August 15, 2019 • 43 mins
Travel doesn't need you to photograph or social media every moment. Travel needs you to be fully present and to see it with real eyes: like I tried to do with Mother in Japan as we were fitted for kimonos and found strange vending machines. And, of course, a chat with Singer Songwriter Anais Mitchell about Hadestown and life on the road. #travel
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, I'm Daniel Scheffler, and this is everywhere Today's travel commandment,
thou shalt ignore thy smartphone as much as I rely
(00:22):
on my smartphone for you know, pretty much everything all
the time. They are these instances where I think I
would just like to throw this device into the Hudson
River and live a simple life without it. I know
I'm not alone when I say this. Now, let's imagine
the phone free life of a travel writer like me.
(00:44):
First off, maybe I should check if those old school
internet cafes still operate all over the globe. Next up,
imagine me slipping bundles of printed boarding passes around. I'd
actually have to hail a real yellow cab without an
umer app, so that will be something old that's new again.
But how will I tell my husband we've bought it,
(01:06):
and now we're pushing back, and now we're taxing, and
now we're taking off. I'd have to save my hotel
addresses and reservations in print them out, like my great
aunt used to do in this giant leather folder which
she carried everywhere with her on trips. Or maybe I
need a very chic, oversized lanyard with all my paperwork
(01:29):
then again, I could get nicely lost on purpose with
just a paper map or even no map. Believe me,
a little part of me finds all of this rather thrilling.
Let's call it low tech high tech. I think this
all the time. Technology will save us, but not before
it destroys us. When it comes to travel, my feelings
(01:50):
are quite specific as someone who's not on social media,
and yes, you heard me correctly, no social media whatsoever.
I happen to now have an everywhere podcast Instagram page,
but hey, that's just work. Recently, my high school brother
(02:11):
said to me, maybe you don't exist, and I really
like that. I did social when it came out years ago.
I used it, abused it, and then for about ten
years or so, I've cut it all off cold turkey.
My compulsive nature and my deep desire for real in
the moment right now experiences were simply too strong to deny,
(02:35):
and I'm a happier human for it. Recently I counted
twenty travel writers, slash bloggers, slash influences who died in
ten from trying to capture the best image for their
social channels. Nearly two dozen people died for what exactly.
(02:57):
Every time someone shows me the idyllic beach photo, or
that picture perfect yoga position photo on top of a camel,
or another plate of over stylized food. You know the
ones I just think, were you actually there? Or were
you just posing? Sometimes at a work lunch, when I'm
(03:18):
just about to tuck into my salad and I'm starving,
I get told to wait as it's being photographed by
a fucking influencer. What kind of life is this that
every moment needs to be memorialized? I have to wonder. Luckily,
I've had some practice. Spending a month in Japan with
Mother showed me just how to do less phone and
(03:42):
more life in the now, the right now. So let
me tell you about Mother. I often describe her as
the sweetest, smartest, funniest, happiest aunt everyone should wish for.
If she was a believer of reincarnation, I'd say she
was in her last life, having learned every less impossible,
(04:04):
having finally reached that evasive, sneaky thing they call enlightenment.
She wants for nothing, she judges absolutely nobody, and she
lives very simply. It's beyond inspiring. But more importantly certain
for me is that she is the type of traveler who,
after she breaks her foot on the Otter Trail in
(04:26):
South Africa, just keeps going. She walks the remaining twenty
miles without a complaint. If she wasn't so skinny, I
think she would have made it big in the Mossad,
Israel's special forces. She's also the type of traveler who's
not interested in driving around cities and a fancy black
car seeing things from behind a window. Nope. She puts
(04:48):
on a pair of sneakers, walks every block, every nook
and cranny. Plus she greets and chats to everyone she
comes across, from the president of an African state I've
never heard of to the Mr. Delivery guy holding her
take out. So of course Japan is perfect for her.
Everyone is as polite as she is, and walking all
(05:09):
over is so much part of the culture that she
fits right in. Although she towers over everyone, she graciously
bows right down to chat. Traveling with Mother is always
the most fun any human can have. She's up for anything, like,
let's not google this at all, but go and find
out where the birthplace of Pearls could be. And we did.
(05:31):
It's a little prefecture called Mia, just a few hours
south of Tokyo, where only female divers were entrusted to
find pearls. I see how Mother's eyes are filled with
magic as she learns how to use a vending machine
to purchase anything imaginable. So, of course we turn this
into a game, something that almost every situation calls for.
(05:53):
It started with what is the strangest item we could
get from a vending machine. I of course thought I
had one when I found a vending machine with little
doors revealing puppies, but Mother one upped me when she
discovered live goldfish, spiders, and even pet snakes. We were
really not into the dirty underwear vending machines or the
(06:15):
ones dispensing dry ice, but Mother won our competition hands
down with her unearthing of a vending machine that dispenses
doggy wigs. Because you know that day when you're out
and about and your pop urgently needs a costume change
or maybe a disguise. We didn't tweet about this or
(06:36):
instagram this moment. We just saved it just for ourselves,
and it was so indulgent. Well, we really got into
the vending machine thing. We ate entire six course meals
under bridges in Tokyo, all from vending machines. We also
managed to buy an enormous inflatable pool swan. By mistake,
(06:57):
Mother just wanted a new iPhone charger, but she was thrilled. Nevertheless,
at some point in Kyoto, since it was freezing one day,
we bought matching Harajuku girls pink sweaters with thirteen bunnies
sewn onto them. I got an extra large and she
got a small. We were twinsies in guess what. We
didn't need to photograph this. We just lived it and
(07:20):
laughed it. There was no Facebook. Mother rocked her new look.
It wasn't really my color. Besides for visiting some of
the oldest temples in Kyoto with Mother or eating our
palid cleanser sherbet from our personal three foot high ship,
done table side out of sculptured ice. We also soaked
(07:41):
in ancient Rio Khan's mud baths and then sat on
tiny wooden chairs getting scrubbed by a very thorough innkeeper.
I think at some point we also glimpsed the Royal Princess,
and I think she was actually holding a Starbucks coffee.
What most love is When Mother and I wanted to
get fitted for kimonos in Tokyo. Old family run kimono
(08:06):
shops are all over, easy to spot with kimono clad mannequins. Outside,
we found an old boutique that was close to the
Palace gardens. The owner was a smiley woman in a glamorous,
light purple kimono, whom I told that I wanted to
be fitted with mother right away, she grabbed my hand
and invited us in. I'm pretty particular about mostly wearing black,
(08:29):
whereas Mother runs down a color wheel once in a while,
so we settled on black for me and dove gray
for her. When I learned that the word kimono means
something that is worn, the literal meaning made me want
to wear it so much more. Supposedly, there are nine
types of popular kimonos. Mother was into the summers style yukata,
(08:52):
the most casual style of kimono, whereas I settled for
a samurai style kimono with an obie, which is the
belt that holds it all together. Of course, fitting a
kimono is a leisurely a fair, a long chat about
to pattern or not to pattern, to clash or not
to clash, to parasol or not to parasol. And then
(09:15):
these lashings of wisdom about which attires appropriate for which
social obligation. Apparently I skewed towards very casual, basically living
a pool party life with no umbrella. But attire is
not just what you put on your body. It's about
a meditation. It's about an observance. A lovely march, a
(09:37):
tea ceremony unfolded in front of our very eyes, all
forming part of this choreography. And at some point fabrics
and robes were whizzing by, and the next thing you're
standing on a too, Tommy Matt fully garbed. Once more.
