CROSSing THE GREAT WATERS

"I learned one thing."
"What?"
"Never go on trips with anyone you do not love."
"Isn't that fine?"
"Yes. And we're going to Spain."
—Ernest Hemingway

Our honeymoon in National Geographic Traveler

"A Volunteering Honeymoon" in Transitions Abroad

Where we went: 16 countries 16 months, 2 people

What better way than a slow, open-ended trip as a full-immersion crash course on each other? If I could experiences deep, travel-triggered discovery and change on my own, wouldn't having a companion—a witness—give those changes more weight and merit? Wouldn't the shared mishaps, missions, and miles help jump-start and build a camaraderie unobtainable by staying home?

The fortune cookie said "yes."

And we were off. Just like that. This trip took us—not the other way around. Searching for Tay's great-grandfather in Pakistan opened the doors to the Hunza Royal Palace. My dream of hiking in the Himalayas led to glaciers, peaks, and shepherd camps in the Karakorum (the highest I've ever been). In India, we found glass in our rice, a live cockroach in my wife's mouth, and silence beneath the Tree of Enlightenment. In West Africa, village chiefs blessed our unborn children (actually, just our unborn sons), and offered fertility rites of slaughtered goats, Arabic prayer, and sacred crocodiles. For nearly half our trip, during scattered multi-month assignments, we worked with the American Jewish World Service Volunteer Corps. This New York–based international development organization places Jewish professionals (and their non-Jewish spouses) with grassroots organizations around the world.