The Anxiety of the Lone Wolf

February 26, 2016 Rob Sims Leave a comment

Milepost 2-26-16 -at a vacation rental in the Dominican Republic

“Introvert, Know Thyself”. This is my most recent note-to-self. I am experiencing a bit of emotional discomfort in my current setting, and I’m realizing that I over-estimated my ability to find solitude in a highly social culture. For an introvert like me, solitude is essential to a balanced life and healthy emotional equilibrium.

Everybody is different, and it would be easy to assume that the majority of travelers and adventurers are extroverts, loving the excitement and the challenges of far-away places and exotic cultures. I don’t know if that is the case, and I am not about to launch a study to find out.

What I do know is what an introvert like me needs when it comes to adventure – and life in general:

I can enjoy crowds and parties and parades and other highly social settings, but only for a short time, and those experiences need to be followed by a season of hibernation, of being alone so that I can refuel my emotional tank.
On the other hand, if I am inactive for very long, I will get restless and need to get outside and satisfy my adventure quotient.
The best balance of these two factors – of solitude and adventure – is to find adventures in sparsely populated locations. Or to follow my crowded adventures with solo adventures in solitary places.
I don’t like cold weather for very long. I can handle Michigan through Christmas every year with just the right allocation of snow and brisk clear air, but after that, the winter is far too long. This is a third factor that complicates my search for the right balance. There aren’t that many southern destinations that offer solitude. RV parks are notorious for noise and overcrowding. For the solitary soul, they are tolerable when and if there are quiet areas nearby.

Where I ran into trouble this winter was that I chose a tropical setting in the middle of a highly social open-air culture for too long a period of time. 10 weeks of noise, bustling streets, merengue music blasting until after midnight every night… well, I just can’t seem to get away from it long enough to refill my emotional tank. Of course, even the beaches are crowded with bodies this time of year.

There are few sidewalks, so pedestrians and traffic share the streets. It's dangerous, and can be irritating. — There are few sidewalks and no parking lots here, so pedestrians share the streets with parked vehicles and moving traffic. It’s dangerous, and can be irritating to a weary traveler.

I find myself avoiding the interaction with the locals that I love so much – for short periods. I just want to stay home and be alone.

Fortunately, Kaye and I are very much alike in most of these ways, only she likes the northern winters and doesn’t need as much adventure as I do.

We solve this by scheduling what we call Bob-alone times. I can head off on a solo adventure, thus satisfying my appetite for adventure, while both of us get to refresh by being alone for a while.

Most of my solo adventures are short, lasting only a few hours. A bike ride down the nearest rail trail works just fine, and I don’t have to talk to anyone along the way, simply nodding to other cyclists that I meet on the trail. I do this several times a week during the fair weather seasons.

Longer alone times usually involve a tent, a sleeping bag and a cooler full of goodies… and my camera, of course. Last summer, I celebrated my birthday by heading up north to the woods with my bike to pedal for miles on end at a beautiful paved bike trail through the woods and dunes of the national lakeshore in northern Michigan. I camped at a state forest campground by a quiet stream where there was hardly anyone else around. Ah, solitary bliss.

The Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail is a premiere cyclist's destination that winds along the shoreline for 27 miles. It's a steep one with grades of up to 11%. — The Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail is a premiere cyclist’s destination that winds along the shoreline for 27 miles.

I always feel that when I am alone with myself… I am in good company. If you are an introvert, you likely know what I am saying.

Anyway, I am sharing this side of myself for the benefit of other would-be adventures who may not entirely understand what happens to them when they feel stressed while living in a foreign culture for an extended period of time. Maybe you are an introvert. Maybe you need to study yourself a bit more and find ways to hibernate from time to time for the sake of your own well-being… and the well-being of those who are traveling with you.

I really do write notes-to-myself that I refer to before scheduling the next outing. It is good to know yourself. The thing is, you can’t always know how you will feel or react in a given situation until you try it out.

