As a student, traveling to distant places and immersing yourself in foreign cultures can seem daunting and, above all, expensive. However, for those like me who still need to feed a hunger for travel and adventure, there is a perfect alternative: reading books and stories by the legendary Polish foreign correspondent Ryszard Kapuściński is like microdosing traveling the world. His descriptions of Siberia will make you run for your blanket and his retelling of being stranded in the deserts of Mali will make you reach for a glass of water.
Kapuściński is a master at describing places, people, cultures, and conflict with an openness and curiosity that leaves no stone unturned. I cherish my heavily earmarked copies of his books like they are my bibles and often open them up to read the same paragraphs again and again. Some favourites are his prophetic chapters on Ukraine and his portrayals of the lives of miners and survivors in northern Siberia in Imperium, his comprehensive summary of Rwandan history leading up to the genocide in the 90s and his observations on the motives of war reporters in The Soccer War, and his encounter with an Iranian statue-toppling expert in The Shah of Shahs. I could go on all day.
The main point I want to get across is that reading Kapuściński is an act of discovery from the safety of your home unlike anything I have experienced before. This man was a central reason for me tossing aside my aspirations to study mechanical engineering and diving headfirst into the increasingly prospectless world of international relations. Kapuściński died in 2007, and I will never be able to tell him personally how much I appreciate his work. What I can do is share it with others.
I want to see much more of the world. But for now, Ryszard Kapuściński is the perfect appetizer.
Photo by Bernard Gotfryd via Wikimedia Commons Public Domain