We didn't have a phone or a camera to commemorate
this moment. We just stood there, dressed and be next
(10:00):
to each other, hugging, smiling. Mother not one for tears
may have wiped a little droplet away at this very moment. I,
of course waterworks, So naturally I had to think, is
this appropriation of culture that is not mine? Am I
being offensive or insensitive? Or am I sincerely and absolutely
(10:24):
celebrating and honoring a beautiful custom. My kimono maker told
me it's all about intention. It's not the one but
the how. I explained to our maestro that I lived
in America, and Mother lived across a very large pond,
and I just don't get to see her as much
as I'd like to. And now Mother just isn't so
(10:46):
young anymore. We plan to put on our kimonos and
call each other on Skype every week. So there we
are on different parts of the globe, chatting over a
cup of tea while in our beautiful garments. Me for
a morning cup, Mother for an afternoon treat, and that
would be our little connection in the world, just hours
(11:07):
nobody else's, and no proof was necessary to know in
our hearts that this really happened, something seemingly so small
and perhaps insignificant, tethering us just a little more. So
let's take a breath there, and we'll be right back
with my friend Holly Fry to give us a little
historical context right after the break. Thanks for sticking around.
(11:32):
Here's more of everywhere. Yes, my love, I'm sorry I
didn't get you a kimono when I was in Japan,
but we weren't friends then, So now when I returned
to Japan, I will bring you a kimono and we
can have a friendship kimono. I need to build a
time machine go back, get me the kimono when you
(11:54):
got your original one, or it's just not going to
have any meaning. Fine, I need a minute to get
right on it. I love kimono because they're beautiful, and
also as someone who sews a lot, I appreciate them
and maybe a different way than normal people would. But
I thought we would talk a little bit about kimono
and their history and then why that is relevant to
(12:17):
your story about your mom. So, up until the High
End period, the kimono not so much in Japan. It
was more like um separate you know, separate tops and
bottoms or trousers or skirts. There were one piece garments,
but they weren't quite the same as we would like
look at and see a kimono. And then during the
(12:38):
High End period, which is quite long, it was from
seven to eleven ninety two, they developed during that several
hundred years. And what I love about kimono and what
to me is really beautiful and kind of a nice
example in general of Japanese design, is that unlike if
you look at garments, for example, that come down through
the European tradition, particularly after the Middle Ages, where there's
(13:01):
lots of tailoring the seams are fussy. They're they're sewn
and cut so that they will mold to your body.
But in Japan, the development of how they cut and
make these clothes, everything is a straight line. They're just
designed in pieces so beautifully that they wrap around you
perfectly and they fall perfectly, and it takes advantage of
(13:21):
the fabric's natural beauty. To me is like brilliant design.
It's it's very much in line with the idea of
which is why I love them, like for a lot
of people that so, making a kimono is really fun
because you can kind of really indulge in just the
beauty of the fabric and you're not worried so much
about like matching up seam lines and stuff. Everything has
(13:42):
to match, of course, but it's just simpler. It's a
simpler design from the interior. But really there's this interesting
development that happens after the high end period, so the
Kama Kuta period, which is eight, there's another big shift,
and then the Moro Machi period. I probably pronouncing these
names very terribly, so my apologies to any Japanese speakers
(14:04):
in the audience. And at this point kimono started getting
more and more colorful. This idea of a colorful garment
came in. The color started to be important in terms
of its symbolic meaning, like certain leaders would be associated
with certain colors, so loyalty could be demonstrated by the
selection of fabrics that were in your kimono, and also
(14:25):
um on the battlefield, alliances were often identified by color,
which isn't unusual now. I mean, even every every nation
has its military that has its uniform, so it's kind
of similar to that. But these tended to be much
more colorful, and so you will sometimes hear historians talk
about ancient Japanese battlefields as a very like wild visual
(14:45):
display of just all of these colors coming together. And
then in the Edo period things really started to become
important in terms of kimono because one, there were several
developments where there were several garments that developed along with
the samurai tradition, and these became super important. The idea
of presentation became more important than ever. The people that
(15:09):
made kimono had to work so hard to keep up
with all of the demands of like Similarly, still symbolic
colors very important. This idea of looking very perfect and
wearing like hakama, which are the split pants style garment,
still using this straight cut method, but because they were
having to churn out garments at a really fast rate,
(15:30):
it really became an art form like people that could
move very quickly, almost like when you watch a master
folder do a piece of origami. It was like that,
but clothing came out at the end. So kimono became
more important than ever in terms of being a cultural
item and a status symbol in a way to really
like telegraph to the world who you were and who
you were associated with. But nowadays kimono are not really
(15:54):
the day to day garments that they once were in
Japanese culture, and they're usually warrant for things like important
celebrate sations or ceremonial days. But also there has become
this growing thing where they share them with travelers, and
that is a new form of income for people that
make close which then becomes this sort of beautiful reflection
like I I love that you talk in this episode
(16:16):
about wondering whether you're appropriating culture in taking part in
buying these things, But at the same time, like that's
the way that that garment had to evolve so it
could stay in the public consciousness, particularly on a global scale,
and I just like that it become this item that
is instantly recognizable. No one looks at a kimono and
(16:37):
is confused about the culture it came from. So in
a way, they have made like this garment the ambassador
for their country, which I love and I think it's
really beautiful. Well, I think the reappropriation thing that I
was thinking about is I feel like there's a pod
of travel that exposes you to so many of these
things where you need to go and appreciate and not
(17:00):
take for yourself, right, And I think a lot of
times people will kind of trinketize because of culture, where
they go and they buy a thing in another country
and then they come back and they wear it almost
like you know, a badge of honor, and they're like,
I went to this country, I am cultured and I
understand it now, which is it gets in a weird
(17:20):
place because their idea is that they're like, I appreciate this,
and it's like, well wait, because you're you're kind of
making yourself like the ambassador of something that you don't
understand and don't really have cultural ownership of. And that's
where it gets a little bit tricky, right, Um, so
what is the right way to do it? I don't know.
I don't know that there's one right way, right, Like
I think a lot of people grapple with this. The
(17:42):
biggest thing I think is always important is to to
listen to people from any given culture when they say, like,
that's not cool. And I understand that the reaction, the
natural reaction most people have is whether they're conscious of
it or not, to be defensive and be like I
was just trying to learn, I was just trying to
appreciate it, but like just to listen and sit with
(18:03):
the information rather than trying to justify or like defend
yourself in that situation. And again, I screw up all
the time, like I think everybody does. It's hard not to.
It's yeah, I mean I think like it's a good
step that you you opened up that conversation with the
person you were buying the kimono from and probably opened
(18:24):
up to him a new idea that like you just
wanted something to share with your mother. It wasn't it's
not as the you're you're wearing it around town and
being like I have been to Japan and I know
the Japanese intimately. Um, that's the trick, right that people
start to kind of come back I think sometimes from
travels and behave as though they have somehow become naturalized
(18:48):
citizens of the place that they went, when even if
you learn about the cultures through doing something like that,
you can never really replicate their experience to a level
of understanding, you know, that is equal to what they've lived.
It becomes about sensitivity as well, like I said, just
listening to other people. Yeah, the kimono and my mother
(19:09):
is a private, personal, beautiful thing we do at home,
in the privacy of our own home. I'm not wearing
it as a representation of Japan as much as I'm
wearing it as a representation of time with my mother.
Specialness of that. It's like your way to recall that
moment and that event in your life. And this is
like the thing that happens to me all the time
(19:29):
that I laugh and think about. When I fly back
from the Caribbean, there's always a bunch of people in
the plane with corn rows that they've had them done,
sometimes Mexico to but the Caribbean in particular. You notice
people that had had their hand done braided or corn road.