And that is part of the adventure.

Know thyself. And have fun!

The Dominican Beach

Venturing Outside the Walls

February 6, 2016 Rob Sims Leave a comment

Milepost 2-6-16 -We are at a vacation rental in the tropics.

Here’s a tip about travel that first-timers may not discover on their own: The real adventure is often where the real people are. I am talking about the backstory that is on the backstreets of your travel destination. I am talking about the true cultural realities that exist outside the walls of the gated resort where you are staying.

Many travelers see a carefully scripted performance when they go on vacation at the all-inclusive resort. Even the cruise lines that claim to visit exotic islands, as it turns out, may have bought the island and designed an elaborate facade that is only a fake reproduction of the real culture that they are trying to depict. But it’s not real.

If you like it that way, fine. If you want to stay within the enclave, you should be comfortable and safe. Hopefully, you will be able to relax and have a good time, maybe even make some new friends. For you, it may be exactly the right thing. But you might be able to ratchet your adventure factor to the next level with a venture outside the walls.

Culturally, the real fun begins when you leave the reservation. When you leave Front Street and venture to Second or Third Street… or even farther to where the street turns into a pathway.

When the waiter comes to your table at the resort, do you ever ask yourself, “Who is this person? Where does he live? Does she have a family? What’s her name?” Better yet, don’t just ask yourself… ask the waiter.

When I was in the Maldive Islands, my scuba diving buddies asked these questions of our guide, a young man named Ibrahim. After 2 weeks of friendly interaction with him, we were surprised when he invited us to come to his home and meet his wife — they were expecting their first child. This sort of encounter is unheard of in the Maldives where the government requires strict oversight of tourists; it just never happens. But for us, it happened. The day before Ibrahim escorted us to the airport, he started crying, and threw himself at us with hugs and weeping as we parted company. I couldn’t believe it. This was unreal. No. This was real.

This sort of rich adventure can be really hard to find when you are on a 10-day cruise where your movements are scheduled and your encounters carefully scripted. It is hard to escape the confines and get to the raw realities of the real culture.

One of the blessings of the traveling life that Kaye and I are now enjoying is the extravagance of being able to stay as long as we want wherever we want. We love to find out where the natives live, and we have been invited into their homes lots of times. Nobody tells us where to be or at what time. We decide for ourselves.

This winter, we are staying 10 weeks in a little town on the beach in the Dominican Republic. We have learned enough Spanish to be able to venture onto the side roads and back alleys to see how these people really live.

In fact, by planning ahead, we were able to visit an indigenous family in the interior of the country just yesterday. We have been sponsoring a kid through an international humanitarian organization that provides underprivileged children with a quality education and health care. Yorgelis is now 15 years old and we got to meet him. We hired a car and driver who was able to find his way through the maze of backroads and the small towns (on the cell phone with the host several times for directions) to find these guys in an obscure neighborhood far (4 hours one way) from the tourist resorts.

We were able to visit our sponsored child's family in their home. — We were able to visit our sponsored child’s family in their home.

What an amazing experience! Their family is actually part of a community of artists and have a pottery factory in their backyard. Did you ever wonder who makes the vases and bowls and cups that you find in the gift shops at the resorts where you stay? We found them.

We got to tour the school where our kid has been educated for the last 9 years, and then his family put on a demonstration for us in the pottery shop. We could not have asked for a more beautiful experience with an authentic indigenous family. Precious.

Here I am with Yorgelis and his dad and granddads.

We now have some pottery to add to our international collection at home. And here’s the thing: We know the people who made it.

That is the stuff of real adventure.

Here are a few more photos from our visit to the interior yesterday:

This guy threw a beautiful vase in about 5 minutes. — This guy threw a beautiful vase on the potter’s wheel in about 5 minutes.

Yorgelis' dad carved flowers onto the vase in a minute. — Yorgelis’ dad carved flowers onto the vase in a minute.

