A Supposedly Meaningful Thing I'll Absolutely Do Again
On finding value in travel outside the substance itself
Hello fam - Apologies for the delay between posts as I came back from a 2-week trip deep in the Andes and have been processing a whoooole lot of life contemplation since which means we got a lot of good material to work with.
I recently read David Foster Wallace’s A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again where he recounts his 7-day cruise and was inspired to take a similar narrative approach to the big takeaway from this trip - namely that the value in travel has little to do with what exactly you end up doing.
A Supposedly Meaningful Thing I'll Absolutely Do Again
Here I sit, writing this in a stuffy metal tube hurtling through the sky, on the third leg of a 17 hour travel day taking me high up in the Andes back home to my balmy Caribbean island. What is normally post trip dread, lamenting the return to alarm clocks, making food, cleaning up dishes, meetings, 1:1s, “circling back on this'' and all the other responsibilities of day-to-day life, has been replaced by a familiar, childlike eagerness; like when you’d come home with a stellar report card in hopes it’d make your parents forget that call they got from the Vice Principal or when you’d get a new Pokémon card you were sure would give you a fighting chance to beat your older brother.1 Apologies if that’s not relatable and you weren’t a trouble-making, smart-aleck, who nerded out on Pokémon but replace that with whatever did light you up as a kid and you’ll get the point.
And so, this present state, post-trip eagerness stems not from expected parental pride (or forgiveness) nor anticipatory sibling revenge but rather from an excitement to return to the world of alarm clocks to try out what feels like a software upgrade for my life operating system; moving through the world with greater connection and deeper love for the world around me. Like a real-life Brick Tamlin.
So how did I get here? What type of experience could have produced this?
Well, I flew to Peru. I stayed a night in Cusco at a 500-year-old Incan royal palace. And worked out in its barebones hotel gym.
I drove into the Sacred Valley with a bunch of Aussies I just met and my best friend Ethan.
I chewed a lot of coca leaves. Not for any material difference felt but more so to do as the Romans do. Plus I’ll do anything to even remotely mitigate the chance of the hellish altitude sickness that left me violently ill 8 years prior.
I spoke broken Spanish with dozens of people, which, by now, should have advanced beyond its sophomoric level given the hours I’ve put in to learn the language. Yet there remains a lingering gringo complex I have in Puerto Rico which gives rise to a tepid hesitancy to actually practice it as I project a layer of perceived insult at my attempt to engage in Spanish knowing full well their English is better even though they’d probably appreciate it or at the very least would get a laugh out of it. But alas, I still can’t help but feel like an overweight cruisegoer from the Midwest2 with a farmer’s tan and some Bacardi merch3 saying “grassy ass” as they check out of the pharmacy with a pack of smokes and Bud Light.
Nonetheless, I got my reps in with a taxi driver, the staff at the luxurious Samadhi Retreat Center, the shamans we worked with, one of the shaman’s - Edgar’s outright adorable daughter’s Luna, who asked everyone for their favorite animal so she could surprise us with her drawings the next day, a Peruvian girl and her two guy friends who approached me at a waterfall asking for a picture which I obliged to take for them only to pick up that they were asking to take a picture of me which I told them I didn’t need one only to then realize they wanted a pic with me and the girl which I was happy to do just slightly confused which I later discovered was a show of interest as she then asked my number. I probably would have picked up on the nature of the interaction earlier were it not for the second cup of Wachuma, also known as San Pedro, a state altering plant medicine I drank 30 minutes earlier with Edgar and his brothers.
I’d nearly gotten heatstroke in a Chulla Chaka, that is, a traditional Andean sweat lodge; not to be confused with a sauna, but a more ritualistic endeavor as you chant, sing, and pray for 3+ hours in an igloo of sorts sweating shoulder to shoulder with 20 or so people packed in. A few up the burlier lads left halfway in utter delirium, spewing nonsense, and I vaguely recall one of them mentioning an orgasm as he laid down on the earth outside. I still hear the ringing of “apuchai”4 as I battled to stay in the sweat lodge through all of the 4 elements they took us through each one lasting 45 minutes and bringing in 13 additional sizzling hot stones to pour water over. I love doing difficult things. I get in a 39-degree ice bath for 10 minutes every day with a smile on my face. This was another level.
I ate great food; mostly vegetarian, prepared with love in the gardens and surrounding farms in the Sacred Valley. Each dish not only providing a pleasant gustatorial sensation but a feeling of health and cleanliness you just don’t get in the US nowadays. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to counteract the absolute havoc wreaked on my bowels from the Wachuma that had me longing for the next time something remotely solid departed my body but we can skip over that part.
I was given a gift straight off the neck of the owner of Samadhi, Fernando, who I opened to about my experience and the profound impact on me. This necklace had a large Tagua seed from the Amazon meant to represent change and planting seeds of growth. I was touched.
