The day the world became big

This post was originally written by us in another language [here]. This English version was translated with Google Translate and lightly reviewed.

Memory has its own quirks. Sometimes it forgets what we did a little while ago, but it vividly remembers things that happened decades ago. There are memories that remain, intact, as if waiting for someone to touch them again to bring them back to life.

One of those memories is my first trip, or at least the first one that truly felt like a trip. Before, there were short journeys: going to my grandparents’ house, to school, to the supermarket with my parents. But that trip was different. It wasn’t just moving from one place to another. There was something more: a new emotion, a sense of adventure I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

We were traveling from Mexico City to Guerrero, specifically to Acapulco. It was a family trip. I remember we left before dawn, when the sun was still just a promise and the streets were empty. My parents were quietly going over the trip’s plans, as if trying not to fully awaken the city. From the back seat, I watched the lights go by and felt that mixture of sleepiness and anticipation that you only feel when something good is about to begin.

The journey seemed endless. Four or five hours can feel like a lifetime when you’re seven or eight years old. But there were little things that made it more bearable: the stops along the road to stretch my legs, the sweets handed out as prizes, my Game Boy trying to beat boredom, and that mini can of condensed milk that, over time, became a travel tradition. I can still taste the sweetness on my tongue when I think about it.

And then, after so much traveling, it happened. The first time I saw the sea. It wasn’t just any sight; it was a revelation. The horizon opened up before me, immense and shimmering, and I felt something I didn’t understand at the time, but that I still recognize when I remember it: the pure thrill of being in a new place, completely different from anything I’d ever known.

That trip was the first of many, but it remains special. Perhaps because it wasn’t just a journey; it was a door that opened to the idea that the world was vast, amazing, and out there, waiting for the moment I decided to explore it.

And every time my memory decides to bring it back, the smell of hot highway and newly discovered sea returns with me, as if it all happened yesterday.