After almost 82 hours of traveling through five Countries, the 54 of us made it to Phnom Penh Cambodia on March 7. It was an exciting and exhausting journey of four flights, many bus rides, and an overnight in Los Angeles where we were able to get a small taste of America again.
When we found out over a month ago that we’d be flying through LA we were all very excited about getting American luxuries again, even if it was only for a night. In fact, we had been planning for weeks all the food we were going to eat, and writing lists of what we wanted to get at Target and REI.
I was very excited to be in LA, eating chicken tacos at Chili’s, but I was surprised at how quickly I picked up my rights again. Before going on the Race, we were asked to give up the rights we have as Americans. The right to being clean (aka having showers), the right to eating well, the right to having things when I want them. Over the past two months I feel like I’ve been pretty good at giving up my rights. I’ve taken bucket showers sometimes only 1-2 times a week, I’ve eaten some pretty tasteless food, and I’ve gone into some of the poorest places of the nations. After giving all this up, I found myself eating way more food than my body could handle just because I “hadn’t had it in two months”, taking a 25 minutes shower, and spending way too much money at Target on things that I probably didn’t need and only got because I was in America.
I’m not saying that’s it’s bad to have American luxuries and there are plenty of days when it’s 100+ degrees that I wish I had things like air conditioning. I just don’t want to depend on American comfort to get me through life. I would like my life to thrive and be content in and out of comfortability and I realized that I still hold on to my rights and comforts as an American. When I come home in 9 months I want my perspective on life to be changed and to not have the same expectations I used to. I’m getting there. It just takes grace and time.
Nevertheless, we had a fun time and it was captured all on video. Enjoy my account reliving what it’s like to be a World Racer on travel days!