And I wonder whether there's a consciousness there at all,
whether you're thinking like, oh, I'm gonna get corn rows
(19:51):
as a person that's not from wherever I've come from
and do it anyway, or am I doing it as
a celebration of hair right? Well, and it kind of
goes back to that thing I was saying about trinket
izing it, right. It's like a fast food version of
culture where it's kind of like you didn't actually immerse
yourself and learn about it. You kind of bought a
(20:12):
look through the drive through. Yeah, but then again, I'd
like to be Devil's advocate hand look at it from
maybe there's a small drop of hey, I'm willing to learn,
like that person actually did think about it. Well, maybe
that's just bullshit. No, they just went and had their
(20:32):
hand writed. I think in most cases it's that it's
an Instagram photo unfortunately. And I hope, I mean, my
hope is always that I mean, once they have had
that thing done, the cow has been flung, Like, you
can't unring that bell and say that they didn't do that,
especially if they've posted it on their Instagram. But I
just always hope that it can open up a conversation
(20:54):
or at least some self reflection about it. We all
need it all the time. I mean, like I said,
I screw all the time. It's the willingness to admit
that you screw up all the time, and I'm willing
to learn. Is that's the point? And travel shows you that, Like,
that's the point. And I think most people don't want
to trinketize anyone else's life, like they don't realize that
it's demeaning to be like I came and enjoyed your
(21:16):
culture and I came away with braids. Well, I enjoyed
you a culture so much I dyed my hair purple
two weeks ago because you have purple hair, and then
went to play my ma gen competition with purple hair. Yes,
but I sent you the die like I was an
active basically by hand. I don't think of that as
you appropriating my culture so much as me prosplytizing the
magic of purpleness. And thank you. It was appreciated only
(21:39):
when I was in the sun. If I was not
in the sun, no one noticed. It just read as dark. Yeah,
but yeah, I think as long as we're all aware
that we're probably screwing up a lot, and we're not
trying to turn someone else's culture into a souvenir, but
be really thoughtful about these things. It will go along
(21:59):
way to bridging that gap. The whole point of this
episode was to talk about the idea of leaving your
smartphone behind. So I've been grappling with this thing forever
because of course I want a moment that's beautiful, to
capture it and share it with friends across the world
and show them something that they haven't seen, or something
that I'm sharing with my mother or something I'm sharing
(22:20):
with my husband. But at the same time, I've been like,
why do I need to memorialize this moment? Annonize this moment?
Isn't it a beautiful idea that you could just be
in the moment? Ironically, like I think about these chats
of ours that are being recorded, and I'm I think,
I'm so glad these will be there when I'm in
my eighties and have lost some of my mental acuity
(22:43):
and I can return to this happy time. But yeah,
I mean, to me, that's a big part of it, right.
It is just that it helps kind of jog your
memory and take you back to that place, like a
visual is an easy way to do that, right. So
now I don't even know since phones are you know,
this ubiquitous additional appendage that like, I mean, I'm as
bad as anyone. I have it in my hand all
(23:03):
the time. And to me, there's also that subtle difference
that you have to acknowledge between capturing a moment like
stopping for a photo versus this will be great on Insta,
this will be great on Twitter, like and I don't know, right,
some of it is that yummy, yummy dopamine hit that
people get from likes and comments, And I don't know
how you tell people not to do that because we've
(23:25):
become dependent on it. So maybe it's about calling the
amount of what's done right. So my mother, who I'm
with traveling all the time, she would take one photore
an entire experience, Like she doesn't need to take hundreds
of photos. She'll take one and she will actually look
at that photo again, which I'd love about her. She'll
share it with me and be like, do you remember
(23:47):
this incredible flower we saw in Kyoto? I will never
forget it. And she looks at the photo and that's beautiful.
So I want her to capture that and remember it.
But at the same time, I mean, I think the
talk on social media has been there for a long time.
How do I get off? How do I spend less time?
Am I less productive? And I'm all like, all those
questions are there, but I feel like no one's given
(24:09):
us a solution. Travel should provide that solution. Travel should
encourage you to not want to do all that stuff,
because why would you want to instagram this beautiful private
moment for everybody else to see if you could just
keep it for yourself and that's the joy of it.
I mean, some people travel, I know that they are
(24:29):
travel companies that book specific instagram worthy trips. Yeah. So
this gets into a slightly deeper conversation right about what
people are actually getting from social media, Like I mentioned
the yummy, yummy dopamine hit, but on a more intense
and to me slightly frightening level, is validation and identity
(24:49):
right right, Like people are not feeling validated in their
day to day lives and there's not a sense of
worth If people are not acknowledging how great you are
all the time, would just problematic and hopefully, like people
can self validate. But that's not the culture we're in
right now. So I feel like we have to figure
out a way to address this, almost like a global
(25:11):
mental health issue that needs to be discussed, Like why
do people feel invalidated and that their identity is defined
by the reactions of others that somebody has to tell
you you're having an amazing time. I'm always having an
amazing time too. Well. I think about travel in that respect,
like I think about these moments in like Floridaanapolis in
(25:33):
the southern part of Brazil, where I was single, I
had no responsibilities. I had this sort of strange moment
between lives where I was just sitting on the beach
by myself and I didn't need to photograph it to
tell anyone about it. And travel shows you all of
(25:53):
that all the time, Like I'm going to Africa and
there's no service, and I worry about it because I
have to work or have stuff to do. And then
I start thinking, wait, this is such a beautiful opportunity
to just be in Africa. Why do I need to
take a photo of the Big Five? I just need
to be with the Big Five. Well, my thing is
(26:14):
always that people have already taken photographs of almost any
important spot in the world, way better than I would
ever manage. So I can just look at those I
have seen no photographic ability. It's perfectly acceptable. Mine, however, terrible.
So my real reason for not taking photos is because
I'm terrible at taking photos. It would challenge your identity
(26:34):
and your self validations exact exactly. Oh my god, thanks
Holly for hanging out with me today. Always Ella is
so happy you're here. I'm always happy to hang out
with ls. She's like the best non speaking co host
on the planet. She's not moving. Her podcast is not
going to take off because she just doesn't have the
(26:54):
gumption to keep it going. She's more interested in napping.
She's like, I need an daddy coming minutes of dog snores.
This is a great moment for us to travel once
again to advertising Land. We'll be right back with more
Everywhere trade tables up. You're returning to everywhere Land. To me,
(27:20):
Broadway really is one of the last art forms untainted
by social media. It exists for you in a moment alone,
created by the artists right in front of your face,
and as Mitchell, the writer and music creator of Broadway's
(27:43):
hit Hadestown is with me in studio. Thank you for
spending a little time with me on its summer Friday.
It's hot and blazing in New York. Let's start by
telling about your childhood and traveling around. Yeah. Yeah, So
I grew up in Vermont. My parents were like back
(28:06):
to the land or hippies that had grown up in
the suburbs. And then they hit chick to California for
the Summer of Love and they they read about how
everyone should buy a farm in Vermont in the Whole
Earth catalog, and so that's what they did. And I
lived there on a sheep farm with my parents, and
my grandparents were also on that same farm in a
different house. And um my granddad was involved in solar
(28:32):
energy research, and after he was retired, he did a
lot of traveling to do um kind of consulting in
different places. And I remember my my grandparents taking off
to go to China or the Middle East and then
coming back with a present for me. So travel was
always like a value in our family. I remember my
mom saying that things that was okay to spend money
(28:52):
on were food, books, your friends, and travel. So there
was a lot of shipping me off to different places
when I was it, and I came to love it
for traveling its own right, you know. And then when
I became a singer songwriter, that has sort of supplanted
my travel life as usually I'm traveling for a gig
now and I sort of miss those days of just
(29:13):
being somewhere for the sake of being there, right, well,
so much of it is business travel, right, Tell me
what you think the difference is, like, is there an
attitude difference or is it like just a feeling difference totally?
