Dragons Winter 2018 Issue of The Map’s Edge

Princeton Bridge Year: To Have a Home

“I believe that there are qualities in each of us that can only be realized in different contexts. I discovered that Brazil brought out a version of myself that inspires me most. To this day, I miss the candor with which I greeted strangers on the street and told them about my love for acarajé, the fried bean fritters I’d eat with friends after hours of practicing Portuguese. I miss the music and the visual arts that flourish across Salvador, and the days I painted lampposts with spray paint oozing down my hands. I miss the confidence with which Bahians wear their own skin, and the way I felt more comfortable in my own body than I’d ever been. More than anything, I miss the people who greeted me with a “seja bem-vindo” (be welcome) and bid me farewell with a “volte sempre” (return always). People who taught me that home can be anywhere in the world, as long as there are people with space in their hearts.”

Lepcha: Children of the Snowy Peak

“The Lepcha believe their people originated within these valleys. They call themselves ‘Mutanchi Rong Kup Rum Kup,’ which translates as ‘Children of the Snowy Peak and Children of God.’ The Lepcha are nature worshippers, whose religion blends animism and shamanism and is called bongthingism, or Munism. The tribe shares an inextricable relationship with nature as evidenced by their vocabulary, which contains one of the richest collections of names for local flora and fauna recorded anywhere, and reveals a vast knowledge of naturopathy as well as holy texts. By some estimates, there are only 40,000 Lepcha remaining in Sikkim; their language is quickly disappearing and they are fighting to preserve their lands and what is left of their culture.”

Photo Essay: Between the Lens & Me

“I was hesitant to bring my camera with me to Senegal. I suppose I approached photography with more of a moralist’s stance than a scientist’s, and I felt some intuitive distrust of images and imagemaking as it related to my educational experience. I worried about the fraught relationship between subject and photographer. I didn’t want to reproduce clichés and reduce people to flat, aesthetic purposes. At the same time, I wanted to remember what I would experience, and the fear of forgetting eventually overcame other qualms about the medium. I brought my camera, and I am both glad and regretful that I did.”

Interview: The Beat of a Different Drum

“…after hours of trekking, Ben M’barek would take out his drum, sit on a rock and start playing whatever came to mind. He never thought his songs would attract the attention of tourists who didn’t understand a word of the Tamazight language. […] The guide explained that M’Barek was singing about his love for the High Atlas Mountains and that he hoped not to see what might be hiding behind them. The oxygen of his life, its meaning, flows down from the peak of the highest mountain to his soul through the drops of rain and flakes of snow-pure and white as his heart, and imbued with love for this region, which to him is heaven on earth.”