“I was born here, I grew up here, I live here, but I will not die here. I am going places.” -Abdul
In Moshi, I met an enterprising young man named Abdul. He said that he was 21, but I think he was 17. Or younger. He was assigned to me as my guide to the Materuni Waterfall, not because I needed one for the rather short and well-worn trail, but because the village wanted to give locals something to do in exchange for the money that they were collecting from tourists to walk on their land.
I suspect he was not actually a guide, but rather, the only person around who was available to chaperone, because as we were chatting he mentioned that his brother is a guide, in the kind of way that made me think he is not – because he is too young to be one.
Anyway, he took pictures like he grew up in the cell phone generation, and I liked his attitude. He was actually curious about me, and what life was like beyond Tanzania.
His insistence that he was "going places" remains seared into my mind whenever I look at his picture.
I, too, was "going places" – places like Tanzania – but Abdul couldn't see his country as a place to go – only a place to leave. When a boy in Africa says he is Going Places, he means that he will leave his village for the big city, or another continent, for a life that is – at least in his mind – bigger and better than the one he has.
When someone says they are Going Places, what they mean is that the place where they currently are is not the place where they want to be.
But it's also about potential, and limitations. We see the present place as not conducive to fulfilling our potential. When we say creative and talented people are Going Places, what we mean to say is New York or Los Angeles – Broadway or the Big Screen.
Going Places isn't about the going – it's about the arriving.
As for me, I was tiring of the going and wondering when I would arrive. The thing about travel that people don't talk enough about is that a significant amount of time is spent getting from place to place, and not actually being anywhere. What would arriving feel like? Would I know it when I got there? Would it feel like a sigh of relief – or like a hard-won achievement?
Going Places is usually followed by Making Something of Yourself, and when we say that, what we mean to say is that we will make money, make headlines, or make a life that society and even ourselves deem worth living: job, partner, house, kids.
Going Places and Making Something of Yourself are euphemisms for becoming a successful, contributing member of society.
Was I Going Places to Make Something of Myself?
I had done that. I got the prestigious college education. I landed the flashy job on Capitol Hill. I lived the Big Life of an entrepreneur in the Big Apple. And now?
I had made something of myself alright. I had made myself into a box that felt smaller than my Brooklyn apartment. And then I had unmade it. Unaware of what I was really doing, I pulled on a loose thread of the sweater I had made and now I had a giant pile of yarn sitting in my lap. I had potential, and possibility. I also had nothing. I had undone my life story, and the one I was writing now did not follow any script I had been handed.
If I am not making something of myself, I am making nothing of myself.
Which is also to say simply: I am myself.
And I don't need to Go Places to be myself. I am everywhere.
And yet.
I, like Abdul, had the ache of discontent in my heart. I didn't know what I was looking for anymore. When people asked, I said myself. I said healing and peace in my body. And I said a place to call home.
Click any image to view larger.
After my Kilimanjaro trek, I went to Lushoto, Tanzania, a place where I had an inkling of home. I wished I stayed longer, but I couldn’t, because I had to get to Dar to catch the train to Zambia.
What does it really mean to go places — and why do we believe we must?
The landscape was like out of a fairy tale book. Beautiful trees in a mountainous terrain, with terraces and hills. It almost felt out of place in Tanzania, hard to believe an environment like this could exist so close to the equator. The red roads I had grown accustomed to contrast against lush greenery and wooded forests. Sunrises and sunsets lit up the backdrop with blues, indigos, oranges, yellows, pinks and violets.
Scenes around Lushoto, Tanzania. | Click any image to view larger.
I liked the cool, crisp mountain air. I liked wandering the streets because everyone was too busy farming to bother me. I loved the farm fresh food. I wanted to stay awhile, even live there, except I knew that I couldn’t because it would never really be mine.
So I kept wandering. I did not know what I was seeking, but I had faith that I would find it, somewhere in all the places I had yet to go.
