I wanted to share this article that I read on Conde Nast Traveler, written by Elizabeth Gilbert. To be honest, I long avoided the Eat, Pray, Love train, thinking it was meant only for middle-aged women going through divorce or a mid-life crisis. It wasn't until it was recommended to me by a person I respect very much, who said a lot of the things I talked about reminded her of the book, that I sat down and read it. I identified with so many of the stories in it, it was almost challenging to read. I began watching Elizabeth Gilbert interviews (I love interviews) and in conversation, and couldn't get enough of the way she articulates herself and her perspectives. She is now one of my favourite figures. Again, I identify with this story in so many ways, and am in agreement with so many of her perspectives stated.
Elizabeth Gilbert's Life-Changing Story from Indonesia (That You Haven't Heard) Here’s a story about a trip I took that changed my life, but not in the way I had planned. Back in 2002, I went away by myself for ten days to a tiny fishing island in the middle of Indonesia. It was the farthest-away place I could find on the map, and all I wanted right then was to be as far removed as possible from all that I knew. My life was a mess. My life, in fact, looked like a dropped pie; everything was on the floor in pieces. I was going through a bad divorce, and in the process I was losing a husband, losing a house, losing money, losing friends, losing sleep, losing myself. So I took myself to this little island 10,000 miles from home, where I rented a small bamboo hut that cost a few dollars a day. My plan was to spend ten days in silence and isolation. I hoped that making myself small and quiet would heal me. I guess what I really wanted was to disappear, and this island seemed the perfect place for it. There was no Internet, and I had no access to a phone. Transportation consisted of fishing boats, or wooden carts pulled by skinny ponies. Here, surely, I could hide from the world. Soon, I fell into a routine. Every day, I would walk twice around the perimeter of the entire island—once at dawn and again at dusk. While I walked, I would try to meditate, but usually I ended up arguing with myself, or ruminating over my life’s many failures as I fell apart into tears. As for the rest of the day, I believe I slept a lot. I was awfully depressed. I hadn’t brought any books with me to disappear into. I didn’t swim; I didn’t sunbathe; I barely ate. I just executed my two walks a day, and the rest of the time I hid in my hut and wished the sadness out of me. There were a few other tourists on the island, but they were all romantic couples and they mostly ignored me—I was a skinny, hollow-eyed, solo woman who talked to herself and gave off a freaky vibe. The local fishermen also looked right through me whenever I walked by. Maybe I actually was vanishing from the material world. I certainly felt that way. But there was one woman who saw me—and that changed everything. She was a local fisherman’s wife, and she lived in a tiny shack on the other side of the island. Like all the locals, she was Muslim. She dressed modestly, with a head scarf. She seemed to be in her mid-thirties, though she had spent a lifetime in the sun so her age was hard to determine. She had a chubby little toddler who was always crawling about and playing at her feet. The first morning I walked by her house, the woman looked up from her work in her scrubby subsistence garden and smiled at me. I smiled back, as best I could manage. After that, she always seemed to be standing outside her house when I passed—once at dawn and again at dusk. After a while, it seemed like she was waiting for me to come by. She was my only point of human contact in the world, and her mere recognition of my existence made me feel slightly less lonely. Once, I glanced back at her, and I saw that she was still looking after me, her hand shading her eyes. She was keeping an eye on me, is what it felt like. On my eighth night on the island, I got terribly sick. It could have been food poisoning, or contaminated drinking water—or maybe it was just that I had finally reached the bottom of my grief and everything bad was coming out of me at last. I was shaking and feverish, vomiting and scared. It was terrifying to be so isolated and so ill. Also, the generators weren’t working that night; there was no light. I remember crawling toward the bathroom in the darkness for the tenth time and wondering, Why did I come here, so far away from anyone who cares about me? I stayed in bed all the next day, shaking and sweating and dehydrated. I had a dreadful thought that I might die on this island all alone, and that my mother would never know what happened to me. That evening, after sundown, there was a knock on the door. On trembling legs, I walked and opened it. It was the woman from the other side of the island—the fisherman’s wife. She didn’t speak English, and I don’t speak Bahasa, but it was clear that she was checking on me and that she was worried. When she saw my condition, she looked even more worried. She put up a finger, like: Wait. Less