Travel lets us experience otherness, and the value of that can be life-changing.
Photo by Andrew Thompson.
A few weeks ago I saw a film so beautiful to me, I pushed the ‘play’ button again the moment it ended. In Night Train to Lisbon, Jeremy Irons is an ageing teacher in a listless life who comes across a book, or rather, the book seems to find him.
An exquisitely illogical moment finds him on board a train, and then his life takes a wonderful turn. For me, the gentle pace of discovery in the film portrays everything that I love about travelling: the notion that worlds and lives run parallel to our own, and leaning into these other lives allows us the space to reconsider our set attitudes and how we’ve constructed our own worlds. And that the readjustment that happens after this allows us more room for richness in our own lives – it’s as if the gaps we didn’t know were there suddenly become visible and we can notice what we can add, or take away.
I get this same feeling when I read our columnist Darrel Bristow-Bovey’s story about the gorillas in Rwanda. But let’s take a step back to how that trip began.
A western lowland gorilla seen through thick vegetation in west Africa. Africa’s jungles are perhaps the most primal habitats on Earth, incredibly rich and diverse but by the same token, stifling. Even the mighty gorilla is both reliant on and trapped by the forest. Photo by Jamie McPherson.
I have read at least 20 stories on gorilla tracking; perhaps you have too. So one of my desires as an editor has been to get the story I want to – and actually will – read to the end. The one that isn’t a cliché. One person who had ardently put his name forward for such a trip – if ever I would consider it – was Darrel. As it happened, a couple of month’s ago it was Rwanda’s Kwita Izina ceremony (read what that is on page 82) and into my inbox popped the invite. ‘Would we be interested in attending?’ asked Rwanda Tourism.
This I forwarded to Darrel.
‘YABBADABBADOOOOOO!’ he replied. And so we met up for a drink.
‘Darrel,’ I said, ‘I do not want the story of “I looked into the gorilla’s eyes and felt my ancestors/a deep connection/etc”. I have read that a hundred times before. I want something surprising, something insightful. Can you give me something like that? How will you give me something like that? I’m not sure if I should go to the expense of two tickets to Rwanda. In fact, perhaps I should send Tyson [Jopson, the deputy ed whom I think walks on water]…’
‘I shall come to your office and fell every single one of you and stand over your broken bodies beating my chest and letting out a blood-curdling cry of lament and fury,’ said Darrel.
So I sent him.
And then I got a story I feel very proud of as an editor. Not that I lay any claim to its excellence – that is Darrel’s alone, and the beautiful images that go with it are our photographer Teagan’s – but it is the very best story I’ve read about gorilla trekking, and it makes me laugh. It also makes me feel the roundedness of life on this earth.
It impressed on me how we all hang together, are affecting each other, from the invisible flu virus to the massive gorilla, from the sea to the Syrian refugee. And I have read it to the end.
I am very proud of this issue. There is so much to inspire your next trip (I hope) however short, such as where to find the best fish restaurant in Cape Town (on page 57). For longer journeys, read the story on Port St Johns by our Vuyi Qubeka, it is lovely and soulful, plus Tudor Caradoc-Davies’ great ideas (page 72) for getting out into SA’s beautiful spaces.
Enjoy the break. Enjoy your people, the creatures, the sea, the bush, the mountains, the fresh air and all our lovely spaces.
This article first appeared in the December 2015 issue of Getaway magazine.
