Category: Travel Writing
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Passing Through
Before each journey, we’re apt to envision ourselves as characters in foreign scenes, playing out fantasies about how our time abroad may pass. And prior to arriving in Ethiopia, my imagination had me crammed into local buses, scruffy and tired, as long, lush sections of open grasslands reflected back against my sunglasses. Nigerian afrobeats would…
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Pakistan: The Karakoram Highway & Hunza
I’ve dreamed of this land for over half my life. The Karakoram Highway found root in my mind through a collection of mountaineering memoirs I’d read in my early 20s and flourished like bindweed in a forgotten garden. Climbers en route to K2 and Nanga Parbat pulled aside the curtain with their descriptions, promising an…
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Heading Home
I’m headed home. After 3 months of weaving my way across Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Ethiopia, and Pakistan, I’m returning to the U.S., carrying glimpses of a new reality I’d previously failed to comprehend. I’m thrilled to see my family, my partner, and my friends. But I’m tangled up in the knots of purpose and place,…
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A Glimpse of Tunisia
In November 2010, I found myself hunched over a table in Amman, Jordan, sitting across from three university professors. The location was a Pizza Hut—the last place I thought we’d be—and I did my best to feign a smile. They thought I’d be homesick after five months of traveling and that a nice taste of…
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Algeria/Tunisia Border Crossing
I waved at Maleyka and her cousins once more before throwing my bag in the taxi. “Sahha, Merci,” I said, knowing this was the last time I’d see familiar faces for a while. Goodbyes are countless when one travels this way for months on end. As travelers, we forge meaningful connections during our time with…
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Desert Discoveries
I wasn’t supposed to be out here in the desert. The plan was to take a simple 1-hour flight from Algiers to Tunis, with the worst of the bumps coming from some light mid-air turbulence. To grant my visa, Algeria required both arrival and departure flights to be booked in advance, but I hated this…
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Algerian News Report on my Travels
Here’s a 10 minute report by El Bilad TV on my journey to Algeria to train jiu jitsu. A journalist thought my writing project carried merit and spent a day with us shooting the above. It’s in Arabic, but the gist is that any chance for human connection is a beautiful thing, and we should…
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Algerian Air
We buzzed through streets, splitting lanes and taking shortcuts. It was 7:00 p.m. and the Algerian air was still hot. Exhaust fumes billowed black smoke into our faces as we tore past buses and old Renault beaters. I held the camera in one hand and clutched the back of the motorbike with the other. I…
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A Heavy Ride
*Note: The main character in this story speaks limited English, and I speak nearly no Arabic. As such, I’ve adjusted the dialogue to refrain from using fragmented language or tawdry colloquialisms. I’m unsure of what to do with this experience, so I thought I’d write about it. Presently, I’m sitting in an aging bus terminal…
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Moment on a Train
I’ve been here before; I know this place. Not the physical patch of earth, per se. Morocco is fresh: my first glance, a new flavor. The multiple flights getting here, sprinting to catch a departing train, the strain of pack straps as they dig into the front of my shoulders; this place—I know it well.…