Eight and a half years ago, Paul Salopek set out on a long walk: 21,000 miles across four continents. He’s still walking.
His aim was to replicate, as far as possible, the migration route that carried early humans from Africa through Asia and to the Americas.
The journey took our species perhaps 50,000 years. Salopek, a California-born journalist, figured he could do it in seven.
He’s in China now, roughly halfway. He estimates he’ll need six more years to reach his goal: Tierra del Fuego, at the tip of South America.
“And that’s OK,” he told me in a call from Shanghai. “This project has become my life. It’s what I am now. I’m privileged to be able to do it.”
The reward, he said, has been meeting other humans of almost infinite variety: cattle-herding nomads in Ethiopia, farmers in Pakistan, a cobbler in Afghanistan, an ox-cart maker in Myanmar.
And migrants, millions of migrants — some driven by war or disorder; others by economic crisis or climate change.
“Movement is mankind’s oldest survival strategy,” he wrote in one of his articles from the road for National Geographic.
“Sitting down” — that is, settling in one place — “is relatively recent,” he told me. “Moving around is in our limbic memory.” Sitting dow — that is settling in one place — is relatively recent. Moving around is in our limbic memory.Paul Salopek, journalist
Even the COVID-19 pandemic, which formally closed borders around the world, didn’t end informal migration. “The idea that you can block migrants with a wall is silly,” he said. “It’s an Iron Age response to a 21st century problem.”
In his travel, he has run into five wars — in Ethiopia, the West Bank, Syria, Kurdistan and Afghanistan — and a military coup in Myanmar. He has been ambushed twice and stopped by police or soldiers more than 100 times.
And yet he has taken positive lessons so far: Most of the world is at peace, and most humans are good.
“Five wars is a lot of wars to walk through, but there’s an awful lot of peace in between,” he said. “This will sound Pollyannaish, I know.”
Salopek has a tip for travelers (beyond investing in good shoes): Pack good reading material.
