dar por descontado

Trying to brush up on my grammar, came across this on the site

“One last stereotype to keep in mind…

Here’s some advice I received from an Argentinian lady, so it’s not just me being a jerk.

She says that if you ask most Spanish speakers where something is, it’s unlikely that you’ll hear “No sé” (“I don’t know”).

They want to be helpful, so they will usually try to give you some kind of an answer, even if they really have no idea.

She recommends that it’s good to get a second opinion, particularly if the directions you receive seem like they’ll be far away or expensive.”

Source

Gosh, it is true, that makes so much sense because everyone gave me directions AND there were a couple of times (ESP in BOLIVIA) where I’d walk towards this direction for 5 mins, ask another person only to have him/her saying it’s the complete opposite direction. There were times by which I circled to and fro because the different (and many!) people I asked gave me conflicting directions. Sigh. In Bolivia, after getting lost for an hour, helpless with directions, I took a taxi back (one by which I flagged by the streets – needless to say I was pretty panicky on the taxi because I was afraid it’s some non-radio-cab that was gonna drive me to some strange place) Pretty amusing on hindsight hahaha.

This brings me to realise things about Singapore I do take for granted, not realising how it could otherwise have been. I cherish being able to flag taxis at ease in Singapore, knowing that if I (ever) get lost here I can easily get home with money. Streetlights too – the dark streets of Chile and Argentina triggered much anxiety in the nights, even if it’s only 8pm. Here the streets are always (largely) lighted. I hear these in national day songs and stuff, but it sinks in a lot deeper after experiencing that element of fear when walking home at night along the dark streets.
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There are some moments by which I’m sitting somewhere on an ordinary day and I suddenly recall random scenes of my trip. This morning, the scene that flashed was the time I sat by Briana in Sao Paulo eating bread (pao de quieso). We sat in silence, a silence of mutual understanding, munching quietly, using Google Translate when we needed to speak. We sat by the window, the sunlight seeping in to fill the white table and the cool tiled floor.

Just like that. Just a flash of a scene.

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