Tunis, Tunisia

I think that part of what makes me a good traveler is my proclivity to fall in love with places. I think Tunis would be an easy place for most people to fall in love with, possessing an irresistible vitality though its flaws are many. Fiery, feisty, smoky Tunis, where you’re screwed if you don’t speak French or Arabic, where you cannot escape dense clouds of cigarette smoke, whether in the airport, grocery store, or elevator, where the people are fierce and loyal and dare to dream of a better future at the expense of near-term stability. Tunisia was the cradle of the Arab Spring in 2012, throwing out their repressive dictator of a president who strong-handedly imposed secularism in a predominately Muslim country, but kept terrorist violence out. The country is now grappling with nascent democracy and the day I arrived had signed a new constitution guaranteeing freedom of religion and rights for women. The country is not as safe as it used to be and I hear the streets are dirtier. These things are never simple.

It seems that the Tunisian’s themselves embody this beguiling complexity. I had the pleasure of working with a gentle-souled, devout Muslim man who’s adopted a stray cat named Mish Mish who lives in and around the office, and a feisty hijab-wearing divorcee with a wicked sense of humor. Sometimes when people speak in a non-native language, they’re forced to say things simply, cutting to the heart of the matter, such as “I don’t want to be copy and paste, I want to be me.” Ah, don’t we all? Well said.

Tunisia is in North Africa, and is not the stereotypical place you think of when you think “Africa”. The capitol city Tunis is nestled on the Mediterranean Sea, with the accompanying climate, orange and olive trees. The men dress like they come from Sicily with slicked back hair and leather jackets, and the woman are a mix of scantily dressed Francophiles and devout Muslims. Many have duel French citizenship and spend their summers there. The radios of taxi drivers thump out techno music in the morning. Did I mention that they all smoke, everywhere? The incidence of lung cancer must be astronomical, unless all that olive oil has some super magical properties.

The city is beautiful. The well-heeled Sidi Bou Said sprawls down a cobblestoned hill overlooking the sea, suggestive of Santorini with immaculately white, terraced houses, but with distinctive blue doors and window gratings, mosques rising towards the sky, and the streets filled intermittently with the evocative call to prayer. The ancient Punic and Roman ruins of Carthage dot the landscape, their columns, aquifers, and amphitheaters still standing as sentinels over two millennia later. 

Tunis’ word is Fiery, because of the fire in its people. I’ll be watching this one closely, hoping it continues down the perilous road it’s sought to stability and freedom.

Enclosing Tourists in Sri Lanka

Colombo, Colombo, what is your word? You are filled with curries and crazy drivers, head bobbles and warm, sincere people. I’ve never been to India, but I hear you’re “India Light.” Sri Lanka, right off the Southeastern coast of India, is supposedly cleaner and better-smelling than its large neighbor. I saw sadly little of Colombo because it was a particularly busy work trip, but I did have the chance to attend a spectacular religious parade called the Duruthu Maha Perahara. We sat in the “tourist enclousure” (finding funny little translations like this is one of my travel delights) for 6,000 rupees, and witnessed an exotic and ceaseless procession of elaborately dressed androgynous dancers, performers, and elephants. Some of the elephants had so many lights that they had to wheel generators behind them. The insane crush of people leaving afterward on the one road shared by pedestrians, vehicles, and elephants meant that we didn’t get back to the hotel until the wee hours of the morning. The whole night was bizarre and wonderful all the same.

Over a long weekend, we took a trip down the west coast to the comically named hippie beach town of Hikkaduwa. It’s not exactly a cultural gem, filled with rude Russian tourists and cheap souvenir shops, but I did get to swim in the Indian Ocean and idle on a sandy beach drinking water out of coconut, a much needed respite from a stressful week. The area was devastated by the 2004 tsunami and was still filled with sobering reminders like the stone foundations of abandoned homes. We visited a tsunami museum with even more sobering pictures and first-hand accounts of the day, of families literally torn apart and loved ones lost. There’s a Hindu temple on its own tiny island close to the shore which was miraculously untouched when everything around it was destroyed. Every Sri Lankan stops in the middle of the road when they pass it to say a prayer and give an offering at a roadside shrine.  I would too.

