Middle of Nowhere

This is an indescribably beautiful place. As with so many of my travels, this trip has shown me things both familiar and exotic, and the real beauty of this place is is how these two sensations compete and combine in ways that are unlike any you will find elsewhere on this marvelous home of ours.

This is a land made out of determination, set in Eden and powered by faith. Faith in God, that the sun will rise tomorrow and that kindness will be repaid both in this life and the next.

Wave to me. This is the request I've heard most often. Wave to me Mr. Big American. Yes, I've run across pushy vendors and hustlers, but the overwhelming number of interactions have been with people who wanted nothing more than to reassert our common humanity through basic courtesy. These are our brothers and sisters and I don't think any event in my life has done more to assert my belief in there being a human family than this trip is.

The landscape of this trip has afforded me views of verdant hills and endless glass topped lakes dotted with the fishing canoes that appear to my eyes as being a natural part of this landscape since time immemorial.

Nothing is out of place here, a fact which renders the chaos of the cities in a tranquil light. The canoes fit with the water, the clapboard shacks, concrete apartment buildings and expansive estates all belong, right where they are. They could exist nowhere else.