Los Lokales adonde fui

Not too long ago I used to travel. Honestly, I didn't really travel that much. Maybe I did "a lot" of traveling for my age. But 7% of the countries of the world are really not that many. At 18 I created the goal to travel to each continent (excluding Antarctica) within 10 years. That means I have just shy of 4 more years to reach Africa and South America, though I'd kinda like to visit Central America and the Middle East also. In someways I would really prefer to just explore South and South East Asia. Yet when I see a spectacular sunset I always think of African grassy plains and medical clinics with beautiful people speaking beautiful languages I do not understand. For whatever morbid reason, I wish I could visit Rwanda to see where the genocide took place, and talk with survivors. I wish I could visit a refugee camp in Chad and bring food, or find immigrants in Cairo who are stateless, hear their stories and help them format them so they can go confidently to their interviews knowing they will be believed. Or it seems amazingly cool to me climb to Matchu Pitchu and see Mayan temples. To go to the slums of Lima or visit a Beef farm in Argentina and speak Spanish with a "sho soy elisa." So I guess my two continents actually do await me.

Why do I love to travel? I have no clue. This is a nonsensical fetish, it seems. I guess I figured it is some oddity that God has programed into me, I generally assume for His purposes. Even though I do somewhat believe it can be "for God" my motives in many ways are driven by just this insane thrill-seeking adventure hormone (or something) which must be released by my liver every month, week, day. Or at least, that is a theory. Maybe it really is just genetics. After all, I am the daughter of my father who would hide travel magazines under His bed like other men might hide porn. Hormones, genetics, or God-ordained . . . I may not be able to pin-point the root. But the root is there. Even if I try to pull it out, ask God to dissolve it with Holy Spirit weed killer or ignore it, wondering if it will disappear, I am beginning to believe it might not. Hence, I was chronically bitten by a travel bug. I rest in my fate.