Last night we had a nephew and a niece, together with her boyfriend, to dinner. We are immensely fond of them. The nephew is just back from Brazil and about to head off to Algeria. He, half-Belgian, half-French, explained his motives in opting for a challenging location rather than a cushier and more financially rewarding posting in the United Arab Emirates (where he’d had a firm offer). It was precisely the challenge, together with a desire to feel that he was doing good (he will be managing a project to build a desalination plant), that had guided him. We old fogies have been led to believe that today’s more individualistic younger generations are inherently selfish but here was an excellent counter-example.
The niece and her boyfriend have just got back from a truly extraordinary nine month, 9,000 kilometres cycling trip from Buenos Aires down to Patagonia, and then back up through Chile in a big loop leading ultimately back down to Buenos Aires again. They showed us some of their pictures and talked about their experiences: the warm hospitality, the extraordinary wild life, leaping tarantulas, soaring condors, puma paw prints outside their tent in the morning, a surreal encounter with the Belgian rugby team in the back of beyond, the challenge of pedalling through snow in 4,000 metre-high mountain passes and across endless salt flats. They also took time out to scale some mountains, including a live volcano. These were places and sites that we have never heard of but that in Europe would surely be major tourist destinations and the subjects of millions of postcards. But what came across most was the almost spiritual experience they had both had in cycling through the vast emptiness of the southern tip of Latin America; indeed, the niece had to hold back her tears when she talked about it. It made me think of the mystic experiences of hermits and saints in the mythical wilderness. The question arises, though, what next? The niece is a brilliant lawyer specialised in human rights law. She has also passed an open competition to work for the European Commission. In other words, she could walk into any job she wanted and I have no doubt that, like her cousin, she will do great and good things. But both she and her boyfriend are having problems in acclimatising themselves to the idea of mere work in the modern western world. What do you do next when you have had such a profound experience?
The question reminded me of a colleague working in one of the EESC’s Groups. Like Murakami (see 31 October post) he is a marathon runner. Recently he ran a 100 kilometres race, running through the night, stopping only for water and snacks. It may not have been quite such a spiritual experience (or, at least, not in the same way), but it was nevertheless an extraordinary feat of intensive effort, endurance and a great personal achievement. Again, as he put it, ‘What do you do after you’ve done that?’