Time in the mountains

Dark and dusty, a sanctuary amongst the ruthless mountain beauty. The unforgiving peaks cut through the clouds and will of any who dare summit them. Drakensberg Mountain range is a cathedral of suffrage and unfathomable reward. Tears, laughs, and all in between. Embedded in this scenic hellscape is a cave, is a dark and dusty cave.

This hallowed hole offers protection from the relentless wind and bone-chilling air. It is the resting place of a weary traveler, where a boy, barely a man, makes his shelter from the harshness of the outside world. He stands there at the cave’s mouth. Looking out at the rain pounding on the rugged plateau of the mountain range. He knows it is impossible to continue with weather like this. He drops his bag, admiring the hole in the mountains he resides in. The black rock walls provide a feeling of stability yet roughness and pain. He enjoys it. He runs his hands across their smooth surface smiling. 

The young man opens his bag and pulls out a pot and stove, preparing his meal for the day. He starts a fire with a small collection of sticks and cotton balls. He stares into the flames. He closes his eyes, taking a deep breath, then another, and another. He opens his eyes to reveal a melancholy face, longing. However, he looks back to the rocks again, and his smile returns once more.

“What are you cooking?” says the older man.

“Rice and beans.”

“My favorite.” 

“Yeah, mine too.”

“Why are you in these mountains?”

“I’m summiting the peak. I’m summiting the tallest there is.” 

“Why?”

“Because it’s hard. I want to do what is hard.”

The older man looks at him from across the flames. The lack of light discloses his face, but his eyes are ablaze. His eyes are the same as those that stare back at him, except they’re older, worn down, and tired.

“You think you will make it?” Asks the older man.

“Do you?”

“I’m not sure, doubt has crept its way into my mind, and it’s spreading.”

“Don’t doubt yourself. Anyone can do it. Anyone can make it.”

“But why do it? Do you think you’ll get something out of it?”

“Yes”

“Do you think you’ll be saved?”

“Maybe.”

“You won’t.” Says the older man as he puts out his cigarette.

“Nothing is final. The crater you’re looking to fill, it’s not a crater at all. It’s a river. A river that ebbs and flows through time, never leaving you. Sometimes it’s calm. Other times it’s chaos, but it flows. That is all.

An elderly man sits on a rock against the cave wall, smiling at the older man. The young one is gone.

“What?” Asks the older man. 

“You think you have it all figured out, right?”

“Do you?”

“Not at all, kid, not at all.” The elderly man says with a smile.

“So what’s next for me then, where is the garden, where is the river leading to?”

“I don’t know.” He continues to smile.

“How could you not know?”

“We never do, there never was a destination son, just another river leading to another, and on and on.”

“So why go forward?”

“The view.”

“The view?” The older man barks.

“The view is one special sight, worth a thousand lifetimes. Those people, those moments, cherish and love them, it’s all that comes with you.”

The old man is alone. He takes one last bite of rice and beans before packing his bag and throwing it over his worn-out shoulders. He smiles again, walking to the mouth of the dark and dusty cave. He looks out at the sprawling mountains and rolling hills. The rain finally subsides, and the sun begins to peek through the clouds. 

Photo by Jones Windhoesel, Instagram at jones.wdl and abovethecloudzz_

New Tides In South Africa

I’m searching for something stable, and I’ve found it. The surf is my crutch in these times of change. The tides of Gqeberha are different than those of the Pacific West Coast. South Africa’s Indian Ocean is a new beast, untamed in the landscape of my mind. The waves behave in a different process, but not an unfamiliar one of the home waves I once knew. The swell, the producer of the wave sets, and its energy is constant. Driving forward over and over again. Unlike San Diego, there seem to always be waves, granting me the freedom to leave behind life’s futility on shore and enter a pure state of mind. However, the wind dictates my quality of surf. It is my greatest enigma. One day it is onshore, blowing from sea to land, creating a chaotic mush leaving frothing surfers only with a bit of windburn and a lot of disappointment. However, as it seems, at a moment’s notice, fortunes change. The winds within the same day will flip 180 degrees. As a result, I am treated to vacant perfect waves. Well, the wind changes, but one thing remains constant: water’s unrelenting power.

             The learning curve of the ocean is grand. At home, I am a novice, but here I am in infancy within my knowledge of the water. I know nothing about anything, but I have learned before and will learn again here. See, well, these waves are new; they are not unfamiliar. I know the feeling of riding down the line. I know what it’s like to wake up with friends at 6 am and get there before sunrise. However, here, in this place, it is different. My life treads a new direction, one I’ve never experienced before. In South Africa, every person, place, and thing is new. Every fear is 10-fold. Every shortcoming is exacerbated by uprooting my life and the subsequent loss of all comfortability. However, every moment pushes me out of my tight box, farther and farther. Until I feel I cannot go another inch. But the waves and my board stay by my side through it all. Acting as my tether to the ground as the storm of culture shock, pressure, and social anxiety whirls around me.

