29 Going On 80: My 2018

How can a year where so many bad things happened remain a fantastic year?

In a year I began with many questions, I find this question difficult to answer. I began 2018 with questions rooted in optimism and end this year with so much left to reckon with.

It feels odd to accept my year as a good year, given divisive political uncertainties. No one will leave this year unscathed from this year's toxic political discourse. I'll mute my thoughts on that, however.

In my personal life, I end my year with new questions I've had to ask and try to answer, such as:

How do I move forward with two close friends leaving our friendship?

Will my goals feel more daunting as I get older?

Am I a good person?

"Am I a good person" is the question that's haunted me this year. That question leads to others:

Am I making the right decisions? 

Do I deserve the good things I have? 

When I asked these questions, my only answer was "I don't know."

Am I Good Person? 

I began seeing a therapist.

People important in my life supported this decision, though a few asked "Why now" or "Why not before?"

Despite perpetual issues of social literacy and stress, I generally move forward during dark times in my personal life. Breakups, rejections, setbacks always sent me down a dark path of insecurity as I imagine it does for most folks. Like most, I developed my own tactics involving constructive or creative distractions, working with those who support me, and listening to "Let it Go" and P!nk on repeat.

Time heals most emotional wounds. But, stress from a new job (a promotion - a good thing), a new living situation, and an emotionally overwhelming falling out with two close friends led me to bleed stress. In the past, I never saw a therapist during my dark times mostly because it felt inaccessible due to cost. I felt as long as I have a grip on my life, goals, and work I was fine.

When on the reference desk, however, I felt compelled to research everything I felt ailing me. I thought I could solve my own emotional truths. Everyday I woke up at 4 or 5 a.m., 2-3 hours before I had to, and spent the hours before getting ready haunted by past missteps. I compulsively ruminated over past conflicts with people. I ruminated over things that happened in high school and even middle school.

I felt like I was a horrible person. Making all the mistakes I made added up to feelings of guilt and shame. I couldn't stop apologizing to coworkers, to my girlfriend, and to my friends, for minor communication errors.

Every action I took led me to second guess my intent. If I helped a patron I would immediately walk away worried. "Was I too rude to them?" "Did they think I spoke to them fairly?" I would ask coworkers for validation. Helping a patron find a homeless shelter, I felt I did the right thing but then I would feel like a bad person. "Should I celebrate myself for doing good? Shouldn't I just do this just because? Would I have done this in public, or would I ignore this person except in the library?"

I felt guilty for being human.

I exhausted my usual tactics of emotional healing. At a certain point, I realized I can't rely on Dr. Google, and that this research and my ruminations interfered with work and my personal routines. So, I booked a therapy session.

"Should I see a therapist?" If you ask yourself that my answer is yes, if you can within your budget. Therapy works. It's not about treating mental illness. It's about wellness. I chose this action because I wanted to feel well.

Immediately, my therapist diagnosed me with acute anxiety and advised medication. I declined, with the hope that developing new tactics will help. So far, I feel better. I feel supported and my therapist advised me to try to tackle moments of rumination, of social awkwardness, or dark thoughts with life affirmations.

I came up with the following to say during rumination:

• Everyone makes mistakes.
• No one's socially perfect. 
• You are a good person.
• People love you more than you think. 

My therapist then advised me to say "I am a good person" more often. Based on our sessions, she felt I wasn't seeing how I am a good person. I wasn't seeing how others accept me and care for me.

So the answer to my most burning question: I am a good person. I help others. I help myself. Moving forward into the new year, I have to keep saying this: I am a good person. 

A Year of Long-Term Thinking

Reckoning with anxieties and long term issues comes in a year involving general long-term planning. Much of the goals shared in my 2018 goals post focused on setting myself up for this long term. While not successful on some goals, I accomplished a lot.

The big goal was buying a house. I ultimately didn't meet that goal but that's because I decided to wait, save up more, and put a down payment on a larger house I want for my long-term happiness.

I did create a short term savings account and saved nearly $400 each month. I also set up a Roth IRA account for long term savings. Financially I feel more comfortable, when I purchase a house I'll feel cozier.

Seeing a therapist and facing my emotional issues, however, I realized I need to also plan long-term for my emotional health. I explored a few of these questions in my September 2018 post but I needed more clarity. I wanted to understand what will make me fulfilled.

I built my long-term emotional health goals using Steven Covey's "80th Birthday" principle. The clip advises to conceive of one's 80th birthday. Who do you want around you? What do you want to reflect on as a life well lived?

A lot of folks may critique the video from a cynical point of view, but I like it. Asking "What do I want to see in my life as I sit at my 80th birthday?" helped clarify what I want or continue to want in my life.

