I’ve been travelling on airplanes
since before I could walk. At the age of
seven I took my first flight alone. I’ve
been blessed with a family who has the means and passion to see the world. My mom knew the moment that I left for
college that I wouldn’t be back.
Throughout college volleyball season, we travelled nearly every other
weekend, logging quality hours in the C terminal of the Atlanta airport,
spending our entire meal per diem on Swedish fish and trail mix from The
Grove. I spent most summers during
college traipsing around Latin America studying Spanish or volunteering. Six weeks after graduating college, I boarded
a plane to Swaziland. At the airport, my
mom dropped me off at the curb, hugged me goodbye, and drove off. Needless to say, I have been beyond blessed
that travel has been such a monumental, yet routine, aspect of my life.
For most
Swazis, travel is a luxury few can afford.
In a country the size of New Jersey, many have not travelled outside the
border into neighboring South Africa. I
am regularly asked which khumbi (mini-bus) I take to America. As I explain the logistics of travel to
America, I receive the same response: pointing to the sky as they gaze into the
clouds, “Hawu! 18 hours? Up there?
Above the clouds? Will you hit a
mountain? Hawu!” For many of the people I interact with
regularly, their world spans only as wide as the community.
So, it goes
without saying, that a trip to the airport is a pretty big deal around here. Schools take field trips to the airport just
to watch the planes take off. I only
just recently grasped the novelty of travel for Swazis as I joined my host
family to bid farewell to my host brother who will be studying in Taiwan for
the next four years. As my alarm went
off at 5:00 am on the morning of his departure, I contemplated forming some
sort of excuse (a “very important meeting”…with my bed, a warm cup of coffee,
and some episodes of New Girl…). What
difference would a goodbye make if it were at our homestead or at the
airport? Reluctantly, I dragged myself
out of bed and piled into the backseat of the car with my Babe and sisi. We arrived at the airport to find my bhuti,
dressed in a fresh new outfit and looking more confident than ever, surrounded
by the rest of the extended families who greeted us with tears in their
eyes. The actual goodbye was anticlimactic,
as my family is relatively unsentimental, a stark contrast from most overly
dramatic Swazis.
The true
beauty of the event came as we stepped outside to join the other families watch
the plane take off. I can’t ever
remember being fascinated with observing this process. To me, it was just something that happened,
planes were a means of travel from point A to B, but the journey in itself was
nothing worthy of admiration. As I stood
among the crowds of extended family members, church pastors, teachers, and
coaches who had come to this monumental sendoff, I realized how blessed I am to
take travel for granted. People stood on benches to glimpse over the crowds of
people huddling around the lookout area.
As the passengers stepped out onto the airstrip, they waved to the
crowd, who erupted into cheers and cries of praise. As the plane slowly started its way down the
runway to turn around, the crowd followed intently, and family members disputed
which route it would take to Johannesburg and whether or not it would turn
around to take off. The moment the
wheels left the ground, the true commotion began as women began crying out
songs of praise to their loved ones and then men waved vigorously, fighting to
hold back tears. Words don’t do justice
to the beauty of the moment and I felt blessed to be a part of it. My eyes filled with tears as I recognized
the implications of this departure. For
those fortunate few inside the plane, this marked the beginning of a new life,
a life beyond the confines of their small Kingdom and most likely a ticket out
of poverty. For those left behind, it
meant the loss of their loved ones as they remained behind, returning to their
small worlds within the limits of their chiefdoms. I feel that often we, as Americans, fail to
celebrate these monumental life transitions.
Sure, we host the obligatory baby shower and bring miniature Converse
shoes or designer car seats, but we don’t freely sing out joyous praises or
wail in the misery of a goodbye. I often
complain that those that I work with here make a big deal about the things that
don’t really matter (i.e. washing your clothes with the proper technique) and
fail to prioritize those things that, in my eyes, do matter (i.e. attending the
business workshop that will teach you how to make money). In this case, however, Swazis have it right. Their ability to fully feel with every ounce
of their being is both inspiring and terrifying and I think we would all
benefit from occasionally allowing ourselves to let our emotions take over
without restriction. So next time you
board an airplane, remember how blessed you are that your world is bigger than
your hometown. And remember that it’s
okay to celebrate those monumental moments in your life. And its okay to celebrate those moments that
aren’t so monumental too. Like when a
meeting I plan actually begins on time, or when the kids at the school call me
“sisi Nosipho” instead of “umlungu.” If
my time in Swaziland has taught me anything, it has been that life is much more
fruitful when you celebrate the simple, everyday victories.
The days following my bhuti’s departure have been filled
with much discussion of the time difference between Swaziland and Taiwan. Nearly every day I receive a knock at my door
from my sisi asking, “Nosipho, Make is wondering what is the time in
China?” Every day when I return home,
Make and Babe greet me on the porch with a discussion of what my bhuti is doing
at that moment, what the weather is like in Taiwan, and whether my bhuti will
have to subsist on a diet of frogs…
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