Shiny, sweaty faces all around me, tourists who are desperately looking for some street, the locals desperately trying to get to work on time as I walk through the city. The city in which I no longer am a tourist, but a temporary citizen.
With confidence and without a map I make my way across the plazas filled with lost, wandering people with confused expressions on their faces. I adjusted my customs to the local ones, and seeing people have lunch at 12 and dinner at 6 now makes me grin: I used to be like that, like them. A tourist. Feeling at home apparently also shows on the outside as I noticed: people start asking me the way, or ask for advice on where to go for a proper traditional dinner. Of course I answer them, pretending to know it all, as if I have lived here my whole life.
It only gets hard when I am dealing with foreigners and locals at the same time. For the former, I belong to the latter, but for the latter, I am still, and will always be a foreigner. I must say though that for now, I enjoy having that double identity: it gives me the best of both worlds.