than an hour later, she was back. She brought me a plate of rice, some chopped-up herbs, and a jug of fresh water. She came into the shack and sat on the side of my bed while I ate every bite of this healing food. I started crying. She put her arm around me, and I folded myself into her as if she were my own mother—even though we were almost the same age. She stayed with me for about an hour, until I was composed. She didn’t say a word; she just sat with me, arms around me, as if to say: I see you. You exist. I will stay with you. I will make sure you are safe. Only after she had departed did I have the clarity to piece together what must have happened. This stranger had come to find me because she’d noticed that I had missed both my morning and my evening walks, and she could clearly see: Something is not right with this one. And because this was her island—her territory—and because she knew I was alone, she took it upon herself to look after me. She, who had so little to share, made me her responsibility and took the risk of reaching out. The distance I had traveled may have been vast (10,000 miles from home), but the distance she traveled was vaster (all the way across the island, to knock on a stranger’s door) and the kindness of her actions opened my heart to awe and amazement. And that’s when I realized that my entire impulse had been dead wrong. I needed the exact opposite of isolation; I needed connection. This stranger had seen my need, and she had offered fellowship. In so doing, she not only healed me but taught me these lessons: Be not solitary, and be not proud. See others, and allow yourself to be seen. Help others, and allow yourself to be helped. Make contact, and be open to kindness. When I returned home to the States, I was not so proud. I sought out human contact. I found people to talk to about my troubles. I shared my vulnerability and my sadness, and made new friends and built a new community as a result. I reached out for love and assistance—and ultimately that’s what made me okay again. I have never told this story before, so why am I telling it now? I tell this story because it occurred almost one year to the day after September 11, 2001. I was a New Yorker whose city had just been attacked. A bunch of people had warned me against going to Indonesia because they said that I—an American woman, traveling alone—would not be safe there. But I went to Indonesia anyhow, right into the heart of a small Islamic community, and there I met one of the kindest human beings I’ve ever known. She enveloped me in safety when I was most afraid, and she helped me to heal. She also modeled for me an example of how we are meant to look after each other in the world—a model that I have tried to live up to ever since. I tell this story because I will never forget that woman’s face, and I dearly hope that she will never forget mine. Whenever I hear people getting panicked about the Islamic world, I think of her. It is my hope that I will always be her personal representation of the West—and that I showed her my humanity just as purely as she showed me hers. I tell this story because it seems like everyone is so afraid of each other right now. Increasingly, my country (safe, powerful, privileged) is becoming a place filled with absolutely terrified people. The Land of the Brave has become The Land of the Very Anxious. We are retreating inside our own individual panic rooms and locking the door behind us. More and more we don’t go anywhere. Nor do we welcome anyone unknown into our midst. We don’t want to know that stranger, and we don’t want her knowing us. To be sure, the world can be a scary place, and we all want to be safe, but here’s the thing--safety can never be found in isolation. Human warmth and openness will always be our only place of true safety. Be careful about hiding yourself away, because walls that are meant to be fortresses can quickly turn into prisons. Be careful about trying to become invisible or you may accidentally disappear. The very thing that you believe is protecting you may ultimately be endangering you—by making your life smaller, poorer, and more deeply saturated with fear. I am not afraid of the world, but I am afraid of people who are afraid of the world. (Terrified people, after all, have a reputation for making terrible decisions.) I want to live in a society filled with people who are curious and concerned about each other rather than afraid of each other. I want to live in a world full of brave people who are willing to risk not only adventure but emotional intimacy. I want to live in a world full of explorers and generous souls rather than people who have voluntarily become prisoners of their own fortresses. I want to live in a world full of people who look into each other’s faces along the path of life and ask, Who are you, my friend, and how can we serve each other? For that to happen, we must all be travelers—in the world, in our own communities, and even in our imaginations. We must risk that journey to the other side of the island, we must keep knocking on each other’s doors, and we must keep letting each other in.
