“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page.”
-Saint Augustine
In July, I took a nine-day vacation and went on a road trip with my good friend. This was my first time traveling since February, a record amount of time for not traveling over the last ten years. So, I was very excited and nervous about the trip like a kid waiting for his Christmas gifts.
We drove from Boston to Dallas. We allocated a decent amount of time for checking out and exploring different states. In total, we crossed 14 states and drove 2,170 miles. To give you some perspective, a straight drive from Boston to Seattle is about 3,045 miles.
I added four new states to my list on this trip, so now I have officially been to 41 different states. The four new states are Rhode Island, West Virginia, Mississippi, and Arkansas. The way I define “officially visited a state” means you spend a night, have a meal or coffee in a small town or city, visit a landmark, drive through parts of it, and/or spend at least a couple hours in that state. Airport layovers and dining in the airport don’t count.
We planned the trip around local famous cuisines, landmarks, and avoided major cities. So, in Boston, we had lobster rolls. We dropped by Brown University in Rhode Island and had a pint of beer by the Providence River. Of course, we had lox and bagels outside New York City. We bolted through New Jersey for the obvious reason and toured the Nemours Estate in Delaware, a huge mansion and garden built by the DuPont family modeled after Versailles. Then, we spent a day hiking in the Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. From there, we drove through West Virginia and visited the New River Gorge and the Greenbrier Hotel, which is modeled after the White House. We swung by Lexington, KY and had the best fried chicken and wagyu beef meatloaf gravy. We headed down to Tennessee and had amazing hot chicken in Nashville and BBQ in Memphis. We did check out Graceland from the outside. We spent a night in Mississippi and then cut through to Arkansas. In Arkansas, we had picnic lunch by the Arkansas River in Little Rock and paid a visit to Bill Clinton’s Presidential Library and Park. The final stretch from Little Rock to Dallas was brutal, but with In-n-Out Burger and Tex-Mex food in mind, we were able to punch it through
It’s really hard for me to pinpoint a favorite location or food during this trip, but the landscapes of West Virginia unexpectedly and pleasantly surprised me. The state is so beautiful. Shenandoah is not Machu Picchu or Yosemite, but it’s darn alluring and charming. I can see the beauty and understand why musicians write songs about it. Last, visiting the Nemours Estate’s DuPont Mansion gave me a little piece of Europe, knowing that I won’t be able to visit Europe anytime soon.
Disclaimer: My friend planned the whole trip and I just provided moral support and ate 🙂
Insights on Traveling Through the South as an Asian
“No place is ever as bad as they tell you it’s going to be.”
-Chuck Thompson
We spent a good amount of time traveling through the South during this trip. I have been to the South multiple times, mostly to major cities or short drives outside the city, for instance from Raleigh to the Outer Banks or Atlanta to Athens to speak at the University of Georgia. This is the first time I’ve actually spent days driving through the South and staying in different little towns.
As a person of color, I always have this fear of the South. This fright of the South comes from the stories of historical racial violence toward Black people and other people of color and the current resurgence of white supremacy. So, I have to admit before the trip, I had to mentally prepare myself. And while driving through the South, I did see trucks and houses carrying the Confederate flag, so I was always looking over my shoulder.
In reality, everyone that I encountered was very friendly and cordial. It might be that I was visiting and not living in those states. But, I constantly had to remind myself that, yes, there are still racist and angry bigots out there, but they don’t represent the majority of people. In fact, their numbers are small compared to decent people.
I know a number of people, including people of color who wouldn’t even consider traveling to those states. I think it’s because their views are clouded by their prejudicial assumptions of those areas and they are consumed by fear, which I can relate to. However, I keep telling myself that I am not going to let fear win over my freedom and growth. Instead, I am going to continue to live my life to the fullest and let my curiosity flourish, and at the same time practice safety precautions. It’s like all the professional and personal trips that I have taken before. There was always some sort of danger and risk. If I allowed my fear to dictate, then I would never leave my house. If I didn’t practice common sense, then most likely I would experience misfortunate during those trips.
Another reflection that I kept pondering while driving through the South was the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Expatriation Act of 1907, and the final overturn of the miscegenation laws in 1967. The Chinese that came to the United States in the 19th century to build the railroad were legally prohibited to marry white females.[i] On top of that, the Expatriation Act of 1907 decreed that any American women who married a foreign citizen, especially Chinese, would lose her American citizenship.[ii]
I am NOT planning to get married anytime soon. However, my traveling companion on this road trip is a very dear friend and she is a white woman. Thus, I couldn’t stop reminiscing and imagining the life, the discrimination and challenges Chinese men experienced over a hundred years ago. The freedom and privilege that I have now were totally deprived from them.
Tips on Traveling during Pandemic
I have been on over a dozen road trips in my life. Some of those are cross-country trips like from Los Angeles to Seattle, Denver to Los Angeles to Portland and back to Denver, Boston to Iowa and to Denver, and Tallahassee to Key West. Traveling and road-tripping during the COVID 19 Pandemic is definitely different and a bit more challenging. But, nevertheless, it’s totally worth it.
Some states are more diligent with their COVID-19 then others, but all the places we visited required mask-wearing and a majority of the people did comply with these rules. The only state that we noticed was very relaxed about physical distancing and COVID-19 precaution was Kentucky. For us is to use common sense. Below are the basic tips and common sense that we used to keep us safe and healthy:
- We brought tons of hand sanitizer and alcohol wipes with us. We were constantly cleaning our faces, hands, and clothing.
- I used alcohol wipes to clean my phone two or three times per day. Cell phones are one of the dirtiest objects we come in contact with every day. A study done by the University of Arizona has found that mobile phones carry 10 times more bacteria than most toilet seats.[iii]
- On top of wiping my phone, I cleaned my credit card, keys, and sunglasses constantly throughout the day. Of course, I didn’t even handle any cash at all.
- Some gas stations provided biodegradable gloves for pumping gas so we used those.
- I brought two cloth masks and every night I washed the masks.
- We kept our physical distance with EVERYONE. We still engaged in casual conversations with strangers. We simply respectfully stepped back and kept the distance.
- We packed a lot of snacks to avoid time spent in the gas stations or convenience stores.
- We only ate at restaurants that had outside patio seating and had physically distant tables.
- Whether in a small city or out at the parks, we avoid groups of people by either walking around them or driving to another spot.
[i]https://go.gale.com/ps/anonymous?id=GALE%7CA403167051&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=abs&issn=10517642&p=AONE&sw=w
[ii] https://asiasociety.org/blog/asia/how-mixed-chinese-western-couples-were-treated-century-ago
[iii] https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/beauty/your-phone-might-be-ten-times-dirtier-than-a-toilet-20180718-p4zs5v.html
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