On my 80th birthday, I want to reflect and feel right saying:

• I spent the most time I could with people I love.
• With my job, I did right in improving or serving the lives of others.
• I made personally fulfilling short films that reflect emotional realities of small town life.
• I lived up to my childhood wanderlust in traveling worldwide.

2018 Was a Good Year for Me

I've often defined a good year in terms of goal accomplishments. Looking at 2018, I feel I let some goals slip but I nailed down the goals important to me.

More importantly, I began building the future I want. Emotional clarity fulfilled my year more than any single goal. 

Yet, I accomplished many of my goals and worked towards satisfying my 80 year old self. Mexico and Japan lived up to my childhood wanderlust. I finished post production on my short film Will and I wrote several scripts. More people passed the GED because of my assistance at the library. 

Most importantly, I made time for supportive people.

A Criteria for Prioritizing Destinations: The Most Martin Thing I've Ever Done

I'm WAY too excited about a criteria I created! I'm not sure if anyone should have excitement over criteria or organization but I love it and I'm sharing this criteria (via my blog to my faithful readers)!

A couple of months ago I created a four point criteria to use when prioritizing travel destinations. I wrote down four criteria to define what I find rewarding in a destination based on previous travels and to help prioritize where I want to travel next.

I felt the list illuminated why some destinations attract me more than others and it ultimately illuminated what I seek in life through experiences such as travel. But, it also illuminates my type of crazy.

Before I shared the specific criteria points, my friend Kevin immediately interrupted my announcement to him and said "That's the most you thing you've ever done." 

He's right. It is a very me thing to do. It's a very me thing to consider travel, where rewards often arise from supreme serendipity, and impose my rigid way of thinking to how I consider a destination.

Make no mistake: serendipity and in the moment discoveries have generated much reward in my travels and life. But developing this criteria helped me realize what I love most about travel. I think it helped me separate myself from a perception of travel as "getting away from it all" or "it's a thing you do." For me, travel is a way for me to extend my love of narratives. It's an extension of what I love in movies and books. The world is my library. 

But libraries are daunting with so much to choose from. So I like knowing a bit about why I choose a place or what I find rewarding in a vacation to understand what attracts me to a new narrative. 

The Criteria

The criteria for prioritizing destinations:

1. Jules Verne reward - places that enable me to feel like an adventurer, but not just in lost civilizations. I'll explain later. 
2. Star Wars reward - places that make me feel like I'm in a science fiction world, most likely in a Star Wars movie or book. In other words, it feels other worldly or futuristic. 
3. History nerd reward - places that reward my love of history. Pretty simple.
4. Food reward - I like to eat really tasty food. Pretty simple. 

Did I Need to Do This?

Did I need to write this at all?

No.

But I found this list helpful. Organization provides clarity and this list provided clarity for me. It's less a list of how I'm supposed to travel than a reflection of what I already love. Most destinations I've loved don't quite cover all four criteria yet I relish the simplicity in which it reflects lifelong pursuits of knowledge. 

Traveling serves as a more intensive and immersive opportunity for knowledge. Ultimately, reading a book or watching a movie isn't the same as being in a place. Traveling provides what a book cannot replicate. It extends my knowledge on a more sensory level. It's one thing to see a picture of a French bakery and an entirely different but connected thing to smell a French bakery. 

Experience allows us to construct more useful knowledge. I'm the kind of person who would rather learn by doing - a method I learned to do the hard way after anxiety and over thinking (my prior mode) led me to do nothing. Travel allows knowledge by doing. 

A Narrative Rarely Shared

A particularly hard to define criteria for me was the Jules Verne criteria. What does that mean? At first I thought that meant finding "lost" or "adventure story-worthy" places, but that wasn't quite it. No - it's about the discovery of a narrative rarely shared. 

I remember my 10th grade World History class hardly touching on the history of Asia, Africa, South America, and other places not connected to Europe and Euro-American events. This bothered me: we learned the historical narrative that relates to less than 2 billion people on a planet that currently hosts 7-8 billion! That's a huge narrative missing!

I asked the teacher why and her rebuttal was that we didn't have enough time: "Research and read about it on your own."

I think defining the Jules Verne criteria led me to understand I've always had a lifelong pursuit of narratives missing. I don't like things missing - it's a puzzle without pieces and my brain doesn't like that. It also diminishes the humanity of a world that has more people than the entirety of Europe or North America combined. 

I want to know this narrative. Hence, the Jules Verne criteria. I love the novels of Jules Verne as he deals with characters discovering the less known or forgotten narratives of Earth.

