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As a small child growing up in the U.S., we believed if we dug deep enough in the ground, we would eventually reach China. Despite our efforts, we dug up a lot of worms and no one who resembled Bruce Lee.
These efforts were mixed with the on-going U.S. propaganda that suggested that we hate and fear Communism favoured by Russia and China. This pretty much dampened an impressionable young girl’s thoughts of ever travelling to these countries.
No matter. There was so much world outside of Russia and China, I could hardly miss knowing them. I was a fearless and participated in the American youth rite of passage of backpacking across Europe. I studied Portuguese in Brazil and made endless visits to my ancestral land in Jamaica, and of course, inhaled Africa where I would make my home, career and family in the course of 20 years.
The first time I travelled to Ghana my mother asked me , “Do you know anyone there?” I responded, “Is that really a reason not to go?”
Over the years my travel discoveries have slowed down to a halt as life got in the way. My former fierceness in the world has given way to role-playing life’s titles: wife, mother and worker bee. I no longer recognized myself and boredom became a part of my new reality.
I was tired of rolling down Lang’ata Road to get to the rest of civilization. I started to loath planning my life around Nairobi traffic. I recognized that I was Nairobi-Kenya- Africa weary, and I needed to breathe another oxygen. The U.S was far, expensive and looking increasingly scary.
But I was not looking for familiar, I was truly yearning for the unknown. A friend was on her way to China and within 5 days I found myself in line with her at the airport travelling on an airline I had never heard of over countries that I had never been. I had not even looked at a map to see if my transfer in Muscat was even on the way to China.
While asking myself these questions I could feel something rise up inside of me. It was a glimmer of my former fearless self. I did not just miss traveling. I missed the adventure of my disappeared youth.
Finally in my mature years, I was ‘digging the holes’ and conquering the ‘Forbidden China’ of my childhood.