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This piece by Matt Kepnes (NomadicMatt.com), found on the Observer, rings so true to me. I often feel criticized for my choices to travel, especially solo and long-term. I must be trying to escape something, right? And it's true. I am running away. I'm trying to escape the mold society has created, closed-minded people and a monotonous life that doesn't make me particularly happy. But I am also running towards. I am running towards like-minded individuals who are much easier to meet on the road than in everyday 9-5 life. I am running towards new experiences, cultures, connections, landscapes, languages and lessons. I am running towards freedom. I am running towards a life that personally feels more fulfilling. I am running towards a truer version of myself. I am running away, but not for the reasons you may think I am.
I've Traveled The World Many Times Over. Everyone Says I'm Running Away. So What? My dad always asks what I’m running away from with my travels. A few weeks ago, a commenter told me to stop running away and live life. And I once came across a travel blog called “Mom says I’m running away.” I’m not sure why, but there exists this perception that anyone who travels long term and isn’t interested in settling down or getting a conventional job must be running away from something. They are, in other words, just trying to “escape life.” The general opinion is that traveling is something everyone should do—that gap years after college and short vacations are acceptable. But for those of us who lead nomadic lifestyles, or who linger just a bit too long somewhere before reaching that final homestretch, we are accused of running away. Yes, travel—but just not for too long. We nomads must have awful, miserable lives, or are weird, or have had something traumatic happen to us that we are trying to escape. People assume that we are simply running away from our problems, running away from “the real world.” And to all those people who say that, I say to you: you’re right. Completely right. I am running away. I’m running away from your idea of the “real” world. I’m avoiding your life. And, instead, I’m running towards everything – towards the world, exotic places, new people, different cultures, and my own idea of freedom. While there may be exceptions (as there are with everything), most people who become vagabonds, nomads, and wanderers do so because they want to experience the world, not escape problems. We are running away from office life, commuting, and weekend errands, and running toward everything the world has to offer. We (I) want to experience every culture, see every mountain, eat weird food, attend crazy festivals, meet new people, and enjoy different holidays around the world. Life is short, and we only get to live it once. I want to look back and say I did crazy things, not say I spent my life reading blogs like this while wishing I was doing the same thing. As an American, my perspective might be different from the rest of yours. In my country, you go to school, you get a job, you get married, you buy a house, and have your 2.5 children. Society boxes you in and restricts your movements to their expectations. It’s like the matrix. And any deviation is considered abnormal and weird. People may want to travel, tell you they envy what you do, say they wish they could do the same thing. But really, they don’t. They are simply fascinated by a lifestyle so outside the norm. There’s nothing wrong with having a family or owning a house — most of my friends lead happy lives doing so. However, the general attitude in the States is “do it this way if you want to be normal.” And, well, I don’t want to be normal. I feel like the reason people tell us we are running away is because they can’t fathom the fact that we broke the mold and are living outside the norm. To want to break all of society’s conventions, there simply must be something wrong with us. Life is what you make it out to be. Life is yours to create. We are all chained down by the burdens we place upon ourselves, whether they are bills, errands, or, like me, self-imposed blogging deadlines. If you really want something, you have to go after it. People who travel the world aren’t running away from life. Just the opposite. Those that break the mold, explore the world, and live on their own terms are running toward true living, in my opinion. We have a degree of freedom a lot of people will never experience. We get to be the captains of our ships. But it is a freedom we chose to have. We looked around and said, “I want something different.” It was that freedom and attitude I saw in travelers years ago that inspired me to do what I am doing now. I saw them break the mold and I thought to myself, “Why not me too?” I’m not running away. I am running towards the world and my idea of life. And I never plan to look back. The following article, written by singer FUSE ODG, comes from The Guardian and shares perspectives on charity work and songs that I think are incredibly important to consider.