This isn't just history either. For instance, it wasn't until I travelled to Japan that I really saw Shintoism and Buddhism in a deeper, more meaningful way. It was never part of any meaningful discourse in my education yet visiting Meiji Shrine proved a more rewarding experience than the Eiffel Tower because the narrative it produced sparked new knowledge and a new sense of seeing the world. This was a cultural narrative rarely shared.

Missing

There's no one way to travel. Travel means discovery and immersion, but the way that happens for each of us depends on a lot of factors. 

For me, what I ultimately find isn't necessarily what I was searching for, but I create this criteria to understand what I can search for and what will enable me to fulfill the lifelong pursuit of personal development and better understanding of a world I barely understand.

Questions Not Asked: A Summer 2018 Update

I began 2018 with so many questions and while I've shared the travel experiences I enjoyed in Mexico and Japan, I haven't written on my year quite yet.

So where am I?

Answers...

Good news to the January 2018 Martin: your hairline remains!

Bad news: you don't own a house. And that's fine!

Announcing an interest in buying a house feels being a way too hot person whose Facebook status went from "In a Relationship" to "Single."Your friend who's in real estate private messages you more than before and random emails and letters don't stop from mortgage lenders. My status is now "Looking to Buy" so now I receive messages like "How u doing?" or "DTB?" (down to buy).

Granted, these folks make their money with marketing such as these emails and letters. I have no qualms with them.

It's a privileged place, to a degree. I'm at a point I hoped for, dreamed for, and worked for: the point where I can make investments for my future. I can start a Roth IRA. I can have a high yield savings account to save up for a down payment on a house.

I'm glad to be here and I know this status won't last. Somewhere in the future a hiccup will occur: furloughs, tax raises, and other hijinks that my occupation as public librarian may bring forth. This knowledge motivates me to invest now while I can because who knows what will happen.

So I started a Roth IRA. I do have a high yield savings. But I'm waiting until after the new year in 2019 to grind down on home-buying. Why? So I can put down enough to avoid paying heavily on my credit line and so I can purchase a detached house. Initially I thought of buying a condo or townhome but I decided that's not me. If I have to take part in this proverbial debutante ball, I want a house I can live in long enough to not deal with it again for a xwhile. That means a not-quite but close dream house with land acreage and rooms I can fill with books!

That means a larger down payment. By December I should have enough for the down payment.

On non-home matters this year, I have found more answers or solutions to my long term questions. But much of what I conceived involves financial concerns, travel concerns, film concerns - quantifiable questions. These concerns have resolutions or answers.

But what about the qualitative questions, or the questions that can't be defined in a set end-goal. What are the questions I didn't ask? How will it feel to be Martin?

I didn't begin this year asking questions for feelings or emotions. I didn't ask "how would I feel when my friends turned 30 or when my mom turned 60?"

"Why am I scared of death?"

Wait what?

Questions


When you read that segue you may think how do I go from "down payment almost ready" to "I'm terrified of dying."

Well, that's my brain right now. I require action and I need to accomplish goals. I also have to read a book or watch The Clone Wars if I wake up too early and can't sleep because if I remain still my anxiety walls fall and all the anxiety armies standing at gates flood in.

I think many of our brains work like this. But I never ask these questions. I start years working towards answers for quantifiable questions or tactics for accomplishing goals and I never consider the tactics for reckoning with my humanity. I remove myself from that because I think I'm a robot.

But despite my inability to articulate my emotions and to reveal inner truths the way others find easily, I am human. Or at least I have human emotions programmed in me.

I ask "why am I afraid of death" because I worry about death. A lot. I wrote about it in my Japan trip post. As I plan for the long term, a very necessary task, it sets forth actual reckoning with the idea that I may die or people I love will die. When I discussed my plans for a Roth IRA, my Mom stopped me. "I don't want to think about you when you're 60, because I'll be 91 if I'm still here."

I have no way to conceive of death in a way that satisfies me even a little bit. I hope the cure for mortality is found. I also wouldn't mind becoming a cyborg. But I don't want to think of just sleeping. I want to have the forest I can wander in with Angie, with my friends, with my family, and with my dog.

So that's an eternal question I never ask that I need to ask: how do I make peace with endings? 

I've spent my whole life working towards becoming or seeming more human. I've tried for more open expressions when it's not natural to me. I try to smile more even though I'm not naturally inclined. I try to share glee like when my friends celebrate - a sincere glee. But it's not a dial for me - I'm off or really on. Like intense weird on. I'm either meh or "YAY!!!" It's not bipolar. It's intensity.

