Its been quite a few years ago now...
I made a comment to a south american friend about “how does it feel to live in a free country”...
He laughed and almost spat. “You have no idea what a free country is”.
From 6 on, I played further and further away from home. I lived in Los Angeles, not in the country either. By the time I was 10, I would take myself to the beach 15 miles away using the san gabriel river channel. But in the late 70’s, early 80’s they didn’t have predators or anything.