Is Travel Irrelevant in These Dark Times?

Among the many sad topics that have hit the news recently are accounts of distrust of international travelers, both of travelers entering the United States and Americans traveling abroad. Travel should be celebrated as the acceptance and blending and coming together of diverse cultures, not excoriated and misinterpreted as unwelcome invasion. It is as important as it ever has been to remind us that we are all members of the same family of humankind.

It is a dismal state of affairs when suspicion of strangers, of those deemed different from the so-called norm, is being stoked at high levels of the government of any nation. This creates fear and uncertainty rather than tolerance and kindheartedness. It is a mistake, though, to conclude that this is a new phenomenon. In fact, this has been the baseline throughout all history; there has never been an era in which civilizations and cultures did not clash one with another. Overcoming the narrow-minded obduracy of intolerance is an ongoing process, and the perennial nomad plays a key role in offsetting bigotry, sectarianism, misogyny, dogmatism, and insularity.

The key to dealing with this mistrust is in once again highlighting the difference between the tourist and the perennial nomad. Tourism is mainly a commercial undertaking, and it is true that during uncertain geopolitical eras it may be disrupted from time to time. Nomadism, though, is a mindset and a lifestyle. In my own experience, I have discovered that even in volatile places, where local people were antagonistic toward my country and its ideals, my attitude of empathy and magnanimity made me well-wishers and even friends. I recall in particular traveling through Iran in the 1970s shortly before the Shah was overthrown. Members of the middle class gave me hitchhiking rides and bought me meals, but after my passport was stolen and I was forced to beg on the streets of Tehran for a couple of weeks before I could obtain a new one and move on, I began to become aware of the strong undercurrent of rebellion suffusing the common people. The writings of Ruhollah Khomeini, the Islamic revolutionary in exile who would soon return in triumph to obliterate the Shah's regime, were widespread, and with them also spread a strong undercurrent of anti-American sentiment. Yet I never felt personally threatened. My quest was so far abstracted from politics that it never occurred to me that I could be affected by such considerations. In fact, on my previous visit to Iran, I remember an Iranian border official who looked very much like Peter Sellers telling me with a comical expression that Jimmy Carter had just been elected president of the United States. I had been so caught up in my travels that I had completely forgotten about the election.

I haven't done as much physical traveling in recent years as I have in the past. Instead, I have been raising my sons and then seeing them off on their own paths as adults. My nomadism these days mainly manifests in my choice of books and in frequent visits to museums and other local places that celebrate diverse cultures. However, as closely as I can I follow the journeys of others who are out there on the road. For instance, I know a woman who bought a van, gutted it, outfitted it as a camper, and has spent the last few years as a digital nomad, roaming the western states, taking outstanding pictures and videos, and teaching photography. Another nomad, a veteran, travels the United States with his dog in an SUV, writing, sharing videos on social media, and educating everyone he meets about environmental awareness.

But let me emphasize again, as I have in past essays, that you don't have to "go round the world to count the cats in Zanzibar," as Thoreau says. The journey of the perennial nomad is as much internal as external. It is your mindset that is important. Maybe you catch the world-vision by taking a walk to the park at the end of your block. Maybe you only make it as far as your bookshelf. The important thing, as Thoreau emphasizes, is to "get to the inside at last." And when we do, when we contemplate our spirits with honesty, we discover that in essence, when all the extraneous details are taken away, we share a core of love with our sisters and brothers in the rest of humankind. We travel to reaffirm this. And even if our movements are temporarily restricted, the truth is still the truth.