I've tried to act more human and measure my intensity and outward humanity. But I haven't given much consideration for the humanity - the fears, hopes - that still live in me. I haven't really made peace with how I view "loneliness as a war." Despite my aversion to humanity, I still want to share pieces of me. But what pieces do I share? I share my intense love of World War 1 and movies, but I feel I underwhelm my loved ones with very little sharing of my humanity and struggles.

I've spent my whole life oversharing the wrong pieces. So what are the pieces people really want? And how do I share them?

I struggle asking these questions because there are not hard set answers or resolutions. I cannot find answers for these questions over a year. I can't write a to-do list and underneath "finish the second draft of Hunters" write "figure out your fear of death by September." These remain eternal questions that I will spend my whole life pursuing answers for.

Maybe that's the piece I need to share: the pursuit, the struggle that I have with how my humanity evolves and how my answers to these questions change.

But I need to remain forward. I can work on these questions and still move forward with the life I want.

Forward

Despite my anxieties, I remain hopeful at what my life may become and where I stand now. I write this post with less than 6 months away from 30. I write this post grateful that I have reaped the rewards of work, of my loved ones' support, and I remain vigilant.

I can plan for my financial future. I have more scripts to write (two have production potential). I finished my short film Will this summer. I accepted a promotion at another library branch.

There remains work ahead. There remains struggle ahead. Anxieties never go away, but I can only give so much time to anxiety. I will push through this year with ample savings, ample screenwriting, trips to Asheville and St. Augustine, and embrace the 50 List.

My Spirit Wants a Forest to Wander In: Japan 2018

How the hell do you tackle Japan?

I started with this question and no definite answers. After 7 days in Tokyo, I still have no definite answers.

As a writer I write characters to be agents of their story, to drive the events in a plot.  But at a certain point, I've learned in my travels, your experience has to be driven by where you are. As much as I love building itineraries and creating narratives I have to let my trip adapt and change what I do.

Japan forced me to reckon with the constraints of my itinerary more than any country. Most folks who dream of Japan have a vision of Japan already set by "Cool Japan" pop culture such as anime and manga. We dream of the Japanese sushi every travel guide devours on Travel Channel shows or we dream of a city built in what we conceive as the future because of Blade Runner or Ghost in the Shell. I'll confess that I wanted to see a Japan I saw in the chambara films I loved in high school.

Each ward and neighborhood in Tokyo, however, contains a multitude of threads that during my journey I felt compelled to pull. Pulling these new threads led me down my favorite paths and towards my favorite moments in Japan.

Tackling Japan

Initially I planned a Tokyo plus Kyoto trip itinerary, but with 7 days in Japan I realized this plan would not serve me well. In Hong Kong, I initially planned to balance my experience with a side trip to a  more historical or natural adjacent destination (in China or Vietnam) but opted against this idea to my benefit. Instead, Hong Kong held plenty of landscapes, traditional culture, but a contemporary life worth experiencing. I decided to follow this template to tackle Japan by staying exclusively in the Tokyo area.

I booked one day trip for myself to Nikko National Park, however. Nikko National Park has a reputation for beautiful scenery near mountains, an active volcano, and the park hosts the tomb of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate that preceded Japan's modernization during the Meiji Restoration. 

Any hesitation I had for an exclusively Tokyo home base left me after I lucked out on a hotel in Akasaka. Ultimately I found Minato, the ward of Tokyo I stayed in, and Akasaka, the district within this ward, convenient yet peaceful. Akasaka served as the ideal place to find inspiration in Tokyo and Japan.

Apparitions of Tokyo

Tokyo is a city that I look back with memories that seem to be apparitions. I would start my day with a purpose or destination and on my way find new threads to pull on that I pursued. Consequently, Tokyo left me with stray moments that feel so slight yet were magical in totality. These moments include:

• EVERYONE CROSSING AT SHIBUYA CROSSING AND RUNNING INTO EACH OTHER BUT STILL IN AN ORDERLY FASHION
• takoyaki balls with the dark but sweet sauce (and not mayonnaise -- my request)
• Metro train rides on the weekdays with men in business suits quietly balancing reading amidst a frenzy of people closing in
• Taking shoes off to step into Nikko Tosho-gu as I listen to the tour guide speak in my headset
• matcha ice cream
• 7 story department stores with the basement floor selling $25 USD cantaloupes for Mother's Day
• a fisherman's lone boat on Lake Chunzenji
• cherry blossom stragglers on trees near Kegon Falls
• a rotation of short films by Kondoh Akino exhibiting at Mori Art Museum
• people staking their place at the Tokyo City View at Roppongi Hills, lounging for the sunset view of Minato and the horizon below us
• ROBOTS!!! (specifically Asimo at Miraikan)
• placing my feet onto the hard rocks underneath the ocean at Odaiba Seaside Park, as locals relish their final Golden Week day in the sun
• Koinobori streaming in the wind before Children's Day near 21_21 Design Sight Museum
• Otaku geeking out over the endless floors of manga in Akihabara
• ANDROIDS!!! (also at Miraikan)
• a bondage lesson in the back of a Shinjuku gallery exhibiting photography depicting bondage
• print screens of pines in the mist and wind from the 16th century (by Tohaku)
• Bamboo trees peeking out at Zojo-ji
• the hidden forest below Tokyo Tower
• a Teppanyaki chef meticulously cutting sweet potatoes and Kobe beef
• well dressed hosts at my hotel's breakfast buffet with a "Good Morning" ready to-go as I spent every morning with coffee, croissants, and burdock root
• Takahasi Korekiyo Memorial Park sliced out on the way from my hotel to Aoyama Station -- my go-to refuge for a coffee and an audiobook

