Here I am in Morocco, though I could be anywhere in the world. I don’t mean it to sound arrogant, but the more I travel the less exciting it is because it all feels more and more familiar. I say “less exciting” but don’t mean it in an unappreciative way—I truly adore it and wish I could travel the world as my job. I mean it in a “homogenous”, “predictable” way. In fact I mean it in the best of ways—we really are all similar and in our similarity we are one.
As we drive down these roads with pink walls, palm trees, trash, wagons, donkeys, and sitting men (always sitting men! Do they ever work?) I struggle to identify my location. Much like my extremely delayed remembrance of the season or month in San Francisco – it is always between 50-60 and with flowering plants—there is a sameness between this country and several other places I have been fortunate to visit. At times I think “this reminds me of India” but I also see essences of Vietnam, Zanzibar, and even Arizona! It’s not just the landscapes that elicit the memories— it' it’s the smells, the colors, the animals, the sounds. The abundance of pink architecture and crenellated parapets remind me of Jaipur, India. The sand dunes remind me of Vietnam. The call to prayer takes me back to Zanzibar. And the rose colored canyons and plateaus transport me to Arizona. It oddly doesn’t feel like Africa (though I know Zanzibar is also Africa). But then again, I try to put Africa in perspective by dredging up the visual of both USA and South America maps overlaid on the map of the African continent—it’s huge and swallows them both! It’s like saying “New York does not feel like San Francisco.” Well, yeah. It’s far away and they are different! But as one wise, cat-caller out a car window at a rest stop en route to the Sahara said in response to hearing that we hail from California, “it is far away but we all have the same rain.”
We are the same—the same!! All under the same sky and cry to the same heaven!
As we crossed the desert on the backs of camels under a starry sky, with no lights save the waxing moon, our “camel man” (their professional title) received a phone call on his cell phone. Our Arabian nights enactment screeched to a halt. Oh right. Modernity has made it’s way here, too. “Yes yes, honey, I’ll pick up a gallon of camels’ milk… No I didn’t fill the petrol… I won’t be home for dinner. These Americans were late… Love you, too,” we imagined him saying. Some things really are the same everywhere.
It is with gratitude for luxury and an appreciation for mankind that I say that. Luxury because I recognize that it is an incredible blessing that I’ve been able to witness several cultures. But I also find it surprising that there are so many similiarities. I mean, how do the Berber people living in the rural mountain towns think to hang their meats in an open-air shop window the same way that they do in Vietnam? They have un-likely visited there (most locals I meet on my travels have not even been able to explore out of their own town, let alone their country). Are we all just choosing the same logical paths? We all come to the same logical decisions? The cross-country/cross-cultural similarities I’ve noticed are boundless, but to name a few:
- We all love to laugh
- A smile goes a long way when language translation doesn’t
- Even learning a few words and phrases is appreciated
- Praise is always welcome
- Taking shoes off when inside is often expected but if not, is grately appreciated as a sign of respect
- Children like to run and play and make up their own games to entertain themselves
- We all sing songs about love, heart-break, marriage, and the future
- We all mourn death
- Friends hold, nurture, and joke with friends
- Siblings tease, play, and protect siblings
- Motos are cheaper and easier than cars
- Bicycles are cheaper still
I want to continue traveling, of course. The world is huge and there is so much to see! I want to go to Turkey, Iceland, Columbia, Peru, New Zealand, Bhutan, Argentina, Chile, the Baltics, Greece, Croatia, Fiji, Austria, and countless others. “But why?” you may ask. “If you think they are all the same then why bother?” Well, my friend. Why listen to music? So often the chords are the same or the transitions are the same, or the beats are the same. But there are infinite combinations that are unique. But all live and operate under the same rules. It’s like the piece I wrote about, “Beautiful Coherency”; there is one macro order and everything within it is a fractal living by the same rules but manifesting itself in a unique way.
So, en shallah, I will keep traveling, keep exploring, keep seeing, smelling, tasting, hearing and feeling. All while our universal rhythm gets more and more pronounced—the cacophony of disparate voices merging into one chorus, one song, and eventually one voice: Ours.