One Story • One Step • One Question. Three minutes.
One Story
[My Substack (The Crossing) publishes every Friday, without fail. I chose to publish this post on Saturday instead. I didn’t want to publish anything on 9/11. That’s a day that hopefully people use for reflection.]
For over fifty years, my work has sent other people across borders. Now and then, it has meant crossing a few myself. Some at exactly the wrong moment.
In December 2010, I was in Amman, where I had just put together a teaching program. Then it was off to Damascus to set up a volunteer project for English tutors, to tutor English in a refugee camp. (Later, after I got back home, I would learn that I was there just a few weeks before Syria came apart.) The work in Damascus was ordinary. The timing was not. As we got close to the city, my driver pulled over. A Western face in the passenger seat, he said, was an invitation for trouble. The safest place for me, until we reached our hotel, was the trunk.
So I rode into Damascus folded up in the dark, bumping along and listening to a city I couldn't see. We arrived. The work got done. I flew home to a family who had no idea what I’d been up to. And to our first-ever family Christmas tree.
People picture the person who builds these programs behind a desk, staring at a wall of clocks, sorting through a stack of flight schedules. The desk exists. So does the trunk. You cannot spend fifty years helping people cross into the world without sometimes the world reaching back.
One Step
Fear and risk are very personal feelings. For almost everything in life, waiting for fear to disappear before you say yes will almost always limit your choices and experiences. The fear just won't disappear. But you have the power to change it into a shape you feel comfortable with. Something you can work with. Damascus was a functioning destination two weeks before it wasn't. I’m thinking that most of what you're weighing next is nowhere near that edge. When your fear or risk involves travel, read travel advisories carefully. The US State Department and the UK FCDO both rate by level and by region, so a Level 4 province inside a Level 2 country is common. Read and focus on the reasons, not the color. And then, check again the week you go. It really is just like crossing the road. Just before you step, look both ways.
One Question
Is it the risk you're afraid of, or the not knowing when it stops being one?
— Randy
I’ve spent fifty years in international education and cultural exchange — a front-row seat to people changing careers, countries, and lives. If you’re putting together a panel, a podcast, or a story and want a voice from the field, just reply. Replies come straight to me, and I read every one.