             The ocean, through it all, calls me. When I am lost, it, no matter the upheaval in my life, shows me the way. My identity is mysterious at this moment. Like a mouse trapped in a desert, finding shade and protecting in the company of an oasis, that oasis, my life in San Diego, has dried up. I have nowhere to hide from the scorching sun. It looms on the horizon. My identity longs to hide, but I must face reality’s piercing rays. My life is gone. Nothing is normal except the peace I find in every breaking wave. The ocean and its graces have delivered me what was lost but not forsaken. Friends and a circle of positive individuals whose lights burn far greater than mine. They are new, yes, but not unfamiliar. They are foreign, but here in this new land, we are a part of the same nation. We are people. We are human beings bound by the same love of life. As a result, the storm has no power here. This land of South Africa has quickly become my home, and I am embedded within it.

The ocean, it calls me once again. We go at it together with my friends and companions on this new journey, reminding me home is not a place. It is a feeling, and when in that water surrounded by new friends, I feel at home.

Fleeting

Art by Milo Stibor, the homie*, follow him @milo.stibor13

I have been very desperate lately. I reach for a string to keep myself out of the all-consuming abyss of worry. The strings wear thin. I think soon I could fall in. Going overseas for an entire year is not a decision. It is a calling. Maybe even beyond a calling, more like a road from which I am irreversibly connected. The road leads into a murky cloud of uncertainty, a frightening but endlessly fascinating darkness. Now that I am departing in less than two weeks, I am closer to that dark cloud. I can begin to hear sounds radiating from its contents, laughs, cries, and everywhere in between. My consciousness fills in the lines in these waning hours in the States. I project memories onto that cloud, fantasizing about future moments for myself. However, my imagination and life experience are weak. I feel the gaps in my understanding and don’t know what will happen. Those gaps scare me as much as they excite. Gaps make room for questions. What will come of me when I am gone? Who will I lose in my life when I am overseas? Will I ever be the same again? Questions fly around my head like flies trapped in a jar, buzzing with incredible speed only to meet a glass wall. My thoughts, they too repeat this motion, hurling towards answers where there are none. The subsequent anxiety from the unknowables. It is strong. It is painful. But I am alright, remember, just breathe. 

The cloud of uncertainty lies across the ocean in South Africa, specifically the port city of Gqeberha (formerly Port Elizabeth). I know nothing of this place. I have never crossed an ocean for travel in my life. I am not familiar with other cultures on a personal level. I am not well versed in the schools of thought outside of America. In many ways, I am just another copy of the “Dumb American” archetype. However, where I see the difference within myself is my openness. I love people. They are fascinating and beautiful in their uniqueness. The discrepancy in people is what makes humanity the grotesque yet ethereal beauty that it is. I want to pursue this disparity, and I will go as far out on a limb as I must to get a piece of it. So I set my sights on South Africa, a place with a history and culture that mimics the enigma of us. From apartheid to the gracious heat of Nelson Mandela and all that is between. I want to come as an outsider and witness a life lived absent of the west’s supreme influence. I will record this journey here on this platform and within these words. To my loved ones, thank you for what you have done for me. To my friends, you inspire me every day to be better than I was the day before. God bless you all for putting me in the position to make a leap forward in the story of my life.

Something Small Right Now

Winds move across the desert, shifting the barren landscape side to side

Mountains rise tall, their peaks connecting this world to that of the divine

Rivers flow with crystal clear water, running and rumbling day and night, all the time

The ocean, vast and unmatched, housing the essence of life from where we came and from which we shall go, forever in a bind

There always was, and there will always be

For me, I am light amongst the endless cosmos, one single piece in the grand landscape of space and time

Yet I am changing

I am not going to be the same

I yearn for something, some assistance in this time of upheaval in my life, but there is none

I return to my breathe, I know my decision is the right one

I turn my head, looking up at the stairs, I am at peace

What I felt before I wrote: A different Age by Current Joys

Leaving it all behind

When am I going to be free? What is freedom anyway? When am I, Jared Rowlen, going to be free from everything that holds me down, holds me back, holds me from doing the things I should be doing? I’m twenty now. Old enough to call myself a man, old enough for others to look and see the flesh and bones of a young adult. But when I look inside, what do I see but a young, ignorant fool hoping to achieve the impossible. I want to be free from this ignorance. I want to feel like I am the man I hope to be. The confines of my self-doubt and the intense external pressure of family, friends, and life often seem too great to surmount. But deep down, I know, somehow, I can and will be free.

