foreign places. You know--that super-relaxed, totally-in-charge expression which makes you look like you belong there, anywhere, everywhere, even in the middle of a riot in Jakarta. Oh, no. When I don't know what I'm doing, I look like I don't know what I'm doing. When I'm excited or nervous, I look excited or nervous. And when I am lost, which is frequently, I look lost. My face is a transparent¹¹ transmitter of my every thought. As David once put it, "You have the opposite of poker¹² face. You have, like . . . miniature golf face."

And, oh, the woes¹³ that traveling has inflicted¹⁴ on my digestive tract¹⁵! I don't really want to open that (forgive the expression) can of worms, but suffice it to say I've experienced every extreme of digestive emergency. In Lebanon I became so explosively ill one night that I could only imagine I'd somehow contracted a Middle Eastern version of the Ebola virus. In Hungary, I suffered from an entirely¹⁶ different kind of bowel¹⁷ affliction, which changed forever the way I feel about the term "Soviet¹⁸ Bloc¹⁹." But I have other bodily weaknesses, too. My back gave out on my first day traveling in Africa, I was the only member of my party to emerge from the jungles of Venezuela with infected spider bites, and I ask you--I beg of you!--who gets sunburned in Stockholm?

Still, despite all this, traveling is the great true love of my life. I have always felt, ever since I was sixteen years old and first went to Russia with my saved-up babysitting money, that to travel is worth any cost or sacrifice. I am loyal and constant in my love for travel, as I have not always been loyal and constant in my other loves. I feel about travel the way a happy new mother feels about her impossible, colicky, restless newborn baby--I just don't care what it puts me through. Because I adore it. Because it's mine. Because it looks exactly like me. It can barf all over me if it wants to--I just don't care.

Anyway, for a flamingo, I'm not completely helpless out there in the world. I have my own set of survival techniques. I am patient. I know how to pack light. I'm a fearless eater. But my one mighty²⁰ travel talent is that I can make friends with anybody. I can make friends with the dead. I once made friends with a war criminal in Serbia, and he invited me to go on a mountain holiday with his family. Not that I'm proud to list Serbian mass murderers amongst my nearest and dearest (I had to befriend him for a story, and also so he wouldn't punch me), but I'm just saying--I can do it. If there isn't anyone else around to talk to, I could probably make friends with a four-foot-tall pile of Sheetrock. This is why I'm not afraid to travel to the most remote places in the world, not if there are human beings there to meet. People asked me before I left for Italy, "Do you have friends in Rome?" and I would just shake my head no, thinking to myself, But I will.

Mostly, you meet your friends when traveling by accident, like by sitting next to them on a train, or in a restaurant, or in a holding cell. But these are chance encounters, and you should never rely entirely on chance. For a more systematic²¹ approach, there is still the grand old system of the "letter of introduction" (today more likely to be an e-mail), presenting you formally to the acquaintance of an acquaintance. This is a terrific way to meet people, if you're shameless enough to make the cold call and invite yourself over for dinner. So before I left for Italy, I asked everyone I knew in America if they had any friends in Rome, and I'm happy to report that I have been sent abroad with a substantial list of Italian contacts.

Among all the nominees²² on my Potential New Italian Friends List, I am most intrigued²³ to meet a fellow named . . . brace²⁴ yourself . . . Luca Spaghetti. Luca Spaghetti is a good friend of my buddy²⁵ Patrick McDevitt, whom I know from my college days. And that is honestly his name, I swear to God, I'm not making it up. It's too crazy. I mean--just think of it. Imagine going through life with a name like Patrick McDevitt?

Anyhow, I plan to get in touch with Luca Spaghetti just as soon as possible.

1 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

2 gutter   

n.沟，街沟，水槽，檐槽，贫民窟

参考例句：

• There's a cigarette packet thrown into the gutter.阴沟里有个香烟盒。
• He picked her out of the gutter and made her a great lady.他使她脱离贫苦生活，并成为贵妇。

3 bureaucrat   

n. 官僚作风的人，官僚，官僚政治论者

参考例句：

• He was just another faceless bureaucrat.他只不过是一个典型呆板的官员。
• The economy is still controlled by bureaucrats.经济依然被官僚们所掌控。

4 complexion   

n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格

参考例句：

• Red does not suit with her complexion.红色与她的肤色不协调。
• Her resignation puts a different complexion on things.她一辞职局面就全变了。

5 halfway   

adj.中途的，不彻底的，部分的；adv.半路地，在中途，在半途

参考例句：

• We had got only halfway when it began to get dark.走到半路，天就黑了。
• In study the worst danger is give up halfway.在学习上，最忌讳的是有始无终。

