There and Back Again

When I returned from Japan in late March of 2020, I could have never imagined what coronavirus would turn into. On returning home, Illinois and many other parts of the country had already entered lockdown. When the lockdown ended, months of staying home followed. Businesses closed, events were canceled, hospitals were overwhelmed, and coronavirus seemed to be the only thing on everyone’s mind. It’s only now, over a year later, that vaccine access to Americans is available, but most of the world is still closed off. 

It doesn’t feel like that long ago that I was driving around New Zealand and Australia. These countries have escaped the worst of coronavirus and have resumed life back to normal. 

Japan escaped the worst of the pandemic during 2020, but it losing its grip on the virus now as vaccinations lag and the Olympics are threatened to be postponed once again.  

Singapore, Hong Kong, and Vietnam were better prepared than many as a result of their experience with the SARS outbreak. Though cases surged in mid-2020, they’ve kept the virus at bay for the most part since, even as variants continue to spread. 

Myanmar is currently facing even larger problems, as violent protests and unrest have broken out as a result of the military staging a coup after the ruling party won by a landslide. 

The past year has been hard for everyone, and in comparison, my problems seem pretty benign. I had planned on finishing this blog months ago, but writing about all the amazing places you went when you are confined to your home proved to be very difficult, so it’s only now, a year into this ‘new world we live in’ as everyone likes to remind me, that I’ve found the ability to revisit my travels.

While covid cut my journey short, I had 4 glorious, uninterrupted months of hiking, backpacking, flying, boating, eating, struggling, and exploring beforehand, and I’m very grateful for that. Had I postponed just a few more months, waited until after Christmas, or gotten cold feet just before the flight out of Ohare, I don’t know that I’d have an opportunity to do such a trip ever again.

The difficult experiences are the most memorable, the most exciting to recall. It seems ironic that one day I was stranded in an airport without any money trying to figure out how to get to my hotel, and the next I was stressed about going to my local grocery store (What if it’s packed? What if I get coronavirus? What if I already have it and I give it to someone and they die?). The grocery store trip, in many ways, felt much more overwhelming than having to sneak across a border because you lost your visa paperwork. 

I’ve unlearned many social skills over the last year, but I’ve gained an appreciation for many things I took for granted – my health, being able to just walk into a restaurant and eat, dance at a bar with my friends, seeing my friends in person. I’ve had the privilege of having the health and means to get a passport, book a flight, and send myself into another world and the ability to figure out how to adapt. 

I’m sure I’ve learned something, and I’m sure I’ve grown, though at the time of writing this, I’m not sure how. Even a year later, I haven’t fully processed everything that happened, and it might be years until I fully understand the full impact of how the last year and a half has changed me. Surely it’s changed us all.

It’s been a year of chaos, but there’s so much hope on the horizon. The vaccine is widely available, at least in America. Countries are slowly reopening borders. Businesses are reopening. 

So here it is. The end of my blog, the end of my travels. Maybe forever, but at least for now. This trip exceeded my expectations in many ways. This blog…not so much. It ended up becoming a laborious project, a thing I dreaded. Nothing I write here is good enough, so why bother? I’m not going to spend days carefully crafting each post, checking every minute detail. And it’s taken over a year for me to be okay with that. 

My trip, my blog, and my life over the past year have been a beautiful, terrifying, glorious, chaotic mess that I’m proud of. At the end of the day, I traveled and kept this digital journey for myself. And for you, if you’re still here reading after all this time. None of it is perfect, but I’m proud of it nonetheless, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds. 

The end.