Why I Had to Turn Down Band Aid | FUSE ODG Saying no to Bob Geldof is one of the hardest decisions I have had to make this year. However, seeing what looked like the corpse of an African woman being carried out of her home on primetime TV when the video was premiered on X Factor crystallised my concerns about this strategy to combat the Ebola crisis. For me it is ultimately flawed. A week before the recording of Band Aid 30, I received a call from Geldof asking if I would take part. I was honoured to be asked and, connecting with his passion for wanting to tackle the Ebola crisis, said I wanted to offer my support. But I also had my concerns. I was sceptical because of the lyrics and the videos of the previous charity singles, and I worried that this would play into the constant negative portrayal of the continent of Africa in the west. Geldof and I spoke at length about this and he agreed with me on many levels, assuring me that we could use it as an opportunity to showcase the positives of Africa. However, on receiving the proposed lyrics on Thursday – two days before the recording was due to take place in London – I was shocked and appalled by their content. The message of the Band Aid 30 song absolutely did not reflect what Africa is truly about and I started to question whether this was something I wanted to be a part of. I pointed out to Geldof the lyrics I did not agree with, such as the lines “Where a kiss of love can kill you and there’s death in every tear”, and “There is no peace and joy in west Africa this Christmas”. For the past four years I have gone to Ghana at Christmas for the sole purpose of peace and joy. So for me to sing these lyrics would simply be a lie. In truth, my objection to the project goes beyond the offensive lyrics. I, like many others, am sick of the whole concept of Africa – a resource-rich continent with unbridled potential – always being seen as diseased, infested and poverty-stricken. In fact, seven out of 10 of the world’s fastest growing economies are in Africa. Let me be clear, I’m not disregarding the fact that Ebola is happening and that people need help. Since the start of the outbreak in March it has killed more than 5,000 people. But every human being deserves dignity in their suffering and the images flashed on our screens remove any remnants of this from Ebola sufferers, many in their dying moments, when they should have it the most. I am not disputing Band Aid’s good intentions. But the shock-factor strategy they have used since the 1980s has sparked a whole wave of “good cause” organisations that have been irresponsible with regard to the images shown to the rest of the world. It’s been totally one-sided. That’s understandable in part, as they wouldn’t raise much money if they showed the affluence, wealth, and happy lifestyles that exist in the continent. But in the process of doing all this “good work,” a huge imbalance has been created. That image of poverty and famine is extremely powerful psychologically. With decades of such imagery being pumped out, the average westerner is likely to donate £2 a month or buy a charity single that gives them a nice warm fuzzy feeling; but they are much less likely to want to go on holiday to, or invest in, Africa. If you are reading this and haven’t been to Africa, ask yourself why. This is New Africa (Tina) is a movement empowering people to shed a positive light on Africa. I was born in Tooting, south London, and was taken as an infant to Ghana. Returning to London at the age of 11, being African was not something to be proud of because of all the negative connotations it conjured up, and it drove me to be almost ashamed of who I was. Anyone who has experienced Africa in a positive way is a citizen of the New Africa and needs to play their part in challenging perceptions. I’m sharing my experience through my music – and if I can make chart-topping music that celebrates Africa then surely Band Aid and its extensive network can do the same. I’ve performed in two of the three countries currently hit by the Ebola crisis, where I have friends and loyal fans, and will be donating the proceeds from my next single to help tackle this issue. I hope from the bottom of my heart that the disease can be eradicated in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea. But though shock tactics and negative images may raise money in the short term, the long-term damage will take far longer to heal. The Truth About Travelers
Written by Stephanie Dandan of infinitesatori.org We have been called many things. Travelers, by default. But we like to be called nomads. Explorers. Vagabonds. Adventurers. Wayfarers. Modern gypsies. Wanderers. We’ve adopted them all. A growing breed of humans with restless feet and the inability to stay still, the inability to stay in one place. That is who we are. And that’s just the gist of it. We come from all walks of life, from bustling gray colored cities, sleepy beach towns, snow-covered metropolises, small villages nestled in between lush green mountains, we come from everywhere. But our inner gravity always brings us to the same place… the road. We deem courage weighs more than money when it comes to travel. We’re not rich, not financially well-off and we don’t travel for luxury. Our money does not come from rich parents, trust funds, or whatever privileges you think we have in order to maintain a life of travel. We work hard, or work while we travel and save whatever means we make. We travel at the cost of sacrifices. We’re happy living with just barely enough as long as we’re on the road. This means that we have given up plenty of comforts for the sake of travel. We would rather choose a dorm bed in a cheap hostel, a couch, a hammock, a tent, or concrete floor. We’ve slept in night boats, century old huts, train stations, in bamboo huts with indigenous tribes, in a house built on stilts in shantytowns and god knows where else. We have learned to live in