I found Tokyo best suits the photo-collages by Sohei Nishino, whose work I found at 21_21 Design Sight.  I felt he captured what I love of a place like Tokyo or other places I've been -- the dynamic individual experiences at play. Tokyo, like the individual component images collected in Nishino's collages, possesses a vast compilation of individual moments and experiences that were transcendent in their totality.

Shinto Shrines and Buddhist Temples

While I relished the individual components of the Tokyo I traveled through, I pulled a new thread that I continued to pull elsewhere in the city: Shinto shrines. I found the most transcendent moments I had in Tokyo through this thread on my journey.

Shintoism describes a way of life more than a religion. Shintoism is about communicating with unseen forces and spirits, kami, that exist in everything. I worry I am oversimplifying Shintoism so I encourage you to read more.

When I conceived of my Japan trip I knew that temples and shrines would serve a major part in connecting me with a timeless if not traditional element of the country. I didn't initially conceive of how Shinto shrines defined a peace in me. After talking with friends I've found this new peace difficult to describe, but I'll try.

See, I am not spiritual and certainly not religious. I'm not a militant atheist -- I use the term agnostic to describe myself. I simply do not know how to measure what is not in front me, so to speak. I take no peace in this belief but it best represents what I believe is the truth -- that I don't know.

If anything rattles me, it's uncertainty, and if anything scares me it's uncertainty of what happens after...I'm gone.

Sometimes I think of death or I think of life post-death which is no life. Just a scare -- a car merging when it shouldn't, a turbulent plane that had to land in Edmonton because of cold winds in Calgary -- cascades my thoughts down a dark rabbit hole.

I do not want to die.

Granted, most folks share this fear and we do the same thing -- we carry on with our lives and try to do the best we can to be decent people. Eventually my depressing cascade tumbles with new, more positive thoughts. But underneath my optimism and a lust for life lies a shattering anxiety over death.

I describe my fear because in Japan I found myself in Shinto shrines or Buddhist temples with affiliated shrines like Zojo-ji, Nikko, or Sengaku-ji. These shrines provided a new sense peace in regards to my fear of death.

In particular, my first shrine -- the Meiji Shrine -- introduced what I found a powerful concept. The government erected this shrine prior to WWII (and rebuilt it after) as a way of communicating with the Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken. The shrine provided a sacred place for their spirits to live on with us in Japan. Inside the city of Tokyo lied this magnificent forest past gargantuan Torii gates, a forest planted for their spirits to wander in.

That's when I realized: if I die, I want a forest to wander in. I want a forest for the ones I love to wander with me.

I remain worried if not uncertain that I cannot have a real post-death forest to wander in. Yet, I found peace knowing I can continue the work I have towards creating a metaphorical forest for my loved ones to wander in. That even without an actual spirit, my human self has many "forests" to wander in with those I love deeply.

Shintoism's belief in communicating with kami leaves me with peace as well. The idea that who I love will continue to communicate with me in the same way people share themselves to the spirits of Meiji and Shoken gives me peace. In a spiritual way, I will continue to communicate with them. I have no physical shrines, but my writings, images, and films will communicate to those left here or to my loved ones. My paper trail can be my forest.

Could this moment of clarity or moment of peace have happened elsewhere? I don't know.

I had this moment in Japan, however. I can thank Japan for this moment.

Final Threads

How can I impose an arc or theme in a place where I can look closely in the Tokyo National Museum at priceless Heian art, then scarf down tempura green beans, and finally sit down on a floor AND WATCH A ROBOT KICK A SOCCER BALL?!?!

There's been an intuitive drive in me to travel to Asia. That drive slowed down as the reality of a post-undergrad life and its financial realities sunk in. I worried Japan would be way over my price range or annual leave range. Yet I did it. With Hong Kong and Tokyo in my life, I have no idea why my drive slowed down for this region. In fact, I don't know why I didn't travel here sooner.

