I will tell you our adventure trying to pass on the emotion that this experience has given me. 1 car, 3 fellows, 5 weeks, 15 states, 19 cities, 10.000 Km. These are all the ingredients that turned what at the beginning was “A trip” into “THE trip”. Other than this, some media partners (a daily paper, a radio and a periodical) have also put this adventure under big lights. The total cost was about 3.500 euro per person (flight, rental car for the entire trip, insurance, room and board).
The itinerary to go through was very im- pressive and studied in the smallest details: New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Buf- falo, Toronto (Canada), Thunder Bay (Canada), Minneapolis, Chicago, St Louis, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Dallas, El Paso, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco. During this adventure, I wanted to gather as much material as possible (pictures, videos, emotions) especially in order to keep inside me this quite spectacular experience, but also, to be able to share the stunning emotions I felt. Once the video of our trip is edited, I’m watching it again and my eyes are shining… If I concentrate a bit I can still hear the sound of the cars in Time Squares; the water drops on my skin at the Niagara Falls; I see the red trees of the Canadian Forests and the reflection of that lake in Ontario; I can taste the bitter flavor of the Tequila shots at the Coyote Ugly, in Chicago; the wind on my face along Route 66; I can still touch Ric’s blood on my jeans, sense the tension of that night in Oklahoma City, the anger and determination of the following days, the solidarity, the humanity, the strength; and I see again the Indians that ride in the Arizona desert, I relive that fantastic hallucination; my breath is taken away, again, on the Grand Canyon; and I smile today as then, on the beach of Santa Monica, in Los Angeles, looking at the sun between the Californian palms trees and thanking I don’t know what, I don’t know who, for everything I had the possibility to hear, listen to, see, …live, in this unrepeatable adventure.
Before I left I knew that it would have been a great trip, but not to this point; the pictures and the articles help me remember, pass on part of what we have lived, and share it… But what this has left inside us is something huge, indescribable, and it’s personal, intimate. It wasn’t just a simple trip, a vacation, an experience: thinking again about those 40 days I get the impression to have lived a “small life” inside of my life. It was almost a separated existence, distinct and independent form everything else, that’s how big it was.
At this point, other considerations on the United States would be superfluous: I wish them (and therefore the rest of the world) to find soon the necessary solutions to solve the current and future economic and social crisis that are invading the Planet. I say this because, if many of the things we have seen are working fine and are ethically right, many others are not. Finally, I would like to underline the importance of travelling, beyond this adventure of ours. I could talk or write about it for hours, but I prefer to leave you with a citation: “Initially we travel to lose ourselves, then we travel to find ourselves. We travel to open our heart and our eyes and to know about the world more than what fits in the papers (…). Essentially, we travel to go back and to be some crazy young people again, to slow time down, to get fooled and fall in love again.” (Pico Iyer)
Have a good trip everyone! Peace.
By: MATTEO “ECKO”
From: Dolce Vita International 4