depth without comforts. The uncomfortable becomes comfortable to us. Most of us don’t own homes, or if some of us do, they’re probably renting it out to use that money to travel & explore. We don’t spend our money lavishly on things we don’t need. We don’t buy many things, we don’t let things own us. We’ve learned that the less things we have, the better we live. We feel the most alive when we’re out there. Living nomadically with nothing but our possessions in a backpack and moving as our only constant. Anything is possible when we are given a brand new day in a place we have never been as we surrender ourselves to the currents of the universe. We are mesmerized by every culture. We act like sponges when we go to a new country we’ve never been to, we immerse ourselves into every experience and soak our souls with its depth. We believe that smiles are universal and no matter what language fills our ears, we can see people’s stories through a smile. We’ve learned to not let small annoyances, adversities, and misadventures get the best of us and we don’t let it ruin our days. We believe that in any given moment, we have the choice to suffer from whatever problems come our way, or just simply accept it. We’ve grown to choose the latter. We’re not afraid of troubles coming our way even if we are traveling alone most of the time. We’ve learned to face our fears and unlearn them so we grace through our days with courage. No matter whatever fears people project on us, we smile and look right past it. We have learned that if we constantly keep a sunny disposition and keep our light bright then we won’t see the shadows. We follow wherever the next sunrise and sunset takes us. We are guided by moon cycles and stardusts. We look up at the night sky, gaze up at the cosmos, and know that wherever we are and whoever we’re without, we are never really alone. And we are comforted by this very notion. We have dedicated our hearts to the road. Even when we’re not on it we’re working to save up for our next trip, every time we hear an airplane, we look up, smile and imagine ourselves on it. We know that the day is coming soon, and we are fueled by that thought. We go to bookstores to browse through the travel section, pick out travel guides and sit there skimming through the pages and daydreaming about our future travels. Our minds constantly drift away to the next destination on our list. Our wanderlust is insatiable and even when we feel it’s slaked, it doesn’t take long at all until we’re hungry again. And we’re hungry all the time. We travel not just to go, we travel to evolve. Embracing new experiences, endlessly changing horizons, and each brand new day as a way of living. We live for airports, planes, buses, boats, trains, road trips. We find clarity in the blur of the places zooming past us as we look through the window. This is our home. This will always be our home. These are the stories we will tell people, the ones we love, the ones we just met, the ones who come and ago, the perfect strangers. We will keep showing the others that we were born wanderers, that wanderlust resides within every single one of us. And that no matter who we are, where we are, what we do, and what we have, we can always choose to follow it. We’re not saying that you should give up everything in your life this second, buy a ticket, and pack your backpack. Although you can if really want to, if everything inside of you is telling you to do so you should listen. But we’re saying that when you choose to strip away years of unnecessary baggage, you’ll find freedom. We’re not saying that you should take the risk and leap, then everything will always be peachy and perfect. It’s never like that. But what we’re saying is, you should allow yourself to be free. You should allow yourself to stand on the fringes of life, and dive into its alluring ambiguity. Even if it means facing your fears. Even if it means making sacrifices. Even if it means letting go of things you’ve held onto for so long. Even if it means having to let go of people you love. Even if it all terrifies you. We’re saying open yourself up to the world. Embrace all of its worth. Let its teachings seep into all that you are. When you do that, all your layers will peel off and you will discover your true self. And so here’s the truth. We travel not just to travel and marvel at people, places, things. That’s not just it. That was never just it for us. We travel to learn, to experience, and to feel all the spectrums of being human in this world. One day, when we are old with silver hair, freckles, creases, and laugh wrinkles from many years of wandering drenched under sunlight. Our children’s children will lay out with us under the stars by a campfire on a moonlit beach elsewhere. We will tell them stories of wild adventures, of lived dreams, of enchanting places, of conquered fears, of lessons that turned into gold, lessons that we’ve learned from the road, and a full life lived. Our journeys will inspire their own. Our journey is our truth. It’s the truth that illuminates us, as we continue on where we thrive and wander, on the road we call our home. This article from Relevant Magazine is dead on. There is so much more to Africa and the countries it encompasses than disease, war and extreme poverty. Understand that what is portrayed in the media isn't a full representation of the continent, and that you should come to your own conclusions through your own experiences. While I have only spent time in Tanzania, and a brief amount in Kenya, I know that people don't see a lot of what really matters from abroad. I have never been surrounded by such friendly, inspiring, loving and joyful people than when I was in Tanzania and Kenya. While there are struggles, there is also a lot of hope. From these experiences, I look forward to the day that I travel more extensively in Africa and further define the continent on my own terms. I hope you will, too.