6 chameleon   

n.变色龙，蜥蜴；善变之人

参考例句：

• The chameleon changes colour to match its surroundings.变色龙变换颜色以适应环境。
• The chameleon can take on the colour of its background.变色龙可呈现出与其背景相同的颜色。

7 flamingo   

n.红鹳，火烈鸟

参考例句：

• This is the only species of flamingo in the region,easily recognized by its pink plumage.这是那个地区唯一一种火烈鸟，很容易凭粉红色的羽毛辨认出来。
• In my family,I am flamingo in the flock of pigeons.在家里，我就像一只被困在鸽笼里的火烈鸟。

8 garishly   

adv.鲜艳夺目地，俗不可耐地；华丽地

参考例句：

• The temple was garishly decorated with bright plastic flowers. 鲜艳的塑料花把教堂装扮得很华丽。 来自互联网

9 phantom   

n.幻影，虚位，幽灵；adj.错觉的，幻影的，幽灵的

参考例句：

• I found myself staring at her as if she were a phantom.我发现自己瞪大眼睛看着她，好像她是一个幽灵。
• He is only a phantom of a king.他只是有名无实的国王。

10 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

11 transparent   

adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的

参考例句：

• The water is so transparent that we can see the fishes swimming.水清澈透明，可以看到鱼儿游来游去。
• The window glass is transparent.窗玻璃是透明的。

12 poker   

n.扑克；vt.烙制

参考例句：

• He was cleared out in the poker game.他打扑克牌，把钱都输光了。
• I'm old enough to play poker and do something with it.我打扑克是老手了，可以玩些花样。

13 woes   

困境( woe的名词复数 )； 悲伤； 我好苦哇； 某人就要倒霉

参考例句：

• Thanks for listening to my woes. 谢谢您听我诉说不幸的遭遇。
• She has cried the blues about its financial woes. 对于经济的困难她叫苦不迭。

14 inflicted   

把…强加给，使承受，遭受( inflict的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• They inflicted a humiliating defeat on the home team. 他们使主队吃了一场很没面子的败仗。
• Zoya heroically bore the torture that the Fascists inflicted upon her. 卓娅英勇地承受法西斯匪徒加在她身上的酷刑。

15 tract   

n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林)

参考例句：

• He owns a large tract of forest.他拥有一大片森林。
• He wrote a tract on this subject.他曾对此写了一篇短文。

16 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

17 bowel   

n.肠(尤指人肠)；内部，深处

参考例句：

• Irritable bowel syndrome seems to affect more women than men.女性比男性更易患肠易激综合征。
• Have you had a bowel movement today?你今天有排便吗？

18 Soviet   

adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃

参考例句：

• Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
• Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。

19 bloc   

n.集团；联盟

参考例句：

• A solid bloc of union members support the decision.工会会员团结起来支持该决定。
• There have been growing tensions within the trading bloc.贸易同盟国的关系越来越紧张。

20 mighty   

adj.强有力的；巨大的

参考例句：

• A mighty force was about to break loose.一股巨大的力量即将迸发而出。
• The mighty iceberg came into view.巨大的冰山出现在眼前。

21 systematic   

adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的

参考例句：

• The way he works isn't very systematic.他的工作不是很有条理。
• The teacher made a systematic work of teaching.这个教师进行系统的教学工作。

22 nominees   

n.被提名者，被任命者( nominee的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• She's one of the nominees. 她是被提名者之一。 来自超越目标英语 第2册
• A startling number of his nominees for senior positions have imploded. 他所提名的高级官员被否决的数目令人震惊。 来自互联网

23 intrigued   

adj.好奇的，被迷住了的v.搞阴谋诡计(intrigue的过去式)；激起…的兴趣或好奇心；“intrigue”的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• You've really intrigued me—tell me more! 你说的真有意思—再给我讲一些吧！
• He was intrigued by her story. 他被她的故事迷住了。

24 brace   

n. 支柱,曲柄,大括号; v. 绷紧,顶住,(为困难或坏事)做准备

参考例句：

• My daughter has to wear a brace on her teeth. 我的女儿得戴牙套以矫正牙齿。
• You had better brace yourself for some bad news. 有些坏消息,你最好做好准备。

25 buddy   

n.（美口）密友，伙伴

参考例句：

• Calm down,buddy.What's the trouble?压压气，老兄。有什么麻烦吗？
• Get out of my way,buddy!别挡道了，你这家伙！