How Travel and Cultural Connections Help Us See Strangers differently
The Stranger
For decades, I've traveled throughout the world as a documentary photographer.
I've entered communities where I didn't speak the language. I've photographed people whose religions, cultures and traditions were very different from my own.
The farther I traveled from home, the harder it became to believe that human beings were truly separate.
Our clothing may have been different.
Our prayers may have been different.
Our languages may have been different.
But everywhere I went, people loved their children.
They grieved.
They laughed.
They worried.
They celebrated.
They wanted to belong.
They wanted to be seen.
And they wanted to know that their lives mattered.
I remember being very sick one day in Morocco and I took refuge in a rug shop with a small bench while I waited for my group.
The owner, a Muslim man, could tell that I wasn't well.
He didn't ask me what religion I practiced.
He didn't ask about my politics.
He didn't ask what country I came from before deciding whether I deserved his kindness. He was so gentle and kind while he escorted me to his bathroom so I could put cold water on my face. He went off and then returned with a hot cup of tea using his own grown lemons and honey.
In that moment, there was no Muslim and Christian, no Moroccan and American, no stranger and stranger.
There were simply two human beings sharing the same fragile, beautiful experience of being alive. He simply saw another human being who was hurting and thought, I have something that might help.
And perhaps that is where Namaste truly begins—not when we become the same, but when we look beyond everything that tells us we are separate and recognize:
Your humanity belongs to mine.
Your life matters to me.
I see you.
That is the bow.
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