ktravula – a travelogue!

Memories of Iowa

The only mental picture of Iowa that I had before embarking on a road trip last weekend was that of driving through corn fields. All I had heard about it from politicians speaking to campaign crowds on television always included something about “corn fields” or the “hawkeye”. I never quite figured out what the hawkeye refers to, but what impressed me the most about driving through the state was something just as green: windmills.

Much of the midwest is a flat terrain. The view of the sunset out of my window in Southern Illinois at 6 o’ clock in the evening is one of the best I’ve seen anywhere. Being on the road at anytime from five pm anywhere around these parts is – if only for the view of the sun disappearing gently out of sight – one of the most pleasant. The trip however started earlier in the morning so we had a benefit of the sunrise as well. By the time we got to Iowa, after driving past Hannibal, it was already past noon. We had a stopover at Godfather’s Pizza (Herman Cain’s old job), and had our first encounter of a different kind of Midwestern accent.

Back to windmills. Somehow, for some reason, my idea of states with green priorities and dependence on wind energy never quite fit my image of Midwestern states. I thought of places San Francisco, or San Diego, or other parts of California and other mostly blue states: Hawaii, Rhode Island, etc. So when driving for about four hours through Iowa, everywhere we saw on the horizon had dozens of windmills, there was some disorientation. It eventually made sense with the realization that the flatness of the land makes the tapping of wind energy a sensible investment. (A news story about the disenfranchisement of ex-felons in the state eventually punctured my idea of the state as mostly progressive in politics, but that’s the story for another time).

At Cedar Rapids, we stopped by the Czech Village, a small neighbourhood created to celebrate the contribution of Czech and Slovak cultures to the United States. The small art shop which now houses a temporary exhibit of some of its most prized artworks welcomed guests with open arms. In 2008, it became the victim of flooding brought about by rain and the overflowing of the Cedar River. Today, a line runs about seven feet high in the art store showing guests the level of water when the whole neighborhood almost went under. As tall as I am, it took me stretching all my arm to be able to reach the water mark. The National Czech & Slovak Museum and Library itself was just a few blocks away. With contributions from donors from around the country, it has now been rebuilt and refurbished, and would be opened officially on July 14 and 15. (Little trivia: former President Bill Clinton was at the initial opening of the library in 1995, along with the president of Czech Republic and Slovakia.)

There are a few other memories involving Clear Lake, and Des Moines, two different but equally enchanting cities. Clear Lake it was where the three famous rock and roll musicians died in a plane crash in 1959. No coincidence, it was also where, on encountering a surprise traffic buildup on the highway close to Mason City, our vehicle got into a bumper-to-bumper accident involving two other cars. No one was hurt, except two of the cars. Des Moines is the capital of Iowa, with one of the most fascinating capitol buildings I’ve seen so far. Well, the car is still in Iowa, which means that there’s another trip coming up soon to pick it up. This time, we just might be able to spend a few more hours exploring Iowa City, the state’s second largest city, and maybe at Waterloo – the birthplace of John Wayne.

Iowa makes it the fifth Midwestern state I’ve visited so far, after Missouri, Minnesota, Illinois, and Kansas. One day soon, maybe there will be Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin and Michigan. I sense a book of travel stories coming up. Each of the state capitols around the country present unique delights. And like the huge one in Providence (RI), Iowa’s is a gold-plated dome in Des Moines that sits on a massive building. In front of it is a statue of three figures from the state’s history, all facing westwards. Iowa, we also found, is home to one of the oldest mosques in the United States, also with the first National Muslim Cemetery in North America. The things we learn everyday.

I guess that explains why it has remained a swing state for a while.

Watercolor Memories

The most pleasurable pleasures of my childhood were those I had moving around with father who was a broadcaster, record producer, culture researcher, and writer. There were many more which included haunts of the neighbourhood in Akobo where we lived in Ibadan (at one time West Africa’s largest city). There was a railway line that ran through the area about two miles from where our house was located. The blare of its horns was always piercing through the morning air. I remember the sense of awe and delight the first time I walked onto the tracks for the first time. We had just got back from school, and we walked, and ran, aimlessly around the area through bushes, paths, houses and dusty roads until the rail tracks showed up, then stretched in two directions away from view. I have encountered a few other moments in life where the simple pleasures of new discoveries made everything else seem insignificant, and with memory being the only consolation for their brief, fleeting existence.