And I think like I've done different kinds of traveling
for music, and sometimes I'm like opening for a band
and they have a tour of us, and I'm just
kind of rolling with them and there's somebody taking care
(29:33):
of all the details, and there's no reason why you
would have a conversation with someone on the street, you know,
you're sort of in a bubble in that scenario, And
that I have also done, you know, just me on
a train or on a bus where you're staying with friends.
But I think the difference for me is probably that
if I'm touring at some level, I end up being
concerned about protecting my own energy kind of just looking
(29:55):
out for my my own energy and own space so
that I can get in the space to perform. And
that's maybe just a perception I have, like I think
I need to do that, But I think if you're
really just traveling to travel, you're more like porous, right Like,
there's fewer boundaries around you're you're psyche. But that leads
us perfectly into talking about the idea of thou should
(30:18):
ignoy your smartphone, right like, as a singer songwriter, as
someone who's just done this thing on Broadway, the concept
of people having to always record that must be frustrating.
And I'm sure there's a part of you that's like,
put this down, be in the moment, be with me
in the moment, because I've done that. I locked the
(30:38):
world own in order to create this thing come and
experience of like that. I have so many thoughts and
feelings about that stuff, Like, yeah, I mean I remember
before those phones, you know, I remember touring before the phones,
and um, I remember so many times just being alone
in a car driving, you know, some impossible distance in
the United States to get to some like folk music
(31:01):
club where I was going to play a gig, and
seeing something stunningly beautiful and not being able to tell
anyone about it, and uh what it does kind of
in your heart when it has a minute, you know,
when you have a minute with that stuff. I think
there's like we're kind of spilling the sap all the
time with these phones, and we're not able to um
(31:21):
let them distill into the syrups that they could as
a Vermont reference for you, um that they could become
if you just sort of live with the beauty, you know,
in the moment. And certainly in the case of performing,
I think and with music and theater, it's all about
humans in a room together in that moment, and you
just can't be together if you have one eye on
(31:42):
the device. I did when I was between London and Broadway.
You know, the show has been in development for thirteen
years and I had like three months between London and
Broadway to make all these changes that we collectively felt
should be made to the script and the songs. And
I was like, I gotta get off my phone. So
I bought a dumb phone that I could take to
(32:02):
my writing place so I could maybe contact my my
husband or my manager if something crazy happened. But that
no one else could be in touch, and it was
amazing to me to reconnect with what it feels like
to live in the world without those devices. And uh,
I think the main thing is, you know, for most people,
it's like probably of my involvement on those sites is
(32:23):
like what do people think about what I said? You know,
as opposed to like what is happening with my friend,
which was really eye opening. And I don't want to
live like that, you know who the fund does. I
think we're being false to live like that because we
think that it's okay. It's not okay. Life is happening
right now in front of you and you don't have
to tell anyone about it. Yes, but it isn't. Broadway
(32:46):
kind of an almost sacred place for this where people
are still off their phones when people very few people,
unlike a concert, Broadway holds this like almost a good
manner or like a politeness, like I'm not going to
be on my phone, even though they have to say
it in the beginning, I feel like people adhere to it.
I agree. I mean, I think the culture is just
(33:08):
very strong in that way. And I mean it's true
at a music show too, It's not that cool to
pull out your phone and you be on it. But
on Broadway especially, I mean, people are paying so much
for those tickets, right, and they're there to lose themselves
in a story, and like, how are you going to
do that if your neighbor has like a screen out.
Let's talk about the ultimate journey. That's how I see
(33:29):
Hades Town, like I think about it in that way,
to the underworld, the ultimate journey, Like how is that
for you? People come from all over the world to
see broad Way and they want to go on that
journey alongside with you and the stars on the stage. Yeah,
they want to go with Andre de Shields, who's playing
the character of Hermes. And in this telling of the Orpheus,
(33:53):
and you really see story Hermes is he something like
a train conductor? Right? The very first lines of the
show are you know, once upon a time there was
a real road line, don't ask where, don't ask? When
it was the road to Hell? It was hard times.
And Andre is just such a consummate showman, you know,
so warm and welcoming. I think people do get a
sense when he comes out there that they have a
(34:13):
guide that they can trust who's going to take them
on a journey. He's such an eloquent man, and if
you've heard any of his interviews, but he talks about
like making a contract with the audience that we welcome
you on this journey with us. You might be challenged,
but you won't be harmed. Like there's such as some
sort of extension of his hand that feels very present
throughout the show. It's a strange peace. It's you know,
(34:36):
it does have this above ground world and this below
ground world, and the above ground world is a kind
of unpredictable place that the weather systems are unpredictable. Um,
there's poverty and hunger and heat and cold, and then
Hades Town or the underworld represents this place of relative
security and industrial world underground, it's walled in. It's all
(35:00):
very metaphorical, right, Like there's not a lot about the
show that's literal, and so I think the designers have
done just such a beautiful job of being able to
take us on that journey in terms of the change
that happens to the set when you travel underground. It's
sort of a sleight of hand move on the part
of Rachel Chapkin and Rachel Halkard, our director and scenic designer.
(35:23):
Give me something about your personal journey that you went
through with this production. So it's been thirteen years, um, yeah,
which is a lifetime really yeah, a third of my life,
you know. Yeah. Literally when it began, it was so
I was living in Vermont and it was this d
I Y community theater project. It was me and a
bunch of friends. We traveled around Vermont in this school
(35:47):
bus that was painted silver and it had all of
our sets and props in it. It was an impossible
thing that we did. Like we we had two weeks
of rehearsal or something and a couple of thousand dollars
to make this thing happen, and we did. Like I
remember of this one moment we were loading the sets
in from the bus into this one of these places
we were going to do the show, and I was
carrying together with the director and this other friend, like
(36:08):
these very heavy set pieces. They were so heavy, and
they didn't feel heavy, you know, they felt light to me.
This is gonna sound pretentious, and I never would like
quote Shakespeare ever, but you know, there's this moment in
um Romeo and Juliette where they're like, how did you
get over the wall to Juliette's house and Romia goes
on Love's Light Wings to iver pers these walls, and
(36:30):
I felt like, oh, this is love light Wings and
that that has been present in this show many different times,
you know, um, and it had to do with the
people coming together to make it happen. So after we
did it in Vermont, we did a concert version of
the show. I made an album with some guest singers,
and then we would tour around and present the show
as a concert, so no staging, no props, no costumes.
(36:53):
I would kind of talk about what was happening between
the songs, and we had like fourteen people and a
dog and if team Passenger Van. It was a really
wild time and always on a shoestring, and you know,
but it felt the same, like people were coming together
to make this thing happen. And then I met Rachel
Chapkin in twelve and started to work with her and
(37:13):
started to work on what has become this Broadway production.
And it's been a master class for me in terms
of taking this piece that came really out of the
wild woods, and you know, the music world essentially had
a lot of a lot of the logic, the sort
of emotional logic of the show is musical, and so
trying to mesh that with the world of dramaturgy and
(37:35):
you know what people are expecting when they're paying a
theater ticket and wanting to be led through a story
for me to be And so that again was a
phase of six years, and and we did off Broadway,
we did Edmonton, we did London, and then we finally
arrived at the cur and I don't know what's next.
You know, it does feel like we're sort of on it.
