Tatty's Travels

It’s been just over a month of me being here in Mauritius and here are some things that I’ve learned, some things I miss, and things I love.

I’ve learned: I’ve learned that french is a pretty hard language to learn. Of course this is common knowledge, but even with daily Duolingo and doing a French/Creole word of the day, I’m just as lost in conversations from the first day I arrived. I maybe can pick up on the context of the conversation more and can decipher certain words. But I’ve definitely have been giving more clueless when it comes to being apart of conversations that aren’t english. (The curse of my life I guess)

I’ve learned: How to drive on the opposite side of the road and on the opposite side of the car! This one was more nerves then anything else. It’s like riding a bike but backwards? I’m not sure if that’s a good way of explaining that. But there’s just so many roundabouts here (too many).

I miss: My family (obviously have to be honest about this) I feel like this past year I got super close with everyone especially with everything that’s happened. Being over nine thousand miles away with an eight hour time difference is hard. I just know that if I wasn’t here this year I would’ve been way more involved at home and gotten to be more present in my sister’s lives. But I am glad with this opportunity, I get to show them they can literally go anywhere they want to. Yes, I’m doing this for myself but also for them and grandma – she would be calling me every day to see the ocean and all the cats I see.

I miss: Puerto Rican EVERYTHING! Food, ingredients, the works. Theres NO platanos here. The first thing I’m having when I go back home are tostones, no doubt about that. Mom used to say that anything she made was puerto rican food because she’s puerto rican and she’s the one making it haha. That’s what I’ve been saying now. But one month in, and I still haven’t had the same touch with making staples that got me through last year. They rarely play spanish music (sometimes depending on the DJ) but also it checks out since this is a country in Africa lol. I’ve found myself listening to more latino artists then anything this past month. It helps that Bad Bunny was also announced to perform for the Superbowl. It’s ironic to think I used to not be a fan of his music. But music here is fire and I am making a playlist of all the songs that I really enjoy here, yes, they’re mostly in french and I’m still learning what they’re saying. One of my favorites apparently is a lullaby that an artist made a tad more fun.

The playlist is called MRU because I made it after being on aux at a party and had to show I knew some music – thank you so much to my girl Jenni for your Afro Beats playlist !!

I love: THE FOOOODDDD. When I say I’ve been eating good, I’ve been eating GOOD. I’m love chili (some of them are too much sometimes but they taste so good still) and curries. I’ve also learned that I like octopus and Chantal, a close family friend of Alex’s, makes the best versions of octopus. The street food here is also the best too, once a week I have faratas – curry with chili wrapped in naan bread – delish. It’s also all fresh and there’s no processed foods and things don’t have all the GMO and chemicals that food in America has. You can taste the freshness and fruits are tiny to me, which I can acknowledge is probably their normal sizes.

Now things I need to do already, especially since it’s warming up, and I’ve settled in.

• Go scuba diving – I would definitely need to do this in a group setting because I’m not the most confident about holding my breath under water but when and where else can I get this opportunity.
• Hike up one of the many mountains here – this one is obvious, there’s so many good trails, apparently some are a bit harder but I like to think I’m a pretty decent hiker. But again I’d feel more comfortable doing this with one more person at least.
• Go to the Seven Colored Earths of Chamarel – It’s a geopark that has different colored earths and sand dunes and the works. It’s sick and something that’s unique to Mauritius.

Those are my side quest goals this month! So hopefully I can share some of those experiences on this site sooner then later. But here’s a photo dump of some more pictures!

Let me know which picture was your favorite in the comments below and subscribe if you want notifications for when I make a new blog post 🙂