I left my bike at work last night because I was going out with friends, and I went to pick it up in the heat of the day today. I intended to go for a long ride along the water, but after I rode the train to the library to pick up a book that was not yet available and then walked to work and then rode my bike home along the waterfront that was packed with annoying hordes of people, I was already dehydrated. So I gave up.
When I switched my wallet and phone to a different purse this afternoon, in order to go out for the evening, I found, in the pocket, a folded blue card. I opened it up to see my photo, a few pounds heavier from the stress eating of law school, staring out at me. It was my SPLM/SPLA* travel permit from Southern Sudan.
This was the purse I used in my final semester of law school, and through Nairobi and Southern Sudan. I finally learned my lesson and brought a cute purse with me instead of the annoying supposedly-hard-to-steal travel bags so many tourists carry. So I was that person with a cute purse next to the dugout canoes on the Nile. It held my camera and money just as well, oh you skeptics who believe travel gadgets and gizmos are necessary, as that silly money pouch that everyone knows you are wearing under your shirt. (P.S. We also laugh at you when you wear your backpack backwards. Why don't you just wear a t-shirt that says, "I AM A TOURIST, AND THERE IS SOMETHING VALUABLE IN THIS BAG"? I once saw people doing this in the airport in Nairobi. I cannot come up with a reason to wear your backpack on the front of your body in the Nairobi airport. I just can't.)
I was just having a discussion again today with a friend about how US Americans dress overseas in ripped khakis, stained t-shirts, and flipflops because they think POOR PEOPLE WON'T NOTICE BECAUSE THEY ARE POOR and I got annoyed all over again at the thoughtlessness and disrespect my countrypeople so often show the rest of the world.
I am currently contemplating how I need to buy some cute sandals for my next trip out of the country. I don't need them here - my crappy Tevas will do, because no one cares what I wear here. But for travel, I have two new dresses already, and I'm hunting for shoes. (Okay, fine, there is a wedding involved in this trip. And no, not my wedding.)
My next trip is a little less than two months away, fortunately.
Fortunately because my passport is empty right now, and that bothers me. It itches and irks. I need to get started filling it. (Funny. The first stamp in this passport, as in the last, will be from Latin America, even though most of my travel in life is to Africa.)
Fortunately also because I feel stuck. Something needs to give, and perhaps a trip will help it along.
* Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Sudan People's Liberation Army, the people generally in charge in Southern Sudan.
When I switched my wallet and phone to a different purse this afternoon, in order to go out for the evening, I found, in the pocket, a folded blue card. I opened it up to see my photo, a few pounds heavier from the stress eating of law school, staring out at me. It was my SPLM/SPLA* travel permit from Southern Sudan.
This was the purse I used in my final semester of law school, and through Nairobi and Southern Sudan. I finally learned my lesson and brought a cute purse with me instead of the annoying supposedly-hard-to-steal travel bags so many tourists carry. So I was that person with a cute purse next to the dugout canoes on the Nile. It held my camera and money just as well, oh you skeptics who believe travel gadgets and gizmos are necessary, as that silly money pouch that everyone knows you are wearing under your shirt. (P.S. We also laugh at you when you wear your backpack backwards. Why don't you just wear a t-shirt that says, "I AM A TOURIST, AND THERE IS SOMETHING VALUABLE IN THIS BAG"? I once saw people doing this in the airport in Nairobi. I cannot come up with a reason to wear your backpack on the front of your body in the Nairobi airport. I just can't.)
I was just having a discussion again today with a friend about how US Americans dress overseas in ripped khakis, stained t-shirts, and flipflops because they think POOR PEOPLE WON'T NOTICE BECAUSE THEY ARE POOR and I got annoyed all over again at the thoughtlessness and disrespect my countrypeople so often show the rest of the world.
I am currently contemplating how I need to buy some cute sandals for my next trip out of the country. I don't need them here - my crappy Tevas will do, because no one cares what I wear here. But for travel, I have two new dresses already, and I'm hunting for shoes. (Okay, fine, there is a wedding involved in this trip. And no, not my wedding.)
My next trip is a little less than two months away, fortunately.
Fortunately because my passport is empty right now, and that bothers me. It itches and irks. I need to get started filling it. (Funny. The first stamp in this passport, as in the last, will be from Latin America, even though most of my travel in life is to Africa.)
Fortunately also because I feel stuck. Something needs to give, and perhaps a trip will help it along.
* Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Sudan People's Liberation Army, the people generally in charge in Southern Sudan.
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