I was eight, and father was driving to Akure in an old Isuzu. Hands on the wheel, and hungry, he asked me the excited son to feed him bread from the passenger’s seat since I had two hands free. There was another one with mother at the wheel driving somewhere, and insisting that drivers should never turn their heads back from the road. It was my duty to look out to find the right water bottle we had wanted to buy from many of those hanging out of the many shops we were driving around. Where are those days? Faces come in and out of that seemingly crowded childhood: Seye, the distant cousin who rode a bicycle, and later joined the military; Baba M who drove the brown Toyota van; Lanko Lanko who made bread a few houses away and who – from now distant memory – looked like the biggest woman I had ever seen. Iya Tobi was the one who pilfered grandmother’s kola nuts. Grandfather liked ludo. Grandmother liked singing, and storytelling, and gardening.

The best rationale I can muster for keeping a public journal of thoughts is so as to re-live the delights of a charming childhood and now an equally stimulating adult experience. It is not remarkable that I’m writing this now from a cozy comfort of a Chicago hotel, but there is also something pleasing in the deja vu smell of a new experience reminding of a forgotten past. One of the first water colour drawings I ever made were lost in a hotel drawer.

Back on the Road

Driving for long hours requires more than just a strong will. Stamina also helps. And when the driver has spent previous days in the comfort of a good house and long hours of rest, it might be a lot easier than a sleep-deprived grad student taking three courses in one semester. The last time I drove for such a long distance, it took the alertness of the fellow passenger in the front seat to prevent the car from going off the road in a brief second of a careless shut eye. We were heading to Kansas City, five hours away. This time, there was no such instance, or even a minor risk. A strong body, a strong mind, a good healthy conversation, and a wide open road with pleasant breeze kept us all alert, and at ease.

The only other observation about this journey other than the presence of a large noticeable number of signposts advertising porn and “pleasure stops”, and smiling co-commuters racing with us in different cars at over 70 miles an hour, is the incredibly long and winding nature of the one road that took us on over 280 miles of the whole trip. Ah, and large trucks transporting whoknowswhat. It’s hard not to make comparisons with the roads on the way from the south of Nigeria to the north. The only difference will be the quality of the tar – not cars.

Time after Time

The motions are the same: a year rolls by with such thrills and frills that when one looks back at it, it looks so short, and one is left wondering just where all the days went. A school year begins in August and ends in May, or July depending on what one has to do.

For the two visiting scholars to this institution, their program is now over and they will return to their country in less than a week. I know this process. A roller-coaster year of both honeymoon and depressing loneliness comes to a certain end and the travellers are filled with the mixed feeling of longing for a long-left home, and missing a bond of affection with the present location. They will be gone and new people would come, and the process will continue, new bonds, and new departures a year from now.

I don’t envy them because my own time here will soon wind down to an end, sometime, again. I think it will become inevitable after some time – if I ever return here – to get inured to the process of bonding, socialization and departures. It might be time to set my sights to another faraway place, maybe Europe, or South America, or Asia, for a different breath of fresh air, languages and surprises. Then with new eyes to look at the world and events, there might be a different kind of thrill and adjustment processes. Just a thought. In any case, this semester will be over in a few days, and I’ll be left with the new dilemma of filling my time with a less exacting routine. Or not. We’ll see how it goes.

(Picture taken at the foot of the Monk Mounds the tallest of the man-made mounds at the old Mississippian heritage site at Cahokia Mounds in Illinois, yesterday.)

Mapping the Country

Living in the mid-west has its perks: you’re far enough from the oceans to live a relatively sane life, and close enough to equally pleasant points of interest to get a feel of outdoors once in a while. A few weeks ago, there was an exhibition of proposals on the renovation of the Gateway Arch and its surroundings. The city of St. Louis along with other donors decided to touch up the nation’s tallest monument and make it live up to its potential as a more viable tourist destination for the country and the world. The winners of the bid have been announced and will have up to 2015 to make the area around the Mississippi the mecca they promised.

I’ve been thinking about a few other places nearby: eagle watching at Alton at the confluence of the two great rivers, a long overdue visit to the Lemp Mansion (the continued mention of which keeps bringing hundreds of people to my blog since last year. What exactly is it with people and ghosts?), the Cathedral Basilica in St. Louis with its replica of Roman art and paintings, and the famous house of Mark Twain at Hannibal. I remember visiting the tomb of Abraham Lincoln in Springfield and thinking that the city was such a centre of history, and then wondering what I’m going to think when I visit Annapolis and all the spots on the coast where the first slave ships first docked. I’m such a nosy wanderer.

I’m looking for as many pointers as my readers can provide, whether far or near. How much more of this country can I see and learn from in the next couple of months. We are travellers, coming to a city near you.

« Older Entries Newer Entries »

...or browse articles by tags