Wandering Southeast Asia

There’s a certain cleanness to an NFL Sunday. The painted lines are perfect, the jerseys are bright, and the collisions are captured in stunning high-definition. We see the finished product. But for a player like Sione Takitaki, the real story isn't under those stadium lights. It’s found in the dust of a Provo practice field, in the quiet moments of doubt that test a person long before they ever sign a pro contract. To understand his journey, you have to go back to the days at BYU. For many, college football is a highlight reel. For Takitaki, it was a crucible. There were moments that could have ended the story before it began—a suspension, a fight, the kind of youthful missteps that can derail a future. You could feel the weight of it, the path narrowing. But that’s where the grind truly begins. It wasn’t just about making tackles; it was about remaking himself. It was about earning back trust, one practice, one play at a time. You could see it in the way he pl...

There’s a particular quiet that falls just before the world starts watching. It’s the stillness in a stadium before the first serve, the deep breath you take before stepping onto a stage, the silent hum of a city from a rooftop at dawn. It’s a moment thick with a single question: what happens next? For years, that question has followed Coco Gauff, not just on the court, but in every headline and conversation. I remember first hearing her name. It was carried on a wave of breathless excitement, a story of prodigious talent that felt almost pre-written. She was a teenager doing the impossible, and the world handed her a map for a journey that wasn't yet hers, marking destinations like ‘Grand Slam Winner’ and ‘The Next Great.’ But maps drawn by others don’t show the terrain. They don’t warn you about the weight of the air at high altitudes, the sheer force of the wind. The real opponent, the one you never see on the other side of the net, is that wind. It’s the whi...

There’s a certain kind of lightness you only find after carrying a heavy pack for too many miles. The moment you let it slide from your shoulders, that first deep breath you take without the weight—it’s a feeling of pure release. It’s the closest I can get to imagining what it must feel like to stand in a garage full of fire trucks, ambulances, and school buses, and decide to let them all go. I read the news the other day. Actor Jeremy Renner is auctioning off his collection of over 100 vehicles. And we’re not talking about a few polished sports cars. We’re talking about the heavy metal of a small town: hulking firetrucks, retired city buses, functional semi-trucks. Vehicles built for rescue, for community, for carrying loads far heavier than a single person. It’s easy to see this as just another celebrity garage sale, a headline that flashes and fades. But you can’t uncouple this act from the story that came before it. You can’t ignore the sound of the snowcat, the...

Standing at the edge of a chaotic market square, the sheer volume of sounds, smells, and motion can feel overwhelming. Every direction pulls you, every vendor calls out, the path ahead a blur of unfamiliar faces and vibrant colors. It’s beautiful, yes, but also… a lot. In moments like these, facing a daunting journey or even just navigating a particularly dense part of life, I often find myself thinking of Chris Evert. It might seem a leap from a bustling street corner in Southeast Asia to a pristine tennis court, but hear me out. Chris Evert, the 'Ice Maiden' known for her unwavering focus and strategic calm, mastered the art of tackling the monumental not as a whole, but in minuscule, manageable pieces. Her famous mantra? 'One point at a time.' On the court, this meant shutting out the roaring crowd, the high stakes of the match, the weight of expectation, and focusing solely on the single serve, the single return, the single rally unfolding right...