There's More to Africa Than Just Problems to Solve Written by Kola Olaosebikan As a young child growing up in West Africa, one of my favorite pastimes was explaining to my parents the latest thing I had learned about Americans from watching TV. One of my favorite things to watch was New York Fashion week. I would catwalk around the living room, sashaying and swaying my boney 7-year-old hips from side to side. I would tell my parents all about the funny way Americans talked. American accents were cute but difficult to understand, I’d explain. As a 7-year-old in Nigeria, I didn’t know any Americans. I didn’t even have any white friends. It hadn’t yet occurred to me that Americans could be anything other than what I saw on television. Imagine my wonderment when I finally had the opportunity to visit the United States. Many of the people I saw looked nothing like the models in New York Fashion week. They looked different, walked differently, talked differently. It was all so fascinating. I realized I had a completely skewed and one-dimensional perception of America and the people who lived there. And as I began watching American TV and listening to conversations about my home country, I realized many Americans also had a skewed view of Africa. Between charity ads featuring children with swollen bellies, news reports about things like Ebola, warlords and famines, I observed that most conversations about my continent were in the context of one of three things: disease, war or extreme poverty. At first, I was quite indifferent about this. Over time, however, several questions began to form in my mind. How had I managed to grow up in Africa without knowing that every picture of me and my friends required us to sit in the sand, looking dusty with crusty saliva on our faces? How did I not know that my family was desperately sad and needed immediate help from people on the other side of the world? Maybe I had grown up without witnessing the full harshness of Africa simply because I wasn’t paying attention. Maybe if I paid attention, I would see these things a little clearer. So I started paying attention. When I traveled back home to Nigeria, I visited an orphanage. I saw plenty of need there, but it wasn’t like what I had heard people describe in America. My experience was similar in Ghana. I also had the opportunity to travel to other developing countries, so I kept my eyes open there too. When I traveled to India, I saw and learned of many needs. However, like in Nigeria, the appearance of the suffering was different from the perspective that many Americans seemed to have. The Western perception seemed to be filled with urgent need, suffering and hardship—people waiting for someone to come “save” them. In real life, I saw these things balanced with equal doses of optimism, hope and laughter. In the Western perception, people in developing nations were desperately waiting for rescue. In real life, they were smart and resourceful, going about their business and making the best of their circumstances. The Western perception seemed to be that those in need were sad and melancholy. Those I met in real life, however, had adapted to the environment and found ways to be joyful even when there were no obvious reasons to be happy. Without realizing it, many of us rely on television and other third-hand media sources to learn about people who are not like us. Just like the 7-year-old me watching New York Fashion week, we soak it all in and form perceptions based on very tiny fragments of a much bigger picture. Obviously, not everyone in America looks like fashion models. And in the same way, even though it is true that there is great need in Africa, there is also an abundance of joy, hope, prosperity and innovation there as well. The point here is not to say that there is one universal perception of Africa that every person must hold. Rather, it is to illustrate that there is a lot more to Africa than the typical stereotypes may suggest. A better way forward is to ask more questions about what we think we know, seek opportunities to learn firsthand and dialogue with people who come from different backgrounds, and to share the things we have learned with others. |
If you know me, you likely know that I love a good TED talk, keynote or thought-provoking article. I've included this page to share some of my favourites, or just those that I think provide interesting perspectives worth considering. I don't necessarily agree with everything being said in all of them, but I think it's important to challenge your thinking and be exposed to different perspectives.
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