I want Japan again. I want the threads I can find here. But I must relish the new threads I will pull in the future.  

I Went for Tacos and Mole: My Trip to Mexico

For someone like me, who relishes routine and becomes grumpy at changes traveling is the ultimate challenge.

With travel comes the reality of routines not always working. It's nice and always important to research and have plans. It's also important to not panic when those plans fall through.

There's a blind faith that's required for traveling. You have to have blind faith that you can go to foreign country where you don't know the language completely, you don't know the landscape and terrain, and you have no idea what will happen...and everything will be fine. You have to have blind faith that everything will work out in the end and that you will enjoy your vacation.

These were my thoughts on the 4th night of my trip in Mexico.

When I saw that a tour from San Cristobal de Las Casas -- my 2nd home base in my 1 week trip to Mexico -- that was going to Palenque started at 4am and in a round-trip came back at 10pm I thought "Yes, why not?" 

As we take the back roads along Mayan villages on the tour, this blind faith is tested first as we are stopped by villagers with machetes asking for money. The nearly 20 of us in the van thought "what's going on" and "shit" as the driver laughed it off and said "they just want money. It's all fine." 

That night we find out the road back is blocked. The drivers find out out. During the drive back all the tourist buses/vans (in a convoy) stop and all the drivers congregate to discuss what's going on and options. Our driver comes back on. We find out that because the road is blocked, we cannot be brought back within the time the drivers were paid for (4am - 10pm). Without missing a beat, they place us into taxis --  2-3 folks in one car at a time and for the next 3-4 hours I just sit quietly as two drivers' USB playlist plays everything from "Total Eclipse of the Heart" to Daft Punk in a night drive in the Chiapas highlands. 

At 11:30pm I'm dropped off in the main square (Zocalo) instead of my lodging in San Cristobal where I was picked up. The driver wasn't sure where to go to drop me off at "Zocalo" so as we officially entered San Cristobal he stopped in the middle of the road to discuss with another driver he had never met before to get directions to Zocalo. 

Everything I expected on the tour in terms of scheduling and return was absolutely changed and unexpected. But, how did my night turn out ultimately? Fine. I arrived back at my place thanks to another taxi I took from Zocalo and slept in.

Everything was fine.

"Please Don't Go"

Not everyone was on board with my Mexico trip. Mexico has a bad rap in the U.S. and other places. "I'm going to Mexico" is a statement that I found when said aloud to others elicits several responses such as:

"Is it safe?"
"Please don't go." (Dad)
"Please don't go." (Mom)
"Don't eat the chorizo."
"You're going to poop so much."
"Are you going to Cancun?"
"I was mugged at gunpoint."
"Is it too late to cancel?" (Dad)
"Are you going on a mission trip?"
"Don't walk at night."
 "Cool."

Many people I knew were worried about me -- my parents most of all. Then again, my parents worried about me going to Canada and Austria.

Reading my story of blind faith, it's easy to think that my experience is typical for Mexico, with villagers armed with machetes and eerie nights driving with strangers. That certainly wasn't my take from the experience. Take from my story that despite my worries (I was worried too) everything went well. The reality is: I had a wonderful time in Mexico.

Make no mistake, blind faith is best complemented with planning and preparation. I made sure I never crossed into neighborhoods in Mexico City that I shouldn't be in. I generally took taxis everywhere.

At the same, Mexico isn't bad. I'm not talking about Cancun/Mayan Riviera which is a fine part of Mexico to travel to. I'm talking about Mexico City and Chiapas, the places I went to. Like Peru and other places in South America I've been to there's some superficial grittiness. I didn't come for that. I came for human experience of Mexico.

Politics and Human Experiences

Rick Steves has a lecture called "Travel as a Political Act" where he describes how travel enables a political action due to human engagement. Travel removes you from the often dehumanizing news one may hear or read of another nation to experience the day-to-day realities of how folks live.

When someone tells you all Mexicans are rapists, for instance, you can tear down that belief because of an interaction with an Uber driver or because the kid of your hostel's cooks played peekaboo with you at the dining room like all kids do, among other interactions.

Politics and showing up Trump wasn't my reason for going to Mexico. But it's important to recognize the politics of travel or political differences because most folks won't go to Mexico because "You'll get kidnapped." That wasn't my reality. That doesn't mean it can't happen. It happens. It happens in Mexico just like it happens in Atlanta and just like it happens in Paris, the city I was closest to being scammed. I certainly had a bit of Montezuma's Revenge but Mexico is too different, too multi-faceted to fit one scenario or experience.
 