We're on a train and it and it just keeps
rolling and it's bigger than me, and it's bigger than
(37:58):
any of us that have been working on it. Maybe
the train is to everywhere. Okay, um, let's talk about
New York as a destination. It's like the final thing
to talk about, Like people come from all over the world,
and there's a kind of responsibility to create something for
a broad Way. You're taking on a responsibility because New
(38:19):
York is that place. And I think that as someone
who performs hair or has a business hair or in
any of those ways, you like representing New York. And
that is so crucial to me because it's the sense
of the universe. I I agree. I agree with you. I. Um,
you know, I grew up in a very rural place,
(38:41):
and um, New York was always my dream city. You know,
it took a long time before I got here, but
it wasn't necessarily Broadway that was the draw for me,
you know. I I sort of my romantic notions about
New York are like the Chelsea Hotel and you know,
the folk scene in the village in the sixties and
like Patti Smith and Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen and
(39:02):
that type of stuff. But then you know, there's so
many scenes going on in New York. And once I
tapped into Broadway, and you know, to be working on
this show on Broadway and to be rehearsing at like
Newford Second Street Studios and there's like the TUTSI guys
were upstairs, and you know, my Oklahoma friends were at
the bar like after hours. It does just feel like
(39:24):
such a beautiful camaraderie of artists in this city. And
you know, whatever the scene is, if it's folk music,
if it's Broadway, if it's jazz, you know, there's so
many worlds. So yeah, I feel like it's just a
tremendous privilege to live in this town and and to
be a representative of the arts scene here. It's that's
beyond my wildest dreams. You know. I'm just happy to
be in town. You know, this is like not a
funny story, but I just thought it was interesting in
(39:45):
the context of like what different ways you can travel.
And when I was eighteen, there was a bus ticket
you could get. It was a Greyhound bus ticket that
you could take any bus in the USA for a month.
And I got that ticket, and I did it by myself.
It was such a glorious you know, just me. I
was eighteen. I was reading like Carouac or something, just
(40:08):
like on a great hund bus, you know, overnight wake
up in San Francisco or like Knoxville, Tennessee, or New Orleans,
and get out the bus station, meet some random people.
It was a pretty formative experience for me. That is
what I'd like to inspire. I hope you and your
(40:28):
voice today inspires people to go and do that. It's
not necessarily Greyhound, Deltas available, whatever, whatever. Peter Pan is
the one, right, I always see it like rushing up
Fifth Avenue. Um, but I want to inspire people to
take those journeys to not fear take Pampa spray with
(40:50):
you a few months or like whatever it is. But like,
why are we in a fearful state to do that
stuff now? I mean, I understand that bad things happen
everywhere all the time, yes, but and listen studio with
us again today no one's paying attention to Huh, it's
not about you today all. But really, just take those journeys,
(41:11):
like get on a bus, go somewhere wild, and instead
of thinking about it, just feeling it. Right, that's the
whole show. Two seasons of this for the next year.
This is all I'm going to be talking about. It's amazing.
I love that. And it's so true that, you know,
to be on the ground someplace is so completely different
from reading about it in the news or you know
(41:32):
what whatever sense people have about a place from outside.
And I know, you know, you were talking about Cairo,
And when I was in college, I studied abroad in
Cairo and I did some traveling in the Middle East,
and I remember, you know, you read the what is
the stuff that the government puts out about don't go
to Lebanon Earth propaganda yeah, yeah, and then and then
on the ground in any of these places, even a
(41:53):
place that where there is a war or violence, and
I haven't been in a country like that, but that
there are people. You know, there's people everywhere, and there's
little kids like playing in the street and they're going
to school, and there's people trying to sell you a
piece of fruit. You know, there's just people everywhere. That
is what the show is about. It's about finding the
(42:14):
humanity and showing that there's humanity everywhere. Like we need
to stop the idea of the Middle East or scary Africa. However,
these horrible tropes that are out there, because none of
that stuff truly exists. The world is open with you. Well,
thank you for being with me and spending a little
(42:36):
time with me. Thank you so much for having me
pleasures so wonderful, and NA has me inspired to completely
forget that I even have a phone. And that is
the power of art. So let's take the advice from mother.
One photo that's all your need. So I have a
(43:01):
plane to catch, but if you'd still like to reach us,
go to Everywhere Podcast on Instagram, Everywhere part on Twitter,
or the website at Everywhere Podcast dot com. Of course,
I couldn't have done any of this without my executive
producers Christopher Hats and the loveliest of lovely Holly Fry.
(43:21):
A big thank you to my lead producer and editor
Chandler Maze and also co editor and creative of the
soundtrack Tristan McNeil. I am your host, Daniel Scheffler, and
as I'd like to say, good boys go to heaven
and bad boys are everywhere.
Hi, I'm Daniel Scheffler, and this is everywhere Today's travel commandment,
thou shalt ignore thy smartphone as much as I rely
(00:22):
on my smartphone for you know, pretty much everything all
the time. They are these instances where I think I
would just like to throw this device into the Hudson
River and live a simple life without it. I know
I'm not alone when I say this. Now, let's imagine
the phone free life of a travel writer like me.
(00:44):
First off, maybe I should check if those old school
internet cafes still operate all over the globe. Next up,
imagine me slipping bundles of printed boarding passes around. I'd
actually have to hail a real yellow cab without an
umer app, so that will be something old that's new again.
But how will I tell my husband we've bought it,
(01:06):
and now we're pushing back, and now we're taxing, and
now we're taking off. I'd have to save my hotel
addresses and reservations in print them out, like my great
aunt used to do in this giant leather folder which
she carried everywhere with her on trips. Or maybe I
need a very chic, oversized lanyard with all my paperwork
(01:29):
then again, I could get nicely lost on purpose with
just a paper map or even no map. Believe me,
a little part of me finds all of this rather thrilling.
Let's call it low tech high tech. I think this
all the time. Technology will save us, but not before
it destroys us. When it comes to travel, my feelings
(01:50):
are quite specific as someone who's not on social media,
and yes, you heard me correctly, no social media whatsoever.
I happen to now have an everywhere podcast Instagram page,
but hey, that's just work. Recently, my high school brother
(02:11):
said to me, maybe you don't exist, and I really
like that. I did social when it came out years ago.
I used it, abused it, and then for about ten
years or so, I've cut it all off cold turkey.
My compulsive nature and my deep desire for real in
the moment right now experiences were simply too strong to deny,
(02:35):
and I'm a happier human for it. Recently I counted
twenty travel writers, slash bloggers, slash influences who died in
ten from trying to capture the best image for their
social channels. Nearly two dozen people died for what exactly.
(02:57):
Every time someone shows me the idyllic beach photo, or
that picture perfect yoga position photo on top of a camel,
or another plate of over stylized food. You know the
ones I just think, were you actually there? Or were
you just posing? Sometimes at a work lunch, when I'm
(03:18):
just about to tuck into my salad and I'm starving,
I get told to wait as it's being photographed by
a fucking influencer. What kind of life is this that
every moment needs to be memorialized? I have to wonder. Luckily,
I've had some practice. Spending a month in Japan with
Mother showed me just how to do less phone and
(03:42):
more life in the now, the right now. So let
me tell you about Mother. I often describe her as
the sweetest, smartest, funniest, happiest aunt everyone should wish for.
If she was a believer of reincarnation, I'd say she
was in her last life, having learned every less impossible,
(04:04):
having finally reached that evasive, sneaky thing they call enlightenment.
She wants for nothing, she judges absolutely nobody, and she
lives very simply. It's beyond inspiring. But more importantly certain
for me is that she is the type of traveler who,
after she breaks her foot on the Otter Trail in
(04:26):
South Africa, just keeps going. She walks the remaining twenty
miles without a complaint. If she wasn't so skinny, I
think she would have made it big in the Mossad,
Israel's special forces. She's also the type of traveler who's
not interested in driving around cities and a fancy black
car seeing things from behind a window. Nope. She puts
(04:48):
on a pair of sneakers, walks every block, every nook
and cranny. Plus she greets and chats to everyone she
comes across, from the president of an African state I've
never heard of to the Mr. Delivery guy holding her
take out. So of course Japan is perfect for her.
