Around the world in 104 days!: May 2011

“I feel like this is the real world and we are going back to sleep” –Jason on re-entry

“if you wake up to the voice telling you the date and time, shake yourself, you are having a nightmare.” –Captain Jeremy Kingston

I have to figure out, “What is this thing that is America?” to travel is to return to the place you came from and see it anew.

“Every time you return to the ship after the first time it is like coming home.” - Rosalyn

Dean Dan told us to pick a word that represents this ship to us. The word that whenever I hear it I will think of the ship: UNION!

“The world is a book and those who don’t travel only ready the first page” – commencement speaker

I’m surprised how easy it is to slide back into my routine.
I miss everyone but I don’t feel lonely, I feel connected

Back on land for a few weeks now, I thought I was having a fairly easy re-entry, but it seems to be getting harder with time. I’ve had trouble making sense of it all. Turns out time to think is not all you need in order to process. I was thinking about the people in Ghana and India but especially Ghana – and what it is about them that is so different yet so familiar. What I think it is: they are totally unplugged. These families don’t gather around a TV set after dinner. They don’t communicate with people in the next room via texting or even write papers for school on the computer. They are fully present with each other and the world around them every moment of the day. They are not an escapist culture – they don’t retreat behind headphones or zone out to movies for hours on end while mindlessly shoving food into their mouths without giving a second though to where their next handful might come from. And beyond that – or maybe because of it – they are a grateful people. They dance not because they are carefree or bored, but because they have life inside them and they want to show it. They are spiritual, if not religious, and they are connected. Ghana may be a difficult place to live – it may be disadvantaged economically or whatever, but they have one or two things that we don’t, and I envy them with all of my heart because of it. They taught me that you can’t have it all. Not only because it disrupts the balance that nature put in place but also because whenever you have more than you need, you sacrifice contentment for gratification and you face inevitable anxiety. Only those with something to lose fear loss. If you are privileged, you miss out on an experience that your body was made for – fighting for itself. You can never have the experience of starting off with nothing and building your own fortune. It is easier to measure how far you’ve gone in life if you start at the starting line. How much of a blessing really is a “head start” if it is true that you must sacrifice something else for it? Then maybe that explains the extreme unhappiness and discontentment in this country. Ironically, we think more is the answer – more money, more time, more distraction, more pills. I think the answer is “less.” Uncomplicate your life and see how you feel. Start with noticing how much you have in comparison to how much you need. I learned in one of my psych classes that they have finally proven that money doesn’t buy happiness. Beyond a certain level of income (this is where minimum wage comes from by the way) money is not even an indication of happiness. If you have enough to live off of, you are no worse off emotionally than a billionaire. In fact, it seems to me that the less you have the happier you are to have it. One cookie in the hand is worth two on someone else’s table? Here are some other ideas: There is something to be said for an honest day’s physical labor if it’s your own house you are building, or your own bed. There is a theory that food tastes better if you cook it yourself – I believe a house feels more like a home if you build it yourself. Ghanaian’s lives might be shorter than ours, but they are slower. It balances out…

When I am asked the annoying question, “what was your favorite country?” I respond by saying, “I had the most fun in South Africa, if I could return to one it would be Vietnam, but I liked Ghana the best.” It is the country that was most enlightening and most different from what I was expecting. It was the most different place we went – it might also have been the scariest. Dean Dan told us during his last speech that we have an obligation now to interrupt people when they are talking. We should interject with things like “when I was in Ghana that was not my experience…” The Dark Continent? I don’t think so.

I made a wonderful discovery: The world is a small place.
A long life is not about increasing the number of days, but slowing each one down.