SOULFUL TRAVEL WRITING

Words are so special to me. They carry power and feeling and allow us to communicate and connect with each other. But with all my study and use of words, I still find it hard to pinpoint the exact words to convey the movement and shifting of my soul when it encounters new and influential experiences.

I have always carried a travel journal with me to attempt to record the powerful moments on the road. Sometimes I just write out a chronological report of the day’s activities. Sometimes I jot down the names and addresses of particularly magical sweet shops and restaurants. I even have a whole section of my travel journal dedicated to my relationship with various gelato flavors from Italy. (Yes, I’ve listed them all.)

And while I am always glad to have recorded these travel data, they sometimes seem dry and the words seem little more than statistics. The trip becomes a transcript—well-aligned, organized, and easy to consume.

On some of my travel journal pages, however, the words are askew. They flop over the margins and ricochet as if in a pinball machine. These words simply spill out. There is no time to tuck them tidily into rows or to bookend them with subjects and verbs, capitals or periods. It is simply word vomit that has to be put on paper before it floats out my ears and is lost forever.

These messy hieroglyphics become the building blocks for some of my most cherished travel writings. They seem to pack a punch so much greater than my tactical writings. They are less calculated but have more character, and they preserve my feelings of a moment more accurately than the words I write after the fact.

Below is an example of a piece of writing that came after my first trip to Africa. It began as a conglomeration of words or phrases that were slop on the page but felt like poetry to me. I pieced the fragments together into a mosaic of prose after the trip was over. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. And if you have any soulful travel writings, I’d love to read them.

I Am Uganda

I am Uganda. I am the ebony spot of the leopard, the wobbly knee of the towering giraffe. I am the sunset, fingers of mango light combing through emerald palm fronds. I am the sooty coat of copper dirt on your shoes, your hair, your skin.

I am the Nile, surface bubbling with hippos. I am your reflection in the muddied swirls of Lake Victoria. I am the sweet, hot mash of matooke and the woody root of cassava.

I am aching feet, dusted with dirt from the jungle path leading to and from the water source. I am the ringed wrinkles on a mother’s face, carved from the knife of oppressive worry.

I am color. Pigments infused with energy—electric greens, yelping yellows, and smoldering purples—dancing on a headdress. I am the tingle of waterfall mists and the ridges of crocodile spines. I am the wail of a whiskered goat. I am the elephant’s chalk-encrusted tusk, the hyena’s peppered fur, the rhino’s heather skin.

I am the raw city street and the soft jungle trail. I am the rain, cascading, leaf over leaf, until sopped up in spongy earth. I am carrot-colored bricks sealed with melded mortar.

I am the dewy skin of an unclothed infant, swarthy and sweet. I am a forlorn child with onyx eyes, solid and sad save for a brilliant, white highlight of hope. I am the bronze glimmer of a baby’s cheek and the plaited pink of his petaled lips. I am the ivory smiles of children, loved and full of love.

I am the ache in your heart upon arriving “home” and the whisper from oceans away pleading, “Return.” I am the lost shard of your soul. I am Uganda.