Live long and learn

I'm traveling alone and I've run into a local young girl. We can't speak each other's language but somehow find a way to communicate and she shows me her village and around her part of the country when we come across a group of Western tourists, all men, who somehow got surrounded by the young girl's village hunters. They're about to get killed because traveling without a female in your midst means your there for war in this part of the world. I try to tell the villagers they're my friends and step into the group. The weapons are pulled away and the group is safe.

I wake with a start. What's really interesting is the fact that I've been thinking about traveling a lot lately. I would love to travel alone. But a woman alone in the areas I want to travel...not acceptable. The eastern part of Turkey along the border of Iran and Iraq. Parts of Africa. And other parts of the world where traveling as a woman alone is okay, just a little dangerous. So the dream ends up reflecting an opposing view of reality. There are serious considerations that I would have to take if I were to plan some trips. I'll have to wait 'til I get home and have some time to think and figure out what the dream means.

Whenever traveling to a place with a different language--the words: "please," "excuse me," "hello/good day," and "thank you" become an absolute necessity and as I learn them, they're set into memory. My goal is to learn those words in at least 27 languages before I die. So far I know 7. I'd better have a really, really long life, eh?