Everyone is as polite as she is, and walking all
(05:09):
over is so much part of the culture that she
fits right in. Although she towers over everyone, she graciously
bows right down to chat. Traveling with Mother is always
the most fun any human can have. She's up for anything, like,
let's not google this at all, but go and find
out where the birthplace of Pearls could be. And we did.
(05:31):
It's a little prefecture called Mia, just a few hours
south of Tokyo, where only female divers were entrusted to
find pearls. I see how Mother's eyes are filled with
magic as she learns how to use a vending machine
to purchase anything imaginable. So, of course we turn this
into a game, something that almost every situation calls for.
(05:53):
It started with what is the strangest item we could
get from a vending machine. I of course thought I
had one when I found a vending machine with little
doors revealing puppies, but Mother one upped me when she
discovered live goldfish, spiders, and even pet snakes. We were
really not into the dirty underwear vending machines or the
(06:15):
ones dispensing dry ice, but Mother won our competition hands
down with her unearthing of a vending machine that dispenses
doggy wigs. Because you know that day when you're out
and about and your pop urgently needs a costume change
or maybe a disguise. We didn't tweet about this or
(06:36):
instagram this moment. We just saved it just for ourselves,
and it was so indulgent. Well, we really got into
the vending machine thing. We ate entire six course meals
under bridges in Tokyo, all from vending machines. We also
managed to buy an enormous inflatable pool swan. By mistake,
(06:57):
Mother just wanted a new iPhone charger, but she was thrilled. Nevertheless,
at some point in Kyoto, since it was freezing one day,
we bought matching Harajuku girls pink sweaters with thirteen bunnies
sewn onto them. I got an extra large and she
got a small. We were twinsies in guess what. We
didn't need to photograph this. We just lived it and
(07:20):
laughed it. There was no Facebook. Mother rocked her new look.
It wasn't really my color. Besides for visiting some of
the oldest temples in Kyoto with Mother or eating our
palid cleanser sherbet from our personal three foot high ship,
done table side out of sculptured ice. We also soaked
(07:41):
in ancient Rio Khan's mud baths and then sat on
tiny wooden chairs getting scrubbed by a very thorough innkeeper.
I think at some point we also glimpsed the Royal Princess,
and I think she was actually holding a Starbucks coffee.
What most love is When Mother and I wanted to
get fitted for kimonos in Tokyo. Old family run kimono
(08:06):
shops are all over, easy to spot with kimono clad mannequins. Outside,
we found an old boutique that was close to the
Palace gardens. The owner was a smiley woman in a glamorous,
light purple kimono, whom I told that I wanted to
be fitted with mother right away, she grabbed my hand
and invited us in. I'm pretty particular about mostly wearing black,
(08:29):
whereas Mother runs down a color wheel once in a while,
so we settled on black for me and dove gray
for her. When I learned that the word kimono means
something that is worn, the literal meaning made me want
to wear it so much more. Supposedly, there are nine
types of popular kimonos. Mother was into the summers style yukata,
(08:52):
the most casual style of kimono, whereas I settled for
a samurai style kimono with an obie, which is the
belt that holds it all together. Of course, fitting a
kimono is a leisurely a fair, a long chat about
to pattern or not to pattern, to clash or not
to clash, to parasol or not to parasol. And then
(09:15):
these lashings of wisdom about which attires appropriate for which
social obligation. Apparently I skewed towards very casual, basically living
a pool party life with no umbrella. But attire is
not just what you put on your body. It's about
a meditation. It's about an observance. A lovely march, a
(09:37):
tea ceremony unfolded in front of our very eyes, all
forming part of this choreography. And at some point fabrics
and robes were whizzing by, and the next thing you're
standing on a too, Tommy Matt fully garbed. Once more.
We didn't have a phone or a camera to commemorate
this moment. We just stood there, dressed and be next
(10:00):
to each other, hugging, smiling. Mother not one for tears
may have wiped a little droplet away at this very moment. I,
of course waterworks, So naturally I had to think, is
this appropriation of culture that is not mine? Am I
being offensive or insensitive? Or am I sincerely and absolutely
(10:24):
celebrating and honoring a beautiful custom. My kimono maker told
me it's all about intention. It's not the one but
the how. I explained to our maestro that I lived
in America, and Mother lived across a very large pond,
and I just don't get to see her as much
as I'd like to. And now Mother just isn't so
(10:46):
young anymore. We plan to put on our kimonos and
call each other on Skype every week. So there we
are on different parts of the globe, chatting over a
cup of tea while in our beautiful garments. Me for
a morning cup, Mother for an afternoon treat, and that
would be our little connection in the world, just hours
(11:07):
nobody else's, and no proof was necessary to know in
our hearts that this really happened, something seemingly so small
and perhaps insignificant, tethering us just a little more. So
let's take a breath there, and we'll be right back
with my friend Holly Fry to give us a little
historical context right after the break. Thanks for sticking around.
(11:32):
Here's more of everywhere. Yes, my love, I'm sorry I
didn't get you a kimono when I was in Japan,
but we weren't friends then, So now when I returned
to Japan, I will bring you a kimono and we
can have a friendship kimono. I need to build a
time machine go back, get me the kimono when you
(11:54):
got your original one, or it's just not going to
have any meaning. Fine, I need a minute to get
right on it. I love kimono because they're beautiful, and
also as someone who sews a lot, I appreciate them
and maybe a different way than normal people would. But
I thought we would talk a little bit about kimono
and their history and then why that is relevant to
(12:17):
your story about your mom. So, up until the High
End period, the kimono not so much in Japan. It
was more like um separate you know, separate tops and
bottoms or trousers or skirts. There were one piece garments,
but they weren't quite the same as we would like
look at and see a kimono. And then during the
(12:38):
High End period, which is quite long, it was from
seven to eleven ninety two, they developed during that several
hundred years. And what I love about kimono and what
to me is really beautiful and kind of a nice
example in general of Japanese design, is that unlike if
you look at garments, for example, that come down through
the European tradition, particularly after the Middle Ages, where there's
(13:01):
lots of tailoring the seams are fussy. They're they're sewn
and cut so that they will mold to your body.
But in Japan, the development of how they cut and
make these clothes, everything is a straight line. They're just
designed in pieces so beautifully that they wrap around you
perfectly and they fall perfectly, and it takes advantage of
(13:21):
the fabric's natural beauty. To me is like brilliant design.
