What inspires me? Taking photos, picking fruit, sending letters, standing on the side of the road to watch an amazing sunset. Simplicity at its best or so it seemed.
The photos were taken of children at an AIDS prevention clinic in Africa. Goosebumps never felt so good until then…
The fruit was picked straight from the Syrian trees of the Middle East alongside farmers whose hands have tended the land for hundreds, thousands of years. Fruit never tasted so nourishing until then…
The letters were sent sitting at a Parisian café sipping espresso and listening to people as they walked through Les Champs et Lycees. Conversations never sounded so intriguing until then…
And the only reason I was made to stand on the side of the road to witness the sunset was because about two hundred sheep decided to park themselves in the middle of the road while I was navigating my way through New Zealand’s Remarkable mountain range. Sunsets never felt so patient until then…and wearing wool hasn’t felt the same since.
What seemed simple proved to be deliciously complex. I’ve learned that life experiences are what you make them to be; simple or complex, valuable or forgotten, big or small, real or imagined. I grew up in an Ohio suburb to a Syrian/Argentine, immigrant family whose parents were in an arranged marriage. I didn’t need quizzical stare-downs to know I looked different and I didn’t need my mother speaking in Arabic to stand out as “strange or exotic”. What I did need was for someone to explain that different means many things and that Arabic was a language widely spoken in the world and was not code for terrorist. I needed someone to help open the minds around me so I could breathe…like everybody else. I learned that I was going to have to become that someone.
My life experiences grew stories, lessons and teachings about global customs, cultures, people and places of the world. When I realized how important it is to inspire open minds and open hearts, I also realized I needed to SHARE this with others. Who knows how many other fourth-graders (just like myself) need my story to change their experience from feeling foreign and strange to interesting and new.
So now I tell people that you don’t have to travel to the Middle East to learn that it’s full of peaceful people and legendary family values. You don’t have to travel to Japan to learn that sushi is edible and all Japanese are not into martial arts. And you don’t have to travel to Africa to realize the gift of a clean glass of water. All of these things can be experienced anywhere, anytime. If we are open to learning about them. Then and only then can we experience the benefits of such a diverse world and live simply amongst the complicated backgrounds of each other.
Seek something new, revel in the different and always share your story. You never know who needs to hear it.
Stacy Eugenia George
CEO
Around the World LLC
