Officially Vagabonded

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Well, this journey and experiment of mine is coming to an end. I can hardly believe I traveled around the world for half a year! 6 months, 7 countries (not including transition countries), and 60+ blogs later, I am trying to play catch with my experiences. Thanks to everyone for being voyeurs of my vagabonding exhibitionism! (Aren't we all voyeurs these days?) Thanks for all your encouragement and support.

How can I summarize and process all that I have experienced? It's been a wild ride. Everything I wanted to gain from this trip I have. And because I went in with few expectations I have gained more than I ever could have imagined. The beautiful, the ugly, sad and edifying, euphoric highs and dark nights of the soul, loves and lusts, mystery, intrigue, dreams, and possibilities. I have been extremely lucky on my journey. I haven't had any lost luggage, illnesses, cracked heads, muggings, car accidents, or snake bites.

I love getting to know a new culture! It is kind of like getting to know a new person, really. At first there is this awkward stage, you don't know how to interpret the signals, you don't know if they meant to brush up against you like that...then you find out all these little quirky things and you form this attraction. If you are getting along then you can explore more, maybe share some things, have lunch, maybe more? Seeing all the new faces, new foods, new sounds, new smells, new girls, new customs, new language, and at the same time seeing some of the same universals that ties everybody together.

I've put some of my favorite and memorable photos here, but it is hard to choose because there were so many great ones. Though even the best pics and words in the world can't capture the reality of travel. A blog can't capture the texture and smells and sounds and panoramic multi-sensory wonder of a simple thing like walking down a block in downtown Mexico City or Bangkok or up a Guatemalan volcano or through the crematorium of a death camp, the sweat of Mexico City subway at rush-hour, the burning of candles and incense in a Mayan cathedral with chicken shamans or buddhist temples, the melodious wake-up call of the adhan from the mosque, the haunting roar of the howler monkey at dawn in a dark forest, the strange horror of old mayan grandmas showing you her rooster raping her chickens, the pungent smell of roasted goatmeat or chestnuts or dried sardines and the profusion of market smells and colors and sounds like fresh handmade blue-corn tortillas with squash flowers (flores de calabaza) and white cheese frying on the griddle, the cacophony of horns and touts yelling "Bici, Bici-, sube la bici-taxi!" or "My friend, taxi!" or the Mayan women's sing-song "Pan?? Pan de coco?? Pan de zanahoria??" or the backing-up of trucks with the guys helping and yelling, "Dale! Dale!", the overly-salty Guatemalan cheese, the too sweet but addictive Turkish baklava, the burning mayan Pox sugarcane liquor and Turkish Raki, the bliss of a taquila mind in a Guatemala Che cafe listening to spanish guitar music with a beautiful french girl, the newness of the local languages and the music at a busy market, the wild church bells, taquila-induced cacaphony of mexican dia de la independencia fireworks and their vivacious VIVAS!, or the quiet epic beauty of the rift valley and its archetypal acacia trees, its profusion of wildlife lurking everywhere, the sound of hyenas and fighting baboons outside in the mysterious african night, the smiles and the stares of the locals; the tangy jugos de naranaja and delicioso fried plantains en Guatemala, the being reduced to wild hand gestures and facial expressions in the midst of language breakdowns, the crushing closeness of humanity in Kenyan matatus and Guatemalan chicken-buses, cold, damp primordial caves the sound of earth's beginning, the seaside octopus smashing and camel snorting, the cheesy-hilarious African pop videos and films on bumpy Kenya bus rides, the awe-full beauty of a pacific ocean sunrise from the top of a volcano, the choking on diesel fumes almost counting your brain cells dying as you walk down a busy boulevard in a megapolis....the sound of slow crackling and oppressive heat of flowing lava a few feet in front of you, the tall dark and handsome, spear-and-poison-arrow wielding but mild-mannered Maasai warriors escorting you in the dark speaking his language the whole time and me speaking english the whole time but it doesn't matter in the least, the pleasure of staying in a hotel/butchery, the wonderful alien feeling of floating 50 feet under the ocean watching purple sea fans billow and ugly-beautiful moral eels dart out in search of food, the pungent smell of radishes and onions as you hold on for your life on the back of a Mayan's truck on the side of a volcano, and finally the euphoria and wonderment you have when you are experiencing some new world for the first time through the eyes of a child...

No, photos won't do. For all of that you have to go for yourself!

Before I start rambling on (you mean I haven't started yet?) let me say that if you have a travel bone at all, just do it. You won't regret it. Vale la pena! It will change you. And if you have ever had something you have wanted to do, NEEDED to do, called you, pushed or pulled you, just wouldn't leave you alone, just do youself a favor and don't hesitate. The old cliche about travel being as much an inward journey as outward is true. I learned as much about myself as about the places I visited. You draw on resources you don't think about back in the "real world." While you meet lots of wonderful people, you also have lots of alone time, especially if you are traveling by yourself. With the former you are able express various parts of yourself and "in the restorative idleness of solitude"(Marquez) you explore and find new aspects of yourself. Everything becomes raw material for processing including the various twisted pockets of your own 'soul'. Every place impinges on me differently, with different edges and angles exposed and sometimes spaces and experiences push and pull on parts of you that remain hidden in one place but are pushed to the surface in others. Perhaps this is the subtle, undescribeable phenomenon that draws the traveler.