It's it's very much in line with the idea of
which is why I love them, like for a lot
of people that so, making a kimono is really fun
because you can kind of really indulge in just the
beauty of the fabric and you're not worried so much
about like matching up seam lines and stuff. Everything has
(13:42):
to match, of course, but it's just simpler. It's a
simpler design from the interior. But really there's this interesting
development that happens after the high end period, so the
Kama Kuta period, which is eight, there's another big shift,
and then the Moro Machi period. I probably pronouncing these
names very terribly, so my apologies to any Japanese speakers
(14:04):
in the audience. And at this point kimono started getting
more and more colorful. This idea of a colorful garment
came in. The color started to be important in terms
of its symbolic meaning, like certain leaders would be associated
with certain colors, so loyalty could be demonstrated by the
selection of fabrics that were in your kimono, and also
(14:25):
um on the battlefield, alliances were often identified by color,
which isn't unusual now. I mean, even every every nation
has its military that has its uniform, so it's kind
of similar to that. But these tended to be much
more colorful, and so you will sometimes hear historians talk
about ancient Japanese battlefields as a very like wild visual
(14:45):
display of just all of these colors coming together. And
then in the Edo period things really started to become
important in terms of kimono because one, there were several
developments where there were several garments that developed along with
the samurai tradition, and these became super important. The idea
of presentation became more important than ever. The people that
(15:09):
made kimono had to work so hard to keep up
with all of the demands of like Similarly, still symbolic
colors very important. This idea of looking very perfect and
wearing like hakama, which are the split pants style garment,
still using this straight cut method, but because they were
having to churn out garments at a really fast rate,
(15:30):
it really became an art form like people that could
move very quickly, almost like when you watch a master
folder do a piece of origami. It was like that,
but clothing came out at the end. So kimono became
more important than ever in terms of being a cultural
item and a status symbol in a way to really
like telegraph to the world who you were and who
you were associated with. But nowadays kimono are not really
(15:54):
the day to day garments that they once were in
Japanese culture, and they're usually warrant for things like important
celebrate sations or ceremonial days. But also there has become
this growing thing where they share them with travelers, and
that is a new form of income for people that
make close which then becomes this sort of beautiful reflection
like I I love that you talk in this episode
(16:16):
about wondering whether you're appropriating culture in taking part in
buying these things, But at the same time, like that's
the way that that garment had to evolve so it
could stay in the public consciousness, particularly on a global scale,
and I just like that it become this item that
is instantly recognizable. No one looks at a kimono and
(16:37):
is confused about the culture it came from. So in
a way, they have made like this garment the ambassador
for their country, which I love and I think it's
really beautiful. Well, I think the reappropriation thing that I
was thinking about is I feel like there's a pod
of travel that exposes you to so many of these
things where you need to go and appreciate and not
(17:00):
take for yourself, right, And I think a lot of
times people will kind of trinketize because of culture, where
they go and they buy a thing in another country
and then they come back and they wear it almost
like you know, a badge of honor, and they're like,
I went to this country, I am cultured and I
understand it now, which is it gets in a weird
(17:20):
place because their idea is that they're like, I appreciate this,
and it's like, well wait, because you're you're kind of
making yourself like the ambassador of something that you don't
understand and don't really have cultural ownership of. And that's
where it gets a little bit tricky, right, Um, so
what is the right way to do it? I don't know.
I don't know that there's one right way, right, Like
I think a lot of people grapple with this. The
(17:42):
biggest thing I think is always important is to to
listen to people from any given culture when they say, like,
that's not cool. And I understand that the reaction, the
natural reaction most people have is whether they're conscious of
it or not, to be defensive and be like I
was just trying to learn, I was just trying to
appreciate it, but like just to listen and sit with
(18:03):
the information rather than trying to justify or like defend
yourself in that situation. And again, I screw up all
the time, like I think everybody does. It's hard not to.
It's yeah, I mean I think like it's a good
step that you you opened up that conversation with the
person you were buying the kimono from and probably opened
(18:24):
up to him a new idea that like you just
wanted something to share with your mother. It wasn't it's
not as the you're you're wearing it around town and
being like I have been to Japan and I know
the Japanese intimately. Um, that's the trick, right that people
start to kind of come back I think sometimes from
travels and behave as though they have somehow become naturalized
(18:48):
citizens of the place that they went, when even if
you learn about the cultures through doing something like that,
you can never really replicate their experience to a level
of understanding, you know, that is equal to what they've lived.
It becomes about sensitivity as well, like I said, just
listening to other people. Yeah, the kimono and my mother
(19:09):
is a private, personal, beautiful thing we do at home,
in the privacy of our own home. I'm not wearing
it as a representation of Japan as much as I'm
wearing it as a representation of time with my mother.
Specialness of that. It's like your way to recall that
moment and that event in your life. And this is
like the thing that happens to me all the time
(19:29):
that I laugh and think about. When I fly back
from the Caribbean, there's always a bunch of people in
the plane with corn rows that they've had them done,
sometimes Mexico to but the Caribbean in particular. You notice
people that had had their hand done braided or corn road.
And I wonder whether there's a consciousness there at all,
whether you're thinking like, oh, I'm gonna get corn rows
(19:51):
as a person that's not from wherever I've come from
and do it anyway, or am I doing it as
a celebration of hair right? Well, and it kind of
goes back to that thing I was saying about trinket
izing it, right. It's like a fast food version of
culture where it's kind of like you didn't actually immerse
yourself and learn about it. You kind of bought a
(20:12):
look through the drive through. Yeah, but then again, I'd
like to be Devil's advocate hand look at it from
maybe there's a small drop of hey, I'm willing to learn,
like that person actually did think about it. Well, maybe
that's just bullshit. No, they just went and had their
(20:32):
hand writed. I think in most cases it's that it's
an Instagram photo unfortunately. And I hope, I mean, my
hope is always that I mean, once they have had
that thing done, the cow has been flung, Like, you
can't unring that bell and say that they didn't do that,
especially if they've posted it on their Instagram. But I
just always hope that it can open up a conversation
(20:54):
or at least some self reflection about it. We all
need it all the time. I mean, like I said,
I screw all the time. It's the willingness to admit
that you screw up all the time, and I'm willing
to learn. Is that's the point? And travel shows you that, Like,
that's the point. And I think most people don't want
to trinketize anyone else's life, like they don't realize that
it's demeaning to be like I came and enjoyed your
(21:16):
culture and I came away with braids. Well, I enjoyed
you a culture so much I dyed my hair purple
two weeks ago because you have purple hair, and then
went to play my ma gen competition with purple hair. Yes,
but I sent you the die like I was an
active basically by hand. I don't think of that as
you appropriating my culture so much as me prosplytizing the
magic of purpleness. And thank you. It was appreciated only
(21:39):
when I was in the sun. If I was not
in the sun, no one noticed. It just read as dark. Yeah,
but yeah, I think as long as we're all aware
that we're probably screwing up a lot, and we're not
trying to turn someone else's culture into a souvenir, but
be really thoughtful about these things. It will go along
(21:59):
way to bridging that gap. The whole point of this
episode was to talk about the idea of leaving your
smartphone behind. So I've been grappling with this thing forever
because of course I want a moment that's beautiful, to
capture it and share it with friends across the world
and show them something that they haven't seen, or something
that I'm sharing with my mother or something I'm sharing
(22:20):
with my husband. But at the same time, I've been like,
why do I need to memorialize this moment? Annonize this moment?
Isn't it a beautiful idea that you could just be
in the moment? Ironically, like I think about these chats
of ours that are being recorded, and I'm I think,
I'm so glad these will be there when I'm in
my eighties and have lost some of my mental acuity
(22:43):
and I can return to this happy time. But yeah,
I mean, to me, that's a big part of it, right.
It is just that it helps kind of jog your
memory and take you back to that place, like a
visual is an easy way to do that, right. So
now I don't even know since phones are you know,
this ubiquitous additional appendage that like, I mean, I'm as
bad as anyone. I have it in my hand all
(23:03):
the time. And to me, there's also that subtle difference
that you have to acknowledge between capturing a moment like
stopping for a photo versus this will be great on Insta,
this will be great on Twitter, like and I don't know, right,
some of it is that yummy, yummy dopamine hit that
people get from likes and comments, And I don't know
how you tell people not to do that because we've
(23:25):
become dependent on it. So maybe it's about calling the
amount of what's done right. So my mother, who I'm
with traveling all the time, she would take one photore
an entire experience, Like she doesn't need to take hundreds
of photos. She'll take one and she will actually look
at that photo again, which I'd love about her. She'll
share it with me and be like, do you remember
(23:47):
this incredible flower we saw in Kyoto? I will never
forget it. And she looks at the photo and that's beautiful.
So I want her to capture that and remember it.
But at the same time, I mean, I think the
talk on social media has been there for a long time.