Yorgelis' family gave us gifts of pottery. At the rear is his teacher, and on the right is our host and guide from the organization. — Yorgelis’ family gave us gifts of pottery. At the rear is his teacher, and on the right is our host and guide from the organization.

One of the workers was stoking the fire under the kiln

We found a nice fruit market on the way home, and our driver provided some tips on selecting avocados. — We found a nice fruit market on the way home, and our driver provided some tips on selecting fresh avocados.

I hope you are able to get outside the walls on your next adventure!

Have fun!

The Dominican Beach

When Giving Back – Gives Back

February 2, 2016 Rob Sims Leave a comment

Milepost 2-2-16 –living in a rented apartment near the beach.

My dad used to say that the real joy of having anything – is sharing it, and I proved him right again today. The joy of artistic expression through photography has been multiplied by the joy of giving as I have been visiting my Dominican neighbors with copies of photos that I took of them 3 years ago.

I have made a project of printing the photos, mounting them on 5×7 rigid foam backings, and then handing them to the folks who are in the photos. Part of the fun for me is experiencing the reactions of people who don’t often get noticed by passersby, let alone being given a memorable gift that will almost certainly become a family treasure.

We visited friends at the local colmado (mini-market) who said they knew everybody in the photos. Some of them were in the photo from 3 years ago displayed at the top of this page.

A lot can change in 3 years, and it has been both surprising and gratifying for me to locate so many of the folks that I photographed last time we were here, although in one case, the horse was the same and the people were different.

I shot these guys washing their horses in the ocean 3 years ago... — I shot these guys washing their horses in the ocean 3 years ago…

... and found the same horse this time being ridden by his brother. — … and found the same horse this time being ridden by the man’s brother.

The quest to locate these people has created a secondary adventure that is even more fun than the original photo expedition. When I found one young guy at a fruit stand, the place had changed a lot and I didn’t recognize him. When I stopped and showed him the photo asking him, “Where can I find this guy?” he looked at the photo and pointed at it and then himself, exclaiming, “It’s me!”

This guy was running a fruit market and gift shop 3 years ago... — This young guy was running a fruit market and gift shop 3 years ago…

... and I found him at the same market, though I didn't recognize it from the photo. — … and I found him at the same market, though I didn’t recognize it from the photo.

One of the funnest reunions was when we finally located a little old grandma — after several stops to ask where she was, each stop getting us a little closer to her. She was on the porch of a house with her granddaughters mixing a big bowl of cake batter. When we handed her the photo her eyes got big and she threw back her head and started laughing. They passed the photo around with excitement and then she told us the old house had fallen down, and she pointed to an empty slab next door. Yes, there had been some changes in 3 years.

3 years ago I stopped to shoot a 10-foot high poinsettia plant and found these beautiful old folks in the doorway of their shack. — 3 years ago I stopped to photograph a 10-foot high poinsettia plant and found these beautiful old folks in the doorway of their shack.

We found her living with her grandkids next door to where her house had been. — This time we found her living with her grandkids next door to where her house had been.

Coco was the maintenance man at the condos where we stayed 3 years ago. I had fired his son to wash my rental car. Coco has since been in a motorcycle wreck that destroyed his knee. He has had it reconstructed and doesn't even limp now. — Coco was the maintenance man at the condos where we stayed 3 years ago. I had hired his son to wash my rental car. Coco has since been in a motorcycle wreck that destroyed his knee. He has had it reconstructed and doesn’t even limp now.

The night watchman, Sergio, has nearly died of cancer since we were there. Now they say he will likely survive.

Photography is a wonderful traveling companion. Feeding my artistic appetites has brought me a lot of satisfaction over the years. And in giving it back to my subjects and enriching their lives in this small way, I have found a way to feed my soul as well.

The real joy of having a photograph is sharing it — not just with the cyber world, but with the people who shared their beautiful faces to make it what it is, a work of art.

I love the people of the Dominican Republic. They are gorgeous, inside and out.