Some final random observations, declaratives, and commentary (or 17 glorious ejaculations in the key of B minor with a slight funk and rattle):

1)Traveling the world is much easier than you think

2)A couple warnings for would-be vagabonders: A)it doesn't quench your thirst for travel. In fact, you are hooked for life. You realize what an amazing world this is and you only want to see more and more. Is there such thing as a travel junky? Let's call it vagabondaphilia. B)You begin your trip looking nice and sweet and innocent and you end up looking like this! C)You will swear and you will smell and you will love it!

3)Contrary to what you hear, the single hardest thing about travel is not about finding safe food, or avoiding getting pick-pocketed or getting lost, or being late, but saying goodbye to all the people you meet. It is easy to say hola, but difficult to say adios. You share all these supercalifragilistic experiences with wonderful people, sometimes profound and life-changing, and you eat and sleep and hike and dream together and then you have to say goodbye. That ride out to the airport or the bus station is the hardest.

Geraldine (France), Miranda and Danielle (Oregon), Greysi Coconut (Guatemala), Evie (Brazil), Barry & Esther (Canada), Paco & Mateo (Guatemala), Marie (Kenya), Iris & Yorbelin & the Castillos (Mexico), Liliana (Chiapas), Juliane (Germany), Sabina 1 (Israel) and Sabina 2 (Austria), Marciel & Belen (Spain), Antonio & Moses (Spain), Liz, Dani, Ava & Xenia (California), Donya (Iran), Bee (Thailand), Dominic and Claire (Ireland), Hector & Susan (Texas)...and all the others I met in passing....thank you, thank you!!

4)Airports are glorified malls that just happen to have some planes coming and going.

5)I have gained and lost many things over the past 6 months. I remember how to speak english but I've shed old skins, pains and fears, prejudices and presuppositions...I've lost social, emotional, physical fears, the fear of what other people think and finally I've lost the fear of death. But I have found just as much as I have lost...I've found my patience, my anger, my sadness, my humor, my gut, my forgiveness, my love, I've gained vistas, insights, words, beauty, and eyes.

6)There are ways in which I understand the world better, but for the most part I understand the world less, but that is all right. It is a complicated world out there. I don't think you can ever really understand another culture. Can one even understand one's own culture? Imagine how to enter another fully?

7)It is possible to slide on by a country, just let it slip through the cracks of your fingers. I saw folks like this sometimes. Maybe seeing some mountains or bars or spotted monkey-elk but never really getting beyond the surface, never letting it under your skin. How some live life I suppose...I tried not to let that happen.

8)I wonder what it is like to be born somewhere else? Who would you be if you were born in highlands Peru? What would it have been like to be a shaman? a cock-fight promoter? a chicken-bus driver? a street sweeper? a coconut bread baker? a maquilladora worker? a chicle-gum vendor? a bullfighter? a prostitute? a bicycle-taxi man? a legless street beggar? a cocaine runner? a sumai wrestler? an octopus smasher? a banana farmer? a buddhist monk? a maasai warrior? a tortilla maker? a captain of a yacht? a goat herder?

9)Most of the whole world is superstitious

10)There are some people who will truly hurt you...

11)There are some people who will genuinely help you...

12)Every single thing is a unique experiment of nature

13)Because words are food and sex is eating and sunset raptures are the beauty of the bare shoulder of the freckled woman and the back of her legs are the silence of the misty forest grove and the cries of the baby are the frog's croak at dawn and the playful cheetah kitten is the laugh of the lover and her eyes are the stars of the heavens and all our smiles are the same buds as the spring cherry blossom and our contradictions are the lotus flowers and war is the coyote eating the deer and the lion eating the wildebeast and it is why branding and lies are the march to the crematorium and malaria is the explosion of the bombs killing the peasants and their spotted goats. It is all coming together and pulling apart without end, without a name, without explanation.

14)The world is a nasty, ugly mess, full of death, decay, chaos and illusions...

15)...but the world is also a beautiful and amazing piece of art full of energy and life and creativity

16)somehow not a contradiction?

17)Pole Pole Bara bara baya sana...Keep drinking the rat milk and dancing with the maraposas maravillosas and jumping off bridges!!!

on to new things....hasta pronto amigos!

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Photos

Before-Passport photo
Me at the start of my trip...all nice and sweet and innocent

Comments

[journeyagent]

Aye aye aye!
Ah yes, he's captured it well! I too have lost and found many things on my travels (coming up to ten months on the road) and I really, really understand where you are coming from. You're right. Travelling the world IS eaier than you think, it's understanding what it throws up that's the hard thing to get your head around. And yes the world can be a tragic, seeting mess of inequality and brutal truth, but mostly, the world is teeming with hidden beauty, stark contrasts and amazing characters. You just have to get out there and find them. So get out there you. Yes you! If you're reading this and wondering... asking yourself the same question for the umpteenth time... stop thinking about it. Let some of this guy's vagabondaphilia rub off on you and submit yourself to the treasures the world has to offer. Good work Vagabondvan. I salute you!

[Mimi]

Thank you!
During the past week or so, I've read through all of your journals from the beginning to the end. First I must compliment you on your command of the English language. Next, it's your writing style--professional--kept me glued to the screen. And finally, I found your range of emotions and sensitivity to your surroundings brilliant! Thank you for an amazing arm-chair-journey!

[Nicky]

I really like this post.