a scrap of paper tucked into a wall // thoughts from the airport

Coming back to Jerusalem two days ago felt weird. I hadn't been back since the first weekend after Birthright ended. Yesterday and today, I wandered around the Old City- admiring the painted pottery in the shop windows of the Armenian Quarter, walking the Via Dolorosa surrounded by eager Christian pilgrims, watching as women in floral headscarves did their grocery shopping amidst the twists and turns of the Muslim Quarter- and I wandered around East Jerusalem just outside Damascus Gate, through the stores and cafés of Center City at the triangle of Ben Yehuda, Jaffa, and King George streets, around the spice stands and dried fruit tables at Machane Yehuda, and around the Hasidic backstreets of West Jerusalem.

Yesterday afternoon, I made my way around the perimeter of the Old City and through the Dung Gate security line to pay a visit to the Western Wall. It's hard to believe its been 8 weeks that I've been in Israel, over 6 since I last came to Jerusalem, and 7 since I last visited the Kotel and left a message. I stood at the Wall for a while, remembering the prayer I had written the last time I came. Along with the cursory hope for good health and happiness for those I love, it had had something to do with wishing my life to continue on its current fascinating trajectory of memorable experiences. It was a prayer of looking forward. 

And now I'm looking back. Back at driving through the hills of southern Jordan, so foggy outside that I couldn't see anything through the bus windows. At witnessing a baby goat being born. At seeing the Big Dipper, Orion, Casseopeia, the North Star in the vast emptiness of a desert night, clearer than I've ever seen them. At staying up late enough to watch the sun rise over Tel Aviv, freezing cold and exhausted but happy. 

I don't think I believe in the power of prayers but I believe in hazy Jerusalem sunlight, in small Orthodox children walking home from school trailing their rolling backpacks behind them, in the bustle of the souk as elderly Arab women sell vegetables from wooden crates. I believe in standing on top of a hill in the desert and feeling invincible, and I believe in sitting alone at a rural bus stop in the Galilee, out on a limb and unsure of what's to come. 

I've learned to believe in the importance of being alone, in the value of being lonely, and in the value of figuring things out for myself. Instead of wishing for more, more, more incredible experiences- of course I do want those, but I trust myself now that I'll make them happen- I find that my wish now is to continue to have the wisdom to reflect upon all that I've had (and continue to have) the privilege to do. I like to think that spending time by myself on this trip has lent me greater perspective, a heightened appreciation for things. 

I've grown up a lot since I last came to Jerusalem, and it took returning there for me to fully grasp it. Is a gratitude a prayer? I guess what I'm saying is: 

May I continue to learn from all the places I go and people I meet and things I do. 

Because right now, I can't think of anything I'm more grateful for than that. 

It's been a great two months. 

אהבה 

M

nos vemos, argentina // hola, EEUU

{{posting this now that i'm in the airport in santiago de chile with a wifi signal, but i wrote this earlier this afternoon}}

     right now i’m at a sunny table tomando un café mediano. things that feel real: the reggaeton playing in the background, the refrigerator behind the counter stocked solely with liters of quilmes beer and containers of diet yoghurt, the south-american sun beating down on me through the window. it’s hard to believe that less than a day from now, i’ll be touching down in dc. it seems like a million miles and several dimensions away. a friend i made here once described argentina as being “1 hour and 30 years away” from the united states. the outdated haircuts everyone has here seem to prove this true. but travel is always strange in that it’s impossible to reconcile such disparate realities; how can both “home” and “away” possibly exist at the same time, each chugging along and continuing to live and change? it’s much easier to operate under the misconception that any place where i’m not present simply freezes in time until i’m ready to return to it. 

     it will feel weird to be home. although i spent the majority of the summer at home working most days to save up money, somehow i think this is different. leaving and coming back changes a person. things feel more transient now, which is both good and bad. less stuck in the mud, but also now hyper-aware of what i’ll be missing whilst home. i’ve been trying to focus on small moments, small places, small memories. it keeps me from feeling overwhelmed with my conflicting emotions about leaving argentina. i’m looking forward to the way the sun-dappled leaves of the dogwood tree in front of my room will glow orange in an autumnal sunset hymn every night. i’m looking forward to having my first bites in six weeks of curry, pad thai, falafel, and most of all, mom’s home-cooked food. i’m looking forward to driving down to politics and prose on a rainy sunday and camping out with my journal and my laptop and really, really working on my writing. i’m looking forward to seeing deer grazing in rock creek park. i’m looking forward to reading the washington post as i drink tea in the morning. i’m looking forward to finally wearing my favourite black jeans that i didn’t have room for in my suitcase. i’m looking forward to practicing yoga whenever i please.

and likewise, i don’t want to forget the minutiae of my time here in argentina. it’s easy to remember the big things- the gleaming expanse of the salinas grandes salt flats, the day we baked alfajores with prison inmates, the simultaneously addicting and revolting taste of dulce de leche, the souvenirs and photos that i’m bringing home. but i want to make sure i remember the little things, the things that don’t seem particularly important or memorable right now, but that i’ll forget about if i’m not careful. how some bus drivers had a picture of the virgin mary on the top of their gearshifts. the way salta looked at night from the roof of the hostel, all gold lights in an inky sky. the smell of a wildfire on the side of a highway. listening to the boys i worked with show off their beatboxing skills. the toothpaste-like taste of fernet. the feeling of outsize satisfaction upon doing something vaguely independent, like going to the lavandería, buying groceries, commuting to work alone, having a functionally correct conversation en español. the way my fitted sheet never seemed to stay on my mattress properly. sitting on the steps of patio olmos, reading the horoscopes on the billboard across the street. the melancholy of a ten hour bus ride, and waking up at 5:30 a.m. at the end of said bus ride with a kind stranger’s jacket warming my knees. 

i don’t want to forget the people, either. not just the close friends i made, the coworkers i spent time with, the cousins i met in buenos aires, the boys i worked with at my placement, but also the bit players in my argentine universe. the farmacity employee who looked like jason schwartzman. the taxi driver last week who complained to marit and me about his wife’s weight gain, complete with before and after photos. my favourite alfajor vendor, a wizened old lady, at córdoba’s feria artesanal. the little girls at copa de leche who asked me to draw them all pictures of long-haired princesses in ball gowns. the parking attendant on duty in front of my house, who invariably, regardless of the day’s weather, commented on how lovely córdoba is in the springtime. 

i haven’t even left the country or the continent yet, and i already want to come back. there are so many weekend trips i never got to make: mendoza, iguazú falls, patagonia, montevideo, santiago. i wish i could have spent more time in buenos aires, and i would happily stay in córdoba longer, working hard and spending time with friends. but that’s the crux of travel. you always crave more, and no time ever feels like enough time. i’m proud of the fact, though, that i made this trip be what i wanted it to be. this journey has been memorable and educational in all the right ways, partially by circumstance but partially because i’m learning to make my life happen how i want it to. i’m exhausted. and i’m lucky. i’m lucky i’m lucky i’m lucky i’m so lucky to be doing the things that i’m doing. the past six weeks have been difficult, stressful, and full of unexpected obstacles, but they have been incredible. i can only hope i’ve made a shadow of the impact on the people and places i have encountered here as they have made on me. 

x

msb