Egypt-Suez Canal Crossing
2018 World Cruise · Suez Canal Passage
Between Continents
Transiting the Suez Canal aboard Queen Mary 2—connecting the Red Sea with the Mediterranean, setting a course for Cyprus, and watching Africa officially separate from Asia.
“English? Why do I have to learn that? I’m never going to live in England.” I am glad I did not follow that advice.
The Passage
Suez Canal: Africa Severed from Asia
Transiting the Suez Canal today aboard Queen Mary 2, connecting the Red Sea with the Mediterranean. Then setting a course for our next port of call in Cyprus.
The canal is more than a shortcut. It is a hinge between oceans, continents, empires, histories and the next chapter of the voyage.
Around the World in 80 Clips on Ships
A moving archive of ships, passages, crossings and the world seen from the deck.
Watch the World Go By2018 World Cruise
The wider voyage behind the Suez crossing, the ports that followed and the year-long archive of movement.
Open the 2018 World CruiseThe Call
American English as Mission Equipment
The Defense Language Institute at Lackland Air Force Base brings foreign military personnel from around the world to learn American English and American culture.
Language here is not decorative. It is operational. It carries instructions, reduces uncertainty, prevents misunderstanding and creates enough shared meaning for people to act together under pressure.
The Threshold
Leaving the War Route
The route out of Afghanistan moved through military aircraft, transit bases, commercial airports and a sequence of places that felt less like destinations than operational handoffs.
The Foreign Land
Military Air to Commercial Flight
Fort Bliss, El Paso. New Hampshire. Miami. Norwegian Air from MIA to LGW. What a difference from military air.
The same body moves through both systems, but the emotional machinery changes: from cargo straps and mission clocks to boarding groups, cabin lighting and the almost surreal normality of civilian travel.
The Trials
Learning to Slow Down
When the weather is good, there is no better place than the British countryside. We walk through forests, along rivers and shorelines, creating our own fairy tale and carefully nurturing a sentiment for the simple life.
Being in the countryside is like being in a dream, where you do not quite know who is who but can tell what is what.
There is an anonymity to it all when you connect with nature. The Dude Abides principle says there is an energetic force with your best interests at heart, available whenever you choose to notice it.
Doing nothing in particular, you feel nature somatically through the senses: fermented hay, peat, grass, rain and the vivid colour that arrives after liquid sunshine.
The Revelation
Delay Is Not Denial
Courage is found in the quietest places. A glance at white chalk cliffs or Arundel silage produces a desire to continue. Around the corner there may wait a new road or secret stream.
Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience. Infinite patience can produce immediate results because it changes the person doing the waiting.
Alive and breathing, the landscape watches over us and we are renewed. The good earth laughs in flowers.
The Next Port
Cyprus: The Crossroads
After Suez, the route turns toward Cyprus—a Mediterranean crossroads where archaeology, empire and contemporary life occupy the same ground.
Cyprus: Digging It
A field note from the island where layers of history remain close to the surface.
Read Cyprus: Digging ItThe Return
It All Belongs to All of Us
When we go into the sun with green grass, pasture, grazing sheep, thatched roofs, swans and everything flowering, I say it all belongs to all of us.
The route through war, transit and return changes the scale of ordinary beauty. A field becomes evidence. Rain becomes confetti. Quiet becomes an operational reset.
We Speak English or People Die
This field note belongs to the larger 2019 Afghanistan deployment: live missions, cultural contrasts and language under pressure.
Read About Language Under PressureBeing There
Learning, yearning and still earning the meaning of presence after the mission.
Read Being ThereSeven Places, One Connected Story
The Mediterranean as a Single Narrative
These places are not separate entries in a travel diary. They are connected chambers in one larger story of movement, identity, history and return.
The Hinge
Open GibraltarThe Extended Living Room
Open SpainThe Mirror
Open FranceThe Mythic Archive
Open ItalyBeginner's Mind
Open GreeceThe Crossroads
Open CyprusThe Passage
Open the 2018 World CruiseThe Elixir
The World Does Not Owe the Traveler Comfort
Travel expands the map by testing the threshold. The souvenir is optional; the perspective comes aboard whether you buy it or not. Language gets us through the mission. Nature teaches us how to come back.