The human experience -- the experience of culture, of art, of general day-to-day life outside of my normal way of living -- is my main reason for loving travel. I can't read people but instead of falling into cynicism or blame over this I have instead found trying to understand people to be a lifelong learning opportunity. I've never not been fascinated by different cultures and art.

Now, let's be real: as much as I wanted to see Frida Kahlo's art or see the ruins of Palenque, my favorite human experience is eating. Why would I choose Mexico? I went for tacos and mole.

Food Tour

My first day after my flight I went on a foodie tour via Sabores, a 4.5 hour walking tour of Centro Historico.

Centro Historico is one of the more walkable districts in Mexico, at least it was for me walking from Palacio de Bellas Artes to Zocalo (Plaza de la Constitution). It's the primary tourist area so police are everywhere monitoring traffic. It was our area for hunting for the more traditional cuisine North Americans and Europeans associate with Mexico.

Four others -- 2 U.S. citizens and 2 Canadians -- joined me. First, we had traditional Mole (!) in an Oaxacan restaurant. Oaxacan cuisine is to Mexican food what Sichuan is to Chinese food: it's the best food region in a great food culture.

But the true delight of the tour was Mercado San Juan, a market where the whole of Mexican cuisine has a place. We had traditional Mexican ham and Oaxacan cheese (which has a Mozzarella texture). We also had grasshoppers covered in lime and salt for flavor (which tastes fine) and frozen ants we had to hold in our palate to warm it up before eating (also fine).

Our last stop was a market stall. Our guide translated a conversation with a lady who ran a produce stand. This woman loved food and loved what she did, going into the nuts and bolts of how Mexican squash grows, sharing tastes (cilantro) and smells (lemongrass) culminating with a flan cheesecake topped with the produce stand's fresh fruit and an edible flower.

Bonita!

What drew me to Mexico was this experience. I grew up in a community that has a substantial Latin American (mostly Mexican American) population. Therefore Mexican-American (Tex-Mex, Southwestern) food was everyone's go-to ethnic food. Even now my go-to restaurant in Atlanta is El Mexicano in East Atlanta Village.

So when I write that I came to Mexico for food, it was important to add onto what community has given me. This means trying a ceviche tostada at a food stand. This means having a caldo -- a traditional soup/stew in Chiapas. This means cafe de olla made with single origin Chiapas coffee beans...in Chiapas!

Schedule Change

Food's role in representing the human experience makes every trip for me worthwhile if not magical. But I wanted to penetrate a Mexican cultural experience deeper than my love of tacos.

Before I go on trips I'll usually read a few books to gear me up for my trip. For instance, I read Lady in Gold before I went to Austria which helped me gain a richer love of Gustav Klimt when I experienced his masterpieces. Before I went to Mexico I read some poetry -- particularly poems by Chiapas native Rosario Castellanos -- but also a book titled Frida Kahlo at Home by Suzanne Barbezat that detailed the influence of Kahlo's homes in her art, from La Casa Azul in Mexico City to Detroit.

Consequently I wanted to dig into the art of Mexico. At first I expected this experience to focus on mainstream Mexican art -- Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, Juan O'Gorman, and so forth. A new path emerged, however, due to two reasons and ultimately this path led me to a different but richer artistic discovery: indigenous or pre-Hispanic art.

The first reason: flight change. I had scheduled my flight anticipating an early arrival in Mexico City on a Sunday in order to go to a museum or two before nightfall. Unfortunately my flight was res-scheduled for a later time which would cause me to arrive after most museums were closed. The first leg of my Mexico City stay would only be for Sunday night and Monday, as I would leave Tuesday for a 4 night stay in San Cristobal de Las Casas. So what's the problem? Well, museums are closed on Mondays.

The core part of my 7 day trip would be based in San Cristobal de Las Casas, a place where I had no plans to experience Mexican art. Yet, San Cristobal would be the place I would begin a new and different path of arts discovery, beginning with visiting the ruins of Palenque.

Pre-Hispanic Art in Chiapas

I've already written about the experience of traveling to Palenque. This was the tour that started at 4am and ended at 11:30pm (original end time, 10pm). Included in the tour were stops at enormously gorgeous pieces of scenery: Cascadas Agua Azul, which was lovely in spite of the rows of tourist stands for food and handicrafts, and Cascadas Misol Ha, a place that blew me away in its unreal and cinematic beauty.

But Palenque was the show stopper. I've already been fortunate to have seen Machu Picchu and other older ruins but it's always a breathtaking spectacle to witness a place like Palenque. Witnessing the pyramidal temples blooming out of lush jungle left my tour members and me threadbare with awe.