I love the Sri Lankans. They do the distinctive Indian head bobble, a perplexing combination of nodding yes and no at the same time, so you’re never entirely sure if they’re agreeing with you or not. By the end of the trip I felt confident they were bobbling affirmatively, but may it always remain an endearing mystery. I was in engaged in many friendly street conversations such as this one: “Why do you hurry? Was that your boyfriend? Next time, don’t bring boyfriend and I will find you beautiful Sri Lankan boy,” with an elderly Sri Lankan Buddhist. What hospitality! We rented a tuk tuk driver to show us the sights, and ended up on a disconcerting trek through construction zones and jungle (in a tuk tuk, mind you), where we ate dinner on a boat-table gently bobbing in an enormous, tranquil lake at dusk, surrounded by the jungle. Surreal. Sri Lanka also happens to produce one of the most gastronomically pleasing dishes I’ve had the pleasure of tasting , the unremarkable sounding ”rice and curry”, spiced with whole cinnamon sticks, cloves, cardamom, and curry leaves for a quite remarkable flavor.

Colombo, what is your word? I’m going with warmhearted. 

Alchemy of Oil in Doha

Fabricated. I’m going to choose a word for each city. Every place, every person has a word (Thank you, Eat, Pray, Love), and I’m going to offer my take on it. Doha is fabricated. I don’t mean that as a critique or even negatively, it’s just the thought that occurred to me time and again as I craned my neck in awe at their fantastically shaped and illuminated skyscrapers, bending and twirling their way up from the desert, surrounded by vibrant grasses, flowers and palm trees. The charming Souq Waqif is a trip through time, wandering through the crooked lanes of Arab markets, the smell of sheesha and distinctly Middle Eastern notes filling the air, with men dressed in Thobs and women in abayas and niqabs filling the streets. It’s pristine, white, and beautiful, and less than a decade old, a modern and faithful reconstruction of the old Souq, fantastically fabricated.

I ran the Corniche in the pleasant January mornings, a wide stone promenade with an awe-inspiring view of the city center on one side and jewel green waters of the Arabian Gulf on the other. But you don’t have to drive far to be reminded that all of this is rising out of the desert, something from nothing, the magic alchemy of oil.

I was apprehensive traveling for the first time to a Gulf country, not sure how I would be received as a Western woman. It was winter, thank goodness, so dressing modestly wasn’t an issue, but I was concerned that I’d be expected to cover my head or face (a proposition that made my egalitarian blood broil). I quickly relaxed at the surprisingly diverse mix of ethnicities and cultures coexisting, with at least in my observation, no one seeming to mind what anyone else was or wasn’t doing. I marveled a bit actually at the surreal mix of traditional and modern culture. In Qatar’s race to establish influence in the world, it’s fabricated openness to the outside world that I hear other Gulf countries lack.

It’s interesting to me that Qatar touts its preservation of traditional culture and values, but I wonder how that could really be possible when the influx of nearly unlimited money has revolutionized their lifestyle in a single generation.  Desert to luxury, camels to Ferraris… You can’t help but wonder if it’s all a house of cards. It’s fascinating, really. But I do know that I enjoyed my time there and would be happy to return. I wish them all the best, and I hope their women are happy.

Corners of the World

Recently I started traveling to slightly off the beaten path places for work. It’s been an amazing opportunity filled with once-in-a-lifetime sort of experiences, as well as a 40+ hour workweek. I make the most of the time I have after work and on weekends to explore, but I’m left with little energy for journaling, instead falling back on the cheap and easy Facebook post. As an undergrad English major, writing is close to my heart but I’ve drifted away from the practice and art of it. Natural talent is fine, but writing takes a focus and discipline that must be cultivated, which I’ve made poor efforts at over the last few years. The rich subject matter of international travel is too bountiful to resist and most importantly, waste. So here I am. Every trip. Every city. I chose the title "Techno Taxis and Curry" because in these little sips I get of places, the things I nearly always get to experience are the public transportation and food. I will capture in broad strokes or little moments some of the color, vibrancy and energy of these corners of the world and my memory.