Perhaps one of my earliest attempts to rationalize the anxiety in regards to the issue of global culture was a series of posts that resulted from a trip to Amsterdam. I had the opportunity to visit the World Press Photo exhibition. At the time (2004) there were mainly two sets being displayed: one with photos depicting the horrors of war and another documenting the lifes of immigrants to the city of Amsterdam. Looking at the many faces of immigrants, I realized that these people had had no alternative but to leave their homes behind and look for other alternatives to raise their families. Conflicts, wars, misery, lack of opportunities, they were all pushing people into the big economic hubs. However, these cities were not necessarily ready to receive them.
That wasn’t my first travel experience, but it was the first time I realized something could be done about it. I tried to articulate the idea in the following way:
Travelling is one of those experiences that affect you in many different ways. You’re suddently thrown out of your context, trying to make a living in a place where the rules are different.
What if migrating could be done in a way that a person could preserve his or her cultural background? What if this cultural background could be used as a toolkit to create a way of life, making it easier for a person to succeed?
These are some of the larger questions I’m exploring in this space. Ultimately, it is for those who carry culture around the globe that this project exists.
[...] But the rabbit hole goes deeper. I also wanted to take the “user delight” metaphor to explain another aspect of why new immigrants are great observers. As I explained in the post “culture migration”, traveling throws you out of context. For someone exploring a new city (not just visiting, but figuring out) there will be small moments of delight every time something reminds us of what it used to be back home. It is hard to explain if you haven’t experienced it, but it’s very easy to understand if you have. These little moments are the basic aspects that I think would be incredibly useful to document. They remind us of something familiar within our cultures, but are found out of context. Maybe no one else will notice them, but this knowledge is worth a lot to those who are in the process of finding a way around a new city. [...]