Learner Sojourner
A Sojourner's Truth and Travels
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Mexico City: Flores y Colores
Posted on April 30, 2018 Leave a Comment
This technicolor dream post is brought to you by the marvels in and around La Ciudad de México and by sunflowers. I’ve grown a love of sunflowers. In recent years, they seem to cross my line of vision everywhere, and when they don’t, I often find myself seeking images. I like how, when seen up close, their […]
The Arab Spring Break: Egypt Edition
Posted on April 30, 2017 6 Comments
“I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it…My soul has grown deep like the rivers.” — Langston Hughes This promises to be a long post. I’ve tried hard to condense it, but this experience is resistant to brevity. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t attempt to encapsulate a trip of this length or magnitude in […]
The Arab Spring Break: Jordan Edition
Posted on April 19, 2017 4 Comments
Checking in luggage is the rookiest of rookie travel moves. I did it, and paid for it. Blindsided by an overzealous agent at the EgyptAir counter at JFK, who insisted on weighing my prized koi fish orange spinner carry on, and finding it five kilos overweight (EgyptAir has a strict 8-kilo carry-on weight limit), I […]
Art and Craftsmanship: Port-au-Prince Day 2
Posted on July 2, 2016 2 Comments
This will likely not be my last post about art and artistry in Haiti. Art, of both the high and low varieties abounds, and surrounds you even along the dusty, ruined streets that must have once had sidewalks. Artists display their originals, or original copies, on everything from clothes lines to fences. The ubiquitous “Loto” […]
The Magical History Tour: Port-au-Prince, Part 1
Posted on July 1, 2016 Leave a Comment
We spent most of Tuesday and Wednesday, our first two days, reuniting with friends and family who had either never left Haiti, or who had chosen to return out of love, for work, or both. Among the former group, were my aunt, and three of my mother’s cousins, the aforementioned pressers of uniform pleats, […]
Advance, Retreat, Maneuver: Getting Going at The Globe
Posted on July 14, 2015 2 Comments
The title of this post is a shameless rip-off of one of the techniques we learned on the first day of TSTP, but I think it speaks to the day as a whole, so, with apologies to Colin Hurley whom you’ll meet later in this post, I’m going to misappropriate liberally here, starting with breakfast: […]
The Pope and the Piazza del Popolo (New Year’s Eve Memories- Rome 2008)- A Video Blog
Posted on January 1, 2015 Leave a Comment
Remember the heady last days of 2008? We had just elected Barack Obama president, which made America and Americans suddenly much more popular in Europe and just about everywhere else. This was especially true if you were Black…Anyway, we had quite an adventure in Rome which was the first and last stop on our week-long stay […]
THE ORIENT EXPRESSED: BEIJING BOUND
Posted on August 23, 2014 Leave a Comment
Our 2011 Chinese odyssey consisted of five cities: Beijing, Xi’an,Chonqing,Yichang, and Shanghai. In two weeks, we flew six times, cruised the Yangtze River, and just for fun, rode the world’s fastest train. July 7 & 8, 2011 As I write, we’re three and a half hours into a 13.5 hr. plane ride to Beijing. T’s […]
What I Learned From This Sojourn: Paris Layover Edition
Posted on July 24, 2014 2 Comments
1. When I was 20 years old, I climbed the 422 steps to the bell tower of the Notre Dame and was drafted by our eccentric elderly guide to “ring”the biggest bell. He had me stand under the massive dome, placed the clapper in my hand, and guided me in gently rubbing it along the […]
What I Learned from this Sojourn: A Relatively Random Top 10 List
Posted on July 18, 2014 1 Comment
1. I write my observations humbly, knowing that I’ve only seen a tiny portion of this huge subcontinent and its myriad cultures and traditions. 2. Eating vegetarian while in India is great idea, and not difficult to do. 3. When in doubt, choose to pack the Imodium. 4. Arranged marriages are no longer uniformly de […]
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