the Traveler
What began as my solo sojourn to South America in 2019 would eventually lead me to my new home in Costa Rica…
where my soles have been planted for the past 3 years in the clay soil of the Southern Caribbean.
I was bound for a life abroad. Not just to another country but to another way of life. Latin America has always been a place of curiosity for me, whose borders kissed my own country in the United States yet felt like a stranger beyond. From reading about Che Guevara’s rebellious, unconventional journey in the pages of The Motorcycle Diaries to gnawing through the Spanish epic of Don Quixote, I was drawn to both the language and cultures I had a taste of in the classroom.
My inquiries have taken me across the vastness of Mexico as far south as the Peruvian Andes where I have touched down on stories that I once longed for. I have learned my most valuable lessons of safety as a solo traveler in the throes of civil unrest in the capital of Quito, I have encountered spirit in a woman from Cusco who ran a makeshift bodega on the outskirts of the gentrified city center, and I saw the reality of my privilege weighed adjacent to Indigenous youth and Venezuelan refugees who held an unshakeable resilience. My work, my writing, and my philosophy have all been shaped by the land and the lives I have encountered.