The Meaning of a Taco

I have attached a picture of something rather beautiful to this post. To those who live in North America, you are likely to remark, "But that's just a taco."  However fellow expats who have had the experience of residing in the Giant Yellow Spaceship (my nickname for where I used to live), in the barren Kyrgyz mountains, where everything that sustains a person is precious, will understand me when I reply, "there is no 'just a' in the world."

While the average North American is seldom more than a 10 minute drive from a cornucopia of tacos and burritos, my life in the GYS often found me hundreds of kilometers from anything resembling a taco or most of its ingredients. I would chuckle to myself whenever someone asked me what my hobby was when I lived in Naryn. I always said traveling or reading as that sounds far less bizarre and is easier to explain than "searching for tacos and burritos."

And so I would spend my time searching for ingredients whenever I would take a break in Bishkek. I then would take whatever I had found and haul it back to Naryn. Sometimes I would host "Make Your Own Burrito" Nights (or Tacos) where the Student Life Team and I would construct burritos or tacos to our hearts' content. I think they enjoyed those humble meals more than anything more extravagant I ever cooked.

Yesterday, in the first shopping expedition of my Indonesian residency, I was astonished to easily find everything required to make tacos from shells to refried beans to shredded Mexican cheese to sour cream. Today was my taco making party of one. It was an exercise in memory and nostalgia and creation and, especially, appreciation, for there is no such thing as "just a" taco. In this precarious universe, nothing can be taken for granted, and even the most humble tiles in the mosaic of existence can bring depth and color to the larger picture.

The process of finding, creating, and savoring a taco. For most it is a triviality, but for some of us who have gazed out from the Giant Yellow Spaceship upon the stark mountains of Kyrgyzstan, we understand the meaning that can be found in that which is most simple, if we begin to see more with our hearts and always continue searching for what we love.