Aside from the ruins themselves, this was where I first became enamored with pre-Hispanic art. The Temple of the Cross occupies a spot in what is labeled "Plaza de la Cruz." First, the structure itself mesmerized me. I stepped up to the top of the pyramid and relished my bird eye's view of the rest of the core Palenque city temples and structures. But as I walked around the structure I began to see something greater: the remains of the art by the indigenous Mayans who ruled in the city.

Throughout Palenque stucco and building sculptures remain. Those are wonderful, but the paintings left on the walls inside the temple-- both geometric and figurative -- left me without words. I was humbled by the fact that art created by an artisan 1,000 years ago -- someone's imprint -- has remained for me to view in 2018.

Despite the long drive back, this imprint remained in my head the next morning when I walked around the town of San Cristobal looking for one of the oldest churches there, Iglesia Santo Domingo. Iglesia Santo Domingo is next to a former convent that houses a municipal museum which very little stuff to note, but upstairs is a textile museum, the Centro de Textiles del Mundo Maya. When you read that -- "textile museum" -- it seems stale. I thought it might be but I was wrong. Instead, I was entranced.

The museum was designed and curated to represent the tradition of crafts in Mayan indigenous culture. While the height of Mayan cultural output waned after the "post-classic period," the indigenous people in Chiapas and the surrounding region continue to create absolutely stunning textiles. The museum had fabrics dating as far back as the turn of the century that showcased the recurring geometric patterns, birds, fauna and flora, and people that had been passed on through generations.

Once again, I was humbled by this imprint. The difference was that whereas Palenque had the artistic imprint of one or more artisans, this was an imprint carried by generations of Mayan and indigenous women. This was a cultural imprint that began thousands of years ago and remains vibrant, or at least it was in the tent covered stands outside the church where locals sell their crafts to tourists. It was evident through the collection of fabrics of different periods that these patterns were consistent and similar. It's humbling and astounding.

Museo Frida Kahlo

The textiles I saw in Centro de Textiles del Mundo Maya and the art in Palenque was in my head as I flew back from Chiapas to Mexico City for the 2nd leg of my stay in the city. For my last night I planned to stay in Coyoacan, a neighborhood adjacent to the University City and known for art lovers and Bohemians. It was where Frida Kahlo's family settled and where she remained for the bulk of her life.

Museo Frida Kahlo is a busy place. I was warned by a couple in San Cristobal to get my ticket early as the museum sells out fast. The ticket specifies a time when you are allowed in and it also grants you access into Museo Diego Rivera or Anahuacalli Museum. Despite the name and association, the Anahuacalli Museum doesn't really cover Diego Rivera's works -- most of his and Frida Kahlo's works are in other museums around Mexico City among other places. Instead it covers his collection of pre-Hispanic art.

The museum is designed to be a wildlife sanctuary and the building, designed by Juan O'Gorman, replicates a pre-Hispanic temple. Since I had some time from my flight arrival before my ticket time to Museo Frida Kahlo, I took advantage of the 2 for 1 deal. While the museum did include drawings and sketches by Diego Rivera of some of his murals, the museum was full of figures and figurines collected by Rivera that represents the scope of pre-Hispanic art. The sculptures and figures with seemingly deformed faces are weird for a lot of folks but I was quite enamored with the motifs of fertility, of connections to nature and one's terrain, were present.

All this led to the final action I took before leaving Mexico: visiting Museo Frida Kahlo. The line was around the block for those who had not purchased tickets before. It was an international crowd attracted by the allure of Kahlo -- her art, her presence, her life. It's unquestionably the most expensive museum in Mexico City at MX$220.

How did I take it? I loved it. I was transcended as soon as I walked in and saw the courtyard. What can I say? Going into the mind of an artist is never not amazing for me, but when I saw the art in person I definitely geeked out.

The museum's collection was potent to me for other reasons. After the pre-Hispanic art I experienced Kahlo's art spoke to me in a new way. Rather than just the rawness of how personal her art is, I was amazed with the connections I felt between her art and pre-Hispanic art. One painting had a child with a bird on his shoulder which reminded me of the presence of birds on so much pre-Hispanic art the textiles. A special exhibit included her wardrobe and pieces she wore such as her Tehuantepec-inspired folk dresses. My head was swirling with pre-Hispanic folk art and I loved it all. 

But Did I Love Mexico?

Mexico doesn't stir me like Chile, Peru, Austria or other places I've been, but I was stirred. I did love my experiences and I was overwhelmed by the glances of humanity I was lucky to witness, whether the pre-Hispanic art and crafts or the warmth of folks I met in taxis or in cafes.

I am thankful I got to meet Mexico. And we'll meet again in my life.