bliss

About two weeks ago now, Sharm and I went to hear the author of the Geography of Bliss read at a quaint local bookstore. Turns out, he’s from the Baltimore area, and after years of traveling the world as an international correspondent for NPR, he set out on a different kind of quest – to find the world’s happiest places.

He read mesmerizing passages about Bhutan and Iceland and explained how, according to the “Happiness Institute” in Amsterdam (who knew there was such a thing?), that the bliss he pursued actually had little to do with location, nationality, money, education, gender, race, climate, temperament, or astrological sign. It seemed that a key determinate of happiness could be summed up in the words of a Bhutanese wise man he interviewed, aptly named Karma, who insisted that happiness is 100% about relationships.

Like many “nuggets” during the reading, that notion brought new expression to something I've always felt was true. But it wasn’t until an unexpected reunion a few days later that I understood the "geography" part firsthand.

During my time in Indonesia, Amin and Manan were not just great teammates, they were incredible friends. Amin even joined our house full of girls for a few months (and spoiled us with his Indian cooking). Within days after I learned about the "geography of bliss," both boys were in the States, taking part in a conference for past and present tsunami psychosocial delegates in D.C. It was tremendous experience for them, and an absolute treat for their Americana friends.

Somewhere amid the perpetual laughter of our weekend reunion, as six former teammates be-bopped around Baltimore and camped out at my apartment, the truth of Karma’s words profoundly sunk in. In Indonesia, and everywhere, the blissfulness of life comes from bonds formed with those around us, wherever in the world we are. And even though more than a year had passed since we were all last together, the original joy (so geographically linked to Indonesia) easily found its way across oceans, simply because of the people.

And if that wasn’t enough to drive home the epiphany, the icing on the cake came last week as I prepared to leave for Tanzania. I received an urgent message from our travel agent, who was supposed to be getting my visa, saying instead that I had to get a new passport. Apparently, if it’s within six months of expiring, you have to get a new one before you can leave. So reluctantly, and hurriedly, I agreed.

Within days a shiny new passport appeared on my desk, alongside my old, overly stamped and slightly-faded friend of ten hard-to-imagine years. It was a compact journal of my journeys, with my fresh-faced 23-year-old picture always reminding me (while making others laugh) of who I was when I began this pilgrimage that’s now lasted a decade… I was clueless incarnate, with a red t-shirt, beaded hemp necklace and an expectant heart that never, ever could have imagined what was ahead.

But as leafed through those familiar pages as if it were a precious family photo album, I realized that the nostalgia I felt reminiscing over stamp and stamp was not about those *places* at all, but about the people I met there... Lucas, my star student in China. Lisa and I hitchhiking through the Israeli desert. Boubacar, the malnourished Guinean boy who was struggling to recover in a dilapidated hospital. The infamous bus ride with Jennifer through northern India. Elzat’s sisters in Kyrgyzstan. Alanou, the Ugandan mother, who is courageously raising (with a smile even) nine children in a refugee camp. Face after face flooded to mind, signposts on my map of memories, each one pointing me a little closer to where I’m blessed to be today…

And here I am in Tanzania, drinking an early morning coffee, while fishing boats traverse the harbor a few hundred meters away, trying to wait patiently for breakfast (it’s a virtue one must indeed have in Africa). I will leave here tonight after a relatively short trip, taking home conversations as souvenirs, memories of chatting with the lovely and fabulous "princess of Africa" Yvonne Chaka Chaka (with a name like that how could you not be a true diva), and of Reuben the farmer’s tiny Artemisinin crop (I am not sure how much he realizes the lives the medicine made from his plants will save – he just cares that his family is surviving), and of bumping along the dusty roads of Arusha National Park with my new friend, William the French photographer and our lovely driver John, on a pristine Sunday morning, looking at giraffes, zebras and monkeys...

And I could go on, because of course, there’s more, much more… but my breakfast is here and today's journey awaits. May the steps of your day (the geography of your life) find you in blissful company. And thank you, for helping me find my way here...