I bought a gift for my close friend in Puerto Rico who graciously helped me out with house maintenance that came up the night before I left. This was no small ask in PR where without fail anytime you need something done inevitably becomes a whole ordeal leaving you delayed and over budget with one more thing you end up needing fixed anyways. I was fortunate to have found this in a cute coffee shop day one, relieving myself of any pressure for the rest of the trip of a debt owed.
I even treated myself with some gifts. Edgar’s family runs a textile business in Chinchero, making everything by hand – shearing and cleaning the alpaca wool, spinning it, dying it with local plants, knowing the right admixtures5 to produce exact variations. I bought a bag that will get more than enough use on the beaches of PR along with a cardigan, robe like piece that fits the tasteful, spiritual vibe I’ve been going for as of late, and I could have stopped there but when Edgar’s niece is showing you an awesome abstract lion rug she made that probably won’t fit in your suitcase but knowing it’s awesome and goes towards supporting a lovely family, you buy it anyways.
I laid on my back watching the stars underneath a clear, luminous, Andean night sky for hours on end with Ethan philosophizing on life. We later felt compelled to grab our phones for the one time all trip to pull up Spotify, plug in the airpods, and dance until the lingering effects of the Wachuma wore off.
I did shamanic breathwork which was just as state altering as the plant medicine.
I picked up a paintbrush for the first time since elementary school. And got complimented on it. And not just by Luna.
I rode a bike around Lake Piuray. Well, halfway. The pedal fell off and I had to walk it the rest of the way back. I wasn’t upset about having to take an extra hour making it back.
I went door to door to a dozen shops asking if they could charge my credit card $200 and give me cash so I could tip Edgar’s family and pay for the taxi home. I found one. But I’m pretty sure that technically makes them an illegal money transmitter.
I read. I journalled. I meditated. Got sunburnt. I lost myself. Found myself. Returned to a familiar seat of awareness. I’m fortunate. Grateful. Leaving Peru a better version than I arrived.
And the thing is, it has nothing to do with what I physically did.
None of it was altogether too remarkable, the kind of stories that have you sitting around with a shit eating grin at the Thanksgiving table just waiting to recount. Don’t get me wrong I’ve had those that on paper seem more groundbreaking – partying through the morning in Barcelona only to wake up to a ticket to the Grammy’s that next weekend, taking a doors off helicopter around the stunning island Kauai and loving it so much I jumped out of a plane the next day to get another view, hell I woke up in a hospital in Munich and somehow ended up standing up on a table that night chugging beer out of my shoe. While yes, those were great, memorable experiences. But none of those pales in comparison to this.
Because the value in any trip has little to do with the substance itself and everything to do with how it makes you feel; how the experience can teach you things you could never learn from a book, transform you in a way you struggle to put into words.
Sure, I have memories of the places I went and things I did, but what’s that juxtaposed next to the feeling of being called hermano by Edgar and his brothers, to be truly seen and treated like family with radical acceptance and love. This wasn’t the “hey brother” we throw around in the States. It’s an affectionate acknowledgement of us being part of something greater together. A different worldview. A warm greeting borne of pure authenticity that rivals 99% of any hello I’ve ever received, inviting me to respond with unadulterated genuineness of my own instead of the “hey, how’s it goin’, good” we repeat ad nauseum, allowing myself to drop into my raw, lived experience and burst out with just how fan-fucking-tastic I’m feeling at the moment filled with appreciation at the depth and substance of the people I’m around in the sheer, postcard beauty of the Andes, or in fact saying I’m actually not doing great, maybe I’m still working through a lot that came up, and can be vulnerable, opening up those squishy insides typically reserved for ourselves and the closest of inner circles.
At one point I even cheerfully threw out amigo and quickly had it corrected as if they couldn’t fathom relegating our relationship to friend status. That’s not the type of thing you can go into a trip looking to do, but that’s what sticks; the ways in which you’re really changed for the better. Not the crazy, outlandish, James Bond-like escapades you’ve dreamt of.
If you hold that as your standard, you’ll find yourself in a void, constantly grasping for more substance that never seems to satisfy. If instead you release yourself of those expectations, go into any trip be it a proper vacation, or even just a day off, a first date, a new coffee shop you’re trying out, whatever non-ordinary experience you hope to gain something from and you approach it with an open mind, a willingness to learn from the minutiae, humility to recognize the small part your playing as part of something greater, then there are unfathomable depths to the personal growth, the self-realization, the soul expansion available at your disposal.
Later at-home Christmas videos revealed an opportunistic, if not mischievous, older brother trading swindling his 5-year-old brother with Pokémon cards that in hindsight look worse than the Bears trading up to draft Trubisky
I’m from the Midwest so I’m allowed to stereotype my own. Although I’d never be caught dead on a cruise but still feel okay with my outsiders' condescension there because I mean, cmon, we all know the type.
The Puerto Rican equivalent of an I <3 NYC shirt
Which I later found out is what the Quechua refer to as the stones and means little grandfathers
This one cactus produced a deep blood red but when you add lemon juice it becomes orange or another flower it turns maroon. Pretty crazy to see how they figured this all out.
🔥