Notes from Being Outside (of the country)

A week before spring break, the trip I had planned for months fell apart. I had fundraised to go with a nonprofit to Ethiopia to support their mission there, but conflict in the Middle East made it unsafe.

So, less than seven days before break, planless but antsy for a new adventure, my friend and I booked our flight to Portugal.

At the start of the trip, I had to shift my mindset. I try to value experiences based on what they are -rather than what they are not. It’s the same sentiment as “comparison is the thief of joy.” But going into this trip, I kept imagining what could have been and thinking about what my experience in Africa might have looked like.

Although this happens to a degree every place you go - as you see things that remind you of other experiences, people, places. 

That tension followed me at first, but it slowly turned into something else.

Everywhere you go, you see things that remind you of other places, people, or experiences. Our brains have an incredible capacity to recognize patterns. In a way, it’s almost impossible to create something entirely original - a building, a song, or a piece of art - because our minds are constantly pulling from what we’ve already seen. Subconsciously, everything our eyes and ears consume shapes how we interpret the world.

The majority of the conversations my friend and I had in Portugal circled back to this idea: how things reminded us of other things we had seen.

How the weather felt like California. How the art we saw and the rice and fish we ate felt Asian. And how the architecture carried a clear Islamic influence.

Of course, a lot of these observations had real historical roots. Portugal was conquered by the Moors and later reconquered by Christians, so many buildings reflect Islamic design. And as one of the first major maritime powers during the Age of Exploration, Portugal traded closely with Asian countries - exchanging not just goods, but ideas. This is also where they began to master the craft of azulejos, the painted ceramic tiles seen throughout the country.

A Portuguese native described this blend of influence to me as a “fruit salad” - how the honeydew sitting next to the pineapple starts to taste like pineapple too. Everything mixes, overlaps, and leaves a trace on everything else. I liked this more than what I’ve commonly heard in America - that we are a “melting pot.” In the end, all the soup tastes the same, and that doesn’t fully capture the distinctiveness of each part of our culture.

Architecture was the first place we noticed this clearly.

Take the Arco da Rua Augusta, for example: 

This was the first monument we saw in Lisbon. Immediately, our minds went to Rome - a triumphal arch. Even the nearby equestrian statue reminded us of Marcus Aurelius in the Capitoline Museum. It’s a clear example of how Roman architecture echoes throughout history. 

The Romans built triumphal arches to celebrate victory, achievement, and power. Lisbon’s arch follows that same idea, but in a different context, it commemorates the city’s resilience after the 1755 earthquake that destroyed much of Lisbon.

But the most unexpected example came from nature.

At Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, I found myself staring at the limestone, convinced I could see faces in the rock.

This rock is karst limestone, shaped over thousands to millions of years as water dissolves the stone. The result is full of strange, hollowed forms, almost skull-like. My brain immediately tried to make sense of it by finding faces. This phenomenon is called pareidolia, the tendency to see familiar patterns where none actually exist.

The brain wants to recognize something, even when there’s nothing there.

I used to wonder how police dogs could distinguish between so many different human scents. Then I realized that humans have a similar kind of ability - just visually. We’re constantly scanning, matching, and recognizing, even without realizing it.

Another moment of recognition came in a lighter way. We kept saying that parts of Porto and Lisbon felt like Harry Potter. Later, we learned that J.K. Rowling actually lived in Porto while writing the series. Suddenly, it made sense. We saw Hogwarts-like halls in the Jerónimos Monastery and even visited the bookstore she used to frequent (now a Harry Potter exhibit). 

By the end of the trip, I stopped comparing Portugal to what could have been. Instead, I started adding it to my own collection of references - my mental library of places, textures, and experiences.

Now, when I see a painted ceramic tile or a patterned cobblestone street, it doesn’t remind me of something I missed. It reminds me of Portugal.