A strange paradox about being in a foreign country is that it is surprisingly difficult to meet and to discuss meaningful topics with local people. The language barrier is the main reason for this, but there are many other contributing factors as well. Travelers hang out in the tourist locations, snapping photos during the day and spending their time in hostels arounds other travelers at night. Meanwhile, locals rarely enter those places. Everywhere in the world, there is an entire industry that caters to travelers and keeps things simple for them. Tourist buses go from tourist destination to tourist destination with no local stops in between. It is very possible to spend months traveling all over the world and never interact with a local at all. Instead, days can be filled by talking with other travelers from different countries all over the world EXCEPT the one in which you are currently located. For example, we have great French friends whom we met in Chile, Dutch friends that we met in Botswana, Palestinian friends that we met in Ecuador, and German, Australian and English friends that we met in Bolivia... the list goes on and on.

To help us navigate more like locals, before we enter a new country we try to learn at least 25 words in the local language including the essentials such as "Hello," "Thank you", and "Two beers, please." It is amazing to see what a difference respecting the local language makes in your travels. Even if you butcher the words and sound ridiculous trying to pronounce them, simply showing interest and respecting where you are instead of assuming that the locals should speak English will greatly improve people's interest in assisting you. In fact, we have found that the quickest way to meet friends in a foreign country is to ask them to teach you some words in their language. Laughter is always quick to follow.

From time to time when you travel, you will get an opportunity to stay with and get to know a local and their family, to be invited into their life and experience their world. These are the magic moments that we search for. Such an opportunity arose in Coffee Bay, South Africa when a backpackers lodge could arrange a homestay. We jumped at the chance to spend an evening with a family in a remote Xhosa village deep in the Transkei.

After a long hike down the one of the most picturesque coastlines in the world, we met Elvin, the patriarch of the family that we were going to spend the next two days with. He greeted us with a warm smile and a handshake, then led us down the road to his village where he lived with his family. Like every family in the village, Elvin was a subsistence farmer; they grew only what they needed to eat to survive with the main crop being corn. He was actually one of the most ambitious people in the area because he also grew cabbage, tomatoes, and onions in his garden and kept chickens and cows for milk and eggs. His most recent project was to try to grow apple trees--he saved up his money and bought 2 apples, then planted the seeds in hopes to have apple trees one day. His face lit up when he showed us the seedlings a few inches above the dirt.

When Elvin's wife invited me to help prepare dinner, I unknowingly instigated a few chuckles as the family saw how clumsy I was at peeling potatoes with a knife in my hands. I had always used the ever-fancy potato peeler at home or used a knife and cutting board. Though her knives were dull, Elvin's wife had wide eyes as she watched me cut the skin off of the potatoes-she probably thought I was going to accidently draw blood.

Dinner was generous and consisted of everything from the garden along with a side of beans. Afterwards, we sat inside their mudbrick home talking, exchanging stories about our own lives, then comparing how different our home of New York City is compared to life in rural South Africa. What struck me more than anything was the lack of smart phones and entertainment devices that simply cannot run without electricity. No one was distracted checking texts, emails, facebook, etc. We were all simply facing each other and talking. We shared many great stories and learned a lot about their way of life. It felt like a trip back in time. It made me stop to think about how so many people who didn't have technology longed to have such gadgets, and how people who have those gadgets long to go on vacation and give themselves permission to "unplug" for a whole day, weekend, or even a week if they are so lucky.

After helping clean up from dinner and helping Elvin's ten-year-old daughter with her English homework, the sun had set and it was time to leave the dining-and-living-room hut and go to the sleeping huts. One was for Elvin and his wife and the other was for the kids. We slept on the floor of the kids' hut on a pile of blankets with roosters prepped just outside the window to wake us at sunrise.

The next morning over a breakfast consisting of bread and a cup of "coffee," a concoction of 4 spoonfuls of sugar mixed with half a spoonful of instant coffee, more stories were exchanged and more questions of each other asked. We must have shown enough of an interest the night before in learning the Xhosa language that Elvin had taken it upon himself early that morning to write down on a sheet of paper over fifty Xhosa to English translations for us to practice together and then take with us. He giggled as I practiced them but patiently corrected me until it sounded just right. We studied in the yard with cows mooing and chickens clucking around us, then thanked him for his hospitality and generosity during our visit. Elvin walked us back to our lodge which dropped us smack dab into the tourist world once again. Even though the lodge was basic and most travellers walked around barefoot and lounged in hammocks reading books or playing guitar instead of being glued to an electronic device, there was still beer in a fridge, music playing on a stereo system, and a computer in the office complete with credit card machine to charge guests' purchases.

As the bus drove us away the next day, we reflected on the differences between the world we came from and the world in which Elvin lives. While we are quite comfortable with the overcrowded, overscheduled, overstressed lives which we lead, we also felt the joy in simplicity, in having time to talk to each other face-to-face without the tv blaring, phone ringing, and text notifications sounding on our smart phones. Now all we need is to perfect our Xhosa pronunciation and we can move into the hut next door.