How do I get off? How do I spend less time?
Am I less productive? And I'm all like, all those
questions are there, but I feel like no one's given
(24:09):
us a solution. Travel should provide that solution. Travel should
encourage you to not want to do all that stuff,
because why would you want to instagram this beautiful private
moment for everybody else to see if you could just
keep it for yourself and that's the joy of it.
I mean, some people travel, I know that they are
(24:29):
travel companies that book specific instagram worthy trips. Yeah. So
this gets into a slightly deeper conversation right about what
people are actually getting from social media, Like I mentioned
the yummy, yummy dopamine hit, but on a more intense
and to me slightly frightening level, is validation and identity
(24:49):
right right, Like people are not feeling validated in their
day to day lives and there's not a sense of
worth If people are not acknowledging how great you are
all the time, would just problematic and hopefully, like people
can self validate. But that's not the culture we're in
right now. So I feel like we have to figure
out a way to address this, almost like a global
(25:11):
mental health issue that needs to be discussed, Like why
do people feel invalidated and that their identity is defined
by the reactions of others that somebody has to tell
you you're having an amazing time. I'm always having an
amazing time too. Well. I think about travel in that respect,
like I think about these moments in like Floridaanapolis in
(25:33):
the southern part of Brazil, where I was single, I
had no responsibilities. I had this sort of strange moment
between lives where I was just sitting on the beach
by myself and I didn't need to photograph it to
tell anyone about it. And travel shows you all of
(25:53):
that all the time, Like I'm going to Africa and
there's no service, and I worry about it because I
have to work or have stuff to do. And then
I start thinking, wait, this is such a beautiful opportunity
to just be in Africa. Why do I need to
take a photo of the Big Five? I just need
to be with the Big Five. Well, my thing is
(26:14):
always that people have already taken photographs of almost any
important spot in the world, way better than I would
ever manage. So I can just look at those I
have seen no photographic ability. It's perfectly acceptable. Mine, however, terrible.
So my real reason for not taking photos is because
I'm terrible at taking photos. It would challenge your identity
(26:34):
and your self validations exact exactly. Oh my god, thanks
Holly for hanging out with me today. Always Ella is
so happy you're here. I'm always happy to hang out
with ls. She's like the best non speaking co host
on the planet. She's not moving. Her podcast is not
going to take off because she just doesn't have the
(26:54):
gumption to keep it going. She's more interested in napping.
She's like, I need an daddy coming minutes of dog snores.
This is a great moment for us to travel once
again to advertising Land. We'll be right back with more
Everywhere trade tables up. You're returning to everywhere Land. To me,
(27:20):
Broadway really is one of the last art forms untainted
by social media. It exists for you in a moment alone,
created by the artists right in front of your face,
and as Mitchell, the writer and music creator of Broadway's
(27:43):
hit Hadestown is with me in studio. Thank you for
spending a little time with me on its summer Friday.
It's hot and blazing in New York. Let's start by
telling about your childhood and traveling around. Yeah. Yeah, So
I grew up in Vermont. My parents were like back
(28:06):
to the land or hippies that had grown up in
the suburbs. And then they hit chick to California for
the Summer of Love and they they read about how
everyone should buy a farm in Vermont in the Whole
Earth catalog, and so that's what they did. And I
lived there on a sheep farm with my parents, and
my grandparents were also on that same farm in a
different house. And um my granddad was involved in solar
(28:32):
energy research, and after he was retired, he did a
lot of traveling to do um kind of consulting in
different places. And I remember my my grandparents taking off
to go to China or the Middle East and then
coming back with a present for me. So travel was
always like a value in our family. I remember my
mom saying that things that was okay to spend money
(28:52):
on were food, books, your friends, and travel. So there
was a lot of shipping me off to different places
when I was it, and I came to love it
for traveling its own right, you know. And then when
I became a singer songwriter, that has sort of supplanted
my travel life as usually I'm traveling for a gig
now and I sort of miss those days of just
(29:13):
being somewhere for the sake of being there, right, well,
so much of it is business travel, right, Tell me
what you think the difference is, like, is there an
attitude difference or is it like just a feeling difference totally?
And I think like I've done different kinds of traveling
for music, and sometimes I'm like opening for a band
and they have a tour of us, and I'm just
kind of rolling with them and there's somebody taking care
(29:33):
of all the details, and there's no reason why you
would have a conversation with someone on the street, you know,
you're sort of in a bubble in that scenario, And
that I have also done, you know, just me on
a train or on a bus where you're staying with friends.
But I think the difference for me is probably that
if I'm touring at some level, I end up being
concerned about protecting my own energy kind of just looking
(29:55):
out for my my own energy and own space so
that I can get in the space to perform. And
that's maybe just a perception I have, like I think
I need to do that, But I think if you're
really just traveling to travel, you're more like porous, right Like,
there's fewer boundaries around you're you're psyche. But that leads
us perfectly into talking about the idea of thou should
(30:18):
ignoy your smartphone, right like, as a singer songwriter, as
someone who's just done this thing on Broadway, the concept
of people having to always record that must be frustrating.
And I'm sure there's a part of you that's like,
put this down, be in the moment, be with me
in the moment, because I've done that. I locked the
(30:38):
world own in order to create this thing come and
experience of like that. I have so many thoughts and
feelings about that stuff, Like, yeah, I mean I remember
before those phones, you know, I remember touring before the phones,
and um, I remember so many times just being alone
in a car driving, you know, some impossible distance in
the United States to get to some like folk music
(31:01):
club where I was going to play a gig, and
seeing something stunningly beautiful and not being able to tell
anyone about it, and uh what it does kind of
in your heart when it has a minute, you know,
when you have a minute with that stuff. I think
there's like we're kind of spilling the sap all the
time with these phones, and we're not able to um
(31:21):
let them distill into the syrups that they could as
a Vermont reference for you, um that they could become
if you just sort of live with the beauty, you know,
in the moment. And certainly in the case of performing,
I think and with music and theater, it's all about
humans in a room together in that moment, and you
just can't be together if you have one eye on
(31:42):
the device. I did when I was between London and Broadway.
You know, the show has been in development for thirteen
years and I had like three months between London and
Broadway to make all these changes that we collectively felt
should be made to the script and the songs. And
I was like, I gotta get off my phone. So
I bought a dumb phone that I could take to
(32:02):
my writing place so I could maybe contact my my
husband or my manager if something crazy happened. But that
no one else could be in touch, and it was
amazing to me to reconnect with what it feels like
to live in the world without those devices. And uh,
I think the main thing is, you know, for most people,
it's like probably of my involvement on those sites is
(32:23):
like what do people think about what I said? You know,
as opposed to like what is happening with my friend,
which was really eye opening. And I don't want to
live like that, you know who the fund does. I
think we're being false to live like that because we
think that it's okay. It's not okay. Life is happening
right now in front of you and you don't have
to tell anyone about it. Yes, but it isn't. Broadway
(32:46):
kind of an almost sacred place for this where people
are still off their phones when people very few people,
unlike a concert, Broadway holds this like almost a good
manner or like a politeness, like I'm not going to
be on my phone, even though they have to say
it in the beginning, I feel like people adhere to it.
I agree. I mean, I think the culture is just
(33:08):
very strong in that way. And I mean it's true
at a music show too, It's not that cool to
pull out your phone and you be on it. But
on Broadway especially, I mean, people are paying so much
for those tickets, right, and they're there to lose themselves
in a story, and like, how are you going to
do that if your neighbor has like a screen out.
Let's talk about the ultimate journey. That's how I see
(33:29):
Hades Town, like I think about it in that way,
to the underworld, the ultimate journey, Like how is that
for you? People come