The year 1997 was for me a year of new colleagues becoming friends who shared a love for travel, some means to fulfill it, and journeys of the backpacking, hiking, diving, sailing, flying, biking and railway kind. Some of those friends who missed me on their adventures supported my Amelia Earhart phase with books on the subject. Admittedly, that fascination with the female aviator may have been at a romantic and glamorous distance, for just as I hardly went along with my traveling friends, I did not pursue a career in flight or travel. I was born to a pilot father and a former flight attendant mother, and though they both don’t exhibit a lust for travel, the wandering juices may have flowed into me. The thing is, I may have the bug, but not quite the itchy feet (as they say, makati ang paa), for I do enjoy spending time at home and being immobile as much as I seek bodies of water or sights new to me.
This swing from wanderlust to being a homebody also contributes to why I still enjoy reading Maiden Voyages. It is classified in the Travel/Women’s Studies category, and is a compilation of travel writings by 52 women. Through their work, I am transported to Yugoslavia, Kenya, Persia, Turkey, Morocco and other places which, in their time, were in many ways perilous for women travelers and cumbersome for strangers in general. Reading this may be like watching Discovery Travel & Adventure, minus the visuals, replete with colorful prose and insightful, personal musings. Things that are inspiring when read, but which Justine Shapiro of Lonely Planet would not say on camera, are in every excerpt. Willa Cather in "Willa Cather in Europe" wrote, "Out of every wandering in which people and places come and go in long succession, there is always one place remembered above the rest because the external or internal conditions were such that they most nearly produced happiness." Reading this is also a distinct experience knowing the women traveled in an era where there weren’t golden arches glowing outside one’s hotel room window or other such commercial, worldwide enterprise that has managed to conquer exotic cities’ landscapes with uniform kitsch.
Personally, I am grateful for the conveniences such places offer (read: toilets), but also wonder what it was like for early travelers and their discoveries of foreign cultures. Talk of eco-travel is not complete without mention of nature’s call and how one manages. This book does not disappoint in this area! Every experience, no matter how uncomfortable, is made glamorous by these women’s graceful musings. I imagine them logging in fine strokes such lines as Cather’s: "One cannot divine nor forecast the conditions that will make happiness; one only stumbles upon them by chance, in a lucky hour, at the world’s end somewhere, and holds fast to the days..." The younger ones, perhaps using typewriters, recalling the afternoon tea, the fragrance of flowers and thunder of elephants running across the field, spoke with a passion that suggests a fresh view of the world.
The book’s editor Mary Morris includes her own travel excerpt from her book Wall-to-Wall: from Beijing to Berlin by Rail. She says she chose writings from travels that were made voluntarily by the women, and left out some famous travel writers in order to achieve something that could almost be a chronology of feminism. The writers were detailed in their observations, some sentimental, mostly adventurous. What is common is the sense that these women are indeed of "independent means and without domestic ties," as Morris promises they represent, quoting writer Mabel Sharman Crawford.
One can imagine how that definition tickled my young, free and single mentality then. In the compilation are a few familiar names as Isak Dinesen (Out of Africa), anthropologist Margaret Mead, Anna Leonowens (Anna and the King) and Edith Wharton. I had expected my idol Amelia to be on the list but instead it has Beryl Markham, another of three female aviators whose book is the only one that is still in print. It is of added interest that her excerpt involves a period with the ex-husband of Isak Dinesen, Blix. So, I expected this book to take me to such a realm as Out of Africa, a film I only happened to see at around the time I found this book. The questions I had then about such women, dangerous circumstances of women alone in strange, male-dominant cultures and periods, their sexuality, desires, the colonial mindset and even what clothes they wore in the desert, the tropics, the snow, are common themes in this book. All pages are full of it, sometimes in blatant, detailed ways, sometimes in undercurrents.
There are not a few quotable answers to those life-questions, too. They are sentences of the sort I scribbled on the first pages of my own journals, or as captions for a scrapbook of my own journeys. One such line I had marked is from Mildred Cable and Francesca French who wrote in "The Gobi Desert": "In the desert I learnt to detect some of the illusions which constantly surround me on the greater journey of life, and to depend for direction on the wisdom of Him who is my unerring guide."
One of the beauties of such a compilation is being able to read the book like one would play a game of roulette. Pick a story, any story, and find something new in it each time. I also took to choosing stories according to place, or where I would be or could be whilst reading it. For instance, Christina Dodwell’s piece on being at "the junction of three countries, Central African Republic and Congo on our right, and Zaire on our left," where they paddled, struggled, pushed and pulled through a sometimes raging, sometimes flowing river in a dugout, convinced me that I should finally try kayaking. Soon, in calmer waters where I laughed my throat sore more than paddled miles, I satisfied that curiosity and marveled more at women who embark on such activities. Ethel Brilliana Tweedie’s maiden work was "A Girl’s Ride in Iceland," tackling the subject of women riding astride. While riding horses attracted me, it is not in my realm of experience. However, the idea that women once were only allowed to ride side-saddle throws a "Whoa! You’ve come a long way, baby!" reminder at me. Tweedie goes into detail about the arguments, the events, and the social, historic significance of the subject. Part of the elegance of equestriennes is their manner of dress. Here, Tweedie discusses not only for appropriateness but also for its significance in enabling women to ride as men. She says, "Fashion is ephemeral... Dress to a woman should always be an important matter, and to be well-dressed it is necessary to be suitably clothed. Of course, breeches, high books or leggings are essential in riding; but a neatly divided skirt, reaching well below the knee, can be worn over these articles, and the effect produced is anything but inelegant... whenever English women summon up enough courage to ride their horses man-fashion again, every London tailor will immediately set himself to design becoming and useful divided skirts for the purpose."
Scattered elsewhere in the book are mentions of trousers, overalls or veils that these women wore in their travels. The emphasis on their gear, while not uncommon among today’s travelers who fancy specific types of fabric (wrinkle-free, breathable, stretch), is another reminder of how dress concealed, disguised and protected our gender as much as it now flaunts and celebrates femininity. Box-car Bertha, a hobo who according to Morris "traveled in order to survive," wrote in "Sister of the Road" of herself and other hoboes, emphasizing other women wearing "overalls." Hers is a more somber story with more tragic events. In contrast, Annie Dillard and Margaret Mead traveled to immerse themselves in places out of the usual road, in nature, to wait for natural events to unfold in order to understand them. Travel was not necessarily an escape from life but living it.
One of my favorite lines from Annie Dillard’s excerpt from "Teaching a Stone to Talk" goes, "That night I learned that while we were watching the deer, the others were watching me...They all said that I had no expression on my face when I was watching the deer – or at any rate, not the expression they expected." Every writer here challenges the idea that women are expected to make certain reactions, simply by having traveled and written about it.
It is because the women managed to behave unexpectedly that makes this book special. Unexpected is the way they position themselves. Sometimes by having to disguise themselves as men, or kept secret musings, these women reveal more of themselves. I suspect, by going away, they found their voices too. Mary Morris wrote, "From Penelope to the present, women have waited – for a phone call, a proposal, or the return of the prodigal man from sea or war or a business trip... if we grow weary of waiting, we can go on a journey." Perhaps the best evidence that tells me Maiden Voyages may be my favorite book is that it moved me to write about my own journeys. Mary Morris wishes there were more "multicultural voices" in women’s travel writing and in her book. She has already succeeded in that I have gone away with her book, empowered to seek more personal reflections closer to home. I hear there is just such a Filipino compilation of travel writing hot off the press and I am off to the bookstore to meet it.