Especially for individuals traveling much, there might be a common discrepancy between how the locals see a visitor, and how the visitor feels amongst the locals. The two sides have been very present deep inside, whenever I find myself in a space as a visitor. It feels clear that I will be judged as some form of a stranger, and that I will be feeling my very own affinity or rejection or neutrality to the space, independent of how I might be seen.
Viewing it as percentage, though, almost everywhere I have been, I am seen as a stranger. My speaking, my walking, my dressing, my answers, my questions, all seem to expose me as a stranger from somewhere. This week might have been the first time in my life that an individual expressed having no clue that I was not a local. Because I could not furnish the cashier with the number he asked for, he expressed: “oh, you are from elsewhere!”
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