Driving into Arusha National Park

Reuben's life-saving harvest

cutie pie kids near Reuben's village

the blissful Baltimore gathering -
Sharmila, Manan, Elizabeth, Amin and Bon

detours

A three-quarter moon glowed orange and hovered low over the horizon as the plane touched down in Casablanca. Hours earlier I had at last ended an unexpected five-day stay in Paris, another of the world’s beautiful, intriguing cities. But circumstances as they were, I far from relished my time in either.

I left the States last Wednesday, headed to Bamako, Mali, for an international meeting of advocates, even departing early to help get ready for the big event which my project was sponsoring. The plane landed as scheduled Thursday morning and I meandered around the Paris airport for several hours, waiting for my connection flight on to Mali, in West Africa.

Only when it was at last time to board did the most dreaded word in air travel begin flashing on the screen above my gate = CANCELLED. I couldn’t believe it, nor could the thousands of other people who soon found themselves in the same situation. The flight crews of the airline, Air France, had just gone on strike, leaving passengers from around the world caught in the middle of their discontent ….

And so began my five day saga of coping with (or attempting to) my worst travel debacle to date. Thank God for debit cards and Blackberrys is all I can say. Without those modern conveniences and kind people at my office back home, I would be among the thousands of stranded travelers still lining the terminals, with luggage carts piled high beside them and no flights home anytime soon.

Sparing you the details, and to stifle any online ranting on my part, I’ll boil my dreadfully detailed experience down to the following oversimplified list, minus figures of money and angst (which were both freely spent).

Number of days spent in Paris = 5.5

Number of different re-booked itineraries in three days = 4

Number of hours spent waiting in line for Air France = 12

Number of hours spent waiting in line elsewhere = at least 10

Number of hours spent in transit dealing with the above = 5

Number of hours spent on Blackberry also dealing with above = 7+

Number of different hotels in four nights = 3

Number of hours spent enjoying Paris, excluding eating = about 7

Number of it would have taken hours to fly directly from Paris to Mali = about 7

***************

And now, here I am in Mali. After starting this entry days ago, we’ve since wrapped up our conference and I’m spending the weekend catching up on piled-up work, planning site visits for the next few days, and having a bit of fun, of course. But to add insult to injury, after surviving the Air France travel nightmare, I was here less than a day before finding out that local officials decided this week was the perfect time to close the airport to repave the runways. So again, I found myself surrounded by stranded travelers, but at least this time they were my colleagues, and I got my wish to spend a little extra time here.

Mali is the real home of Blues, a shocking statement coming from a Mississippi Delta girl, I know, but the last few nights I’ve heard the musical research validated for myself. What these bands may have lacked in wailing harmonicas, they made up for in added percussion – from drums of every shape and size to xylophone-type instruments made of wood and string. The lyrics in French and Bambara (the language of Mali) may have been incomprehensible, but the fusion of strings and beats was as familiar as Muddy Waters, B.B. King or any of the soulful sounds drifting from juke joints along Highway 61. I think I’ve found an African home…

In the coming days, I’ll be spending time exploring outside of the capital city, Bamako, so will surely share some sights and sounds from those days as well. But in the meantime, here’s a few glimpses from my few fun hours in Paris....

hmm... guess where this was?

the Louvre

looking down the Seine River

the throngs at Notre Dame

looking down a lovely, typical Parisian street

the fall colors were amazing...

... as were the parks

in pere lachaise cemetary, i finally got to pay my respects to an incredible poet and musician

And when i at last left the "City of Love," i realized that (even after my horrendous experience with the airline) perhaps we sometimes give French people too hard of time... because if i lived somewhere as incredibly beautiful, artistic, historic, and enjoyable as Paris, i'd probably be pretty indifferent toward everywhere else, too. (Just kidding, I know many wonderful French people, but you get the point...)

Without a doubt, though, I couldn't have picked a better place to get stranded.