The countries...

A mural on the front of Lwandi Secondary School's library. Lwandi is located in the hills of Tanzania. I know the picture doesn't show every continent, but I thought it was neat none the less. A world map on the wall of a Tanzanian school is a symbol of how we can respect and even be a part of the whole world while loving and preserving our own culture- a great thing for students to remember as they are filling their minds with knowledge!

The other night, I closed my eyes and pointed on a map with a pencil. Here are the countries I randomly chose and the order I will be "traveling" to them. There are two countries from each contient, with the exception of Antarctica.

Week 1: Congo (Africa)
Week 2: Myanmar (Asia)
Week 3: Guyana (South America)
Week 4: Canada (North America)
Week 5: Spain (Europe)
Week 6: Micronesia (Australia/ Oceania)
Week 7: Eritrea (Africa)
Week 8: India (Asia)
Week 9: Columbia (South America)
Week 10: Mexico (North America)
Week 11: Albania (Europe)
Week 12: Australia (Australia/ Oceania)

I will now do my best to find the most interesting, and for all of us from the United States (as I am writing from the perspective of someone from the United States), the most out-of- the-ordinary, aspects of each of the above countries. I will come up with categories, write them on paper and pick them out of the hat. The order I pick them will determine what country they will go with, just as the order I picked each country (though I was going in a pattern with the continent piece) determines the week number it goes with. I'm so excited to officially begin this journey in exactly one month from now! Until then, much preparation is in order.

My goal:

Tanzania. My travels to Africa are the reason for my passion for culture. You will here about my travels!

Today marks the beginning of a three-month adventure for me. I am not usually the most technology-savvy teenager, nor technology's greatest friend. However, a passion of mine has brought me to blogging and I hope that what I post and what I do will help the world in some small way.

I am very concerned for the cultures of this world. I see them melding together, not in a unifying way, but rather a destructive way. I am so worried that in a matter of years, we will no longer be able to tell the difference between Germany and India, Spain and Russia because customs and ways of life will be deemed unimportant in this evolving world. I know the world is changing and I know that some melding is important to bring us all together as the human race. But I also believe that culture can be the ultimate way to find peace in this world. Culture, when we see it as a beautiful thing with a great purpose can really make life better for everyone, at least that's my opinion. I am now setting out to prove this opinion true, both to myself and also to the few or many that may read this blog over the next 84 days.

I vow now that beginning on January 1st 2011, I will "travel" to a different country of the world each week for a total of 3 months or 12 weeks. To do this, I will randomly pick 12 countries, two from each continent by closing my eyes and pointing to a map. For each country I will pick a specific and hopefully very unique aspect of their culture... a custom, a food, a holiday, etc and for the week will live out that aspect in my daily life. At the end of the week, you will all hear about it, day by day, and hopefully, I will be able to conclude one positive thing that came out of that piece of culture. As you will see over the next weeks, I like to think and often my ideas are very different and to some, very strange. At this point in time, you may be confused as to how something so small in the culture of one of the many countries around the world will prove to be vital in this world. But if I accomplish what I am setting out to do, things will become more clear to you and to me by April 1st, 2011... no joke (April Fools... get it? Sorry... puns won't be a usual... I promise )

As soon as I have my countries selected, I will post them as a way for you to hold me to those that I have picked as well as the cultural aspect I have picked for each one. Although this entire thing may seem small and I am not traveling outside of my country but only out of some of my ways of life, I am hoping that what I can conclude will be of some knowledge, at the very least to myself. I will, for three months be the "Weekly Traveller"... yes I know it is the wrong spelling, but purposefully so. The different spelling is symbolic of a new kind of traveling I will be doing- as I mentioned, I won't be leaving the United States, but instead will be "travelling" out of my comfort zone and out of my greatest passion.