I am shy to call myself a writer, but there are few things I love more than writing. With over two dozen full journals dating back to 1995, writing has been one of my most constant companions. Along with writing, traveling has been a loyal friend. In 1997, I traveled abroad for my first time, landing in Thailand and Japan at the age of eleven. I helped my mom teach english in a northern village of Thailand, and I learned how much can be communicated in the absence of words--especially among kids. Still, I have found that the best way to crystalize the nonverbal chemistry that traveling is full of is through the written word, through reflection, through creation. While, I do not have written records of that first adventure (I'm not even sure blogs had been created yet then), when it was time for my big "college study abroad trip" to India, China, and South Africa, my love for writing and love for traveling finally united. Thus, the birth of this blog.
While this blog is filled with the occasional pontification on daily non-traveling life, it more often provides notes from a life on the move. It leans into the beauty of the unfamiliar and strange. It tracks the countries seen, the pedals pushed, and the people met along the way.
My other life, the one that is maybe only sometimes captured in these pages, is one of being an educator, youth worker, social justice advocate, graduate student, sister, daughter, aunt, friend, life-lover, nature-needer, community-creator, bicyclist, kitchen dancer, culinary creative, and all around do-er. Writing keeps me in touch with me. Writing makes me hear the music and see the stars. Writing is my therapy, my art, and my annoying friend. My hope is that the recording of this journey I am on may also touch the pulse of another, helping us all to feel a bit more seen, a tad more known, and a smidge more connected.
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