           In five days, I will depart for the country of South Africa for a year. A place that I know nothing about. However, I know that it is a place where the comforts of western society crumble. In 5 days, all this will be gone. All of this will be gone. My entire life will fade into the backdrop as my plane takes off from the ground. Family, friends, and the daily comforts of the west will slide away as I take on a new challenging adventure thousands of miles away. Sadness and a bittersweet taste have lingered on my tongue for some time now, as every time I see a face or location that has meant anything to me, it ends in goodbye. But today, that is not how I feel. Today something else has taken the melancholy place in my heart.

           This morning as I said goodbye to my brother at the airport, I drove home thinking about the time we spent together. The memories of youth flooded my memory as tears began to swell in my eyes. Like a coward, I ran from these emotions. I grabbed my phone and looked for solace in music, a habit I implore often. However, when I hit shuffle, a song, Free Bird, by Lynyrd Skynyrd came on. As the song played, all the sadness inside swelled, but then quickly, to my surprise, faded away. Replacing it was a feeling of love. I remembered listening to this song with my mother, as she told me it was this very song that was played at her high school graduation. Her words stuck with me and gave new meaning to the song. For the longest time, this song resembled a finish line, the anthem of when I would finally break through the clouds and chains that confine me. The moment when I leave the chaos to enter the much greener, grassier plains of self-worth and success. But that changed.

I suppose my mother felt that same feeling I did when she heard the song all those years ago. Finally, she was the free bird and was posed to score high and leave all the problems and inadequacies on the ground below her. But, as life has it, it has a way of grounding you. Divorce, tight money, and the daily stresses of life can clip even the strongest bird’s wings. However, against the odds, she faced down the obstacles that plagued her and charged forward, moving to provide a life for her two sons so they too could have the opportunity to fly. But in doing so, she lifted off the ground again, catching a second wind off the backs of her two creations. She flies again.

Now she sees me off, that in five days, I too will be gone. It brings me back, back to where I began in this piece. I am looking for salvation in Africa but will not find it there forever. Nothing is good forever, but what I do hope to find is something pure, something that transcends my inadequacies in manhood, abilities, and career. I look forward to the opportunity to love. To meet different people but connect solely on the one thing that makes any person unite: love for one another. In love, one can soar forever. They can fly high above the challenges of life. Love for your fellow man or woman is the only true finish line. Love and human connection, when I fail at it, I am at my lowest. However, when I succeed at it, I truly become that free bird. Like my mother, who loved me so dearly, she put her life on hold to see me fly. Now I head to Africa to test my wings, but with my mother’s grace in my heart, I know I will find the connection I desperately desire. Thank you for reading, may love tread in your heart every day.

Oregon countryside, near my father’s farm, where the desire for something different was born

A Letter to Remember

Dear Ghana,

I cannot thank you enough for making this one of the best decisions I’ve ever made for myself. You’ve welcomed me with open arms and an open heart. You’ve allowed me to explore who I am and what I want in life.

You’ve taught me that I’m stronger than I think (physically, mentally and emotionally) by putting me to the test hiking Mt. Afajato, challenging me with unexpected blackouts or rainstorms and even bargaining in the markets or with taxi drivers.

You’ve taught me to live in the moment and appreciate every given day, which should be lived to its fullest.

A Closer Look at Ghana

Hey, everyone! In this blog post, a wanted to give you a look at many of the incredible moments I’ve experienced during my time living in Ghana. These photos should not only give you insight into my experience thus far, but hopefully also debunk some of the myths or stereotypes you may have about Ghana.

Putting the STUDY, in Study Abroad

It may seem exciting that the University of Ghana uses the British grading system, because you can earn an A or B in your classes with lower scores than in the U.S. But all that excitement goes away when you find out that your classes consist of only an interim assessment (midterm), worth 30 percent if your grade, and a final exam worth 70 percent.

My Three Day Adventure in Cape Coast

Last weekend, we took a trip to Cape Coast, which was one full of many emotions and memories that I will never forget. Cape Coast is the capital of the central region, in south Ghana. It became heavily influenced by the British due to being used as a trading port and its role in the transatlantic slave trade. Although the city is healing from the trauma, it is still struggling economically.

Catch Me in Ghana, How ‘Bout That?!

Akwaaba everyone! Welcome to my first of many blog posts this semester while studying at the famed University of Ghana!

Meet Our New Bloggers

The new school year is almost upon us! For SDSU Be International, that means it’s time to welcome a new group of study abroad bloggers. We’re delighted to introduce the Aztecs Abroad who will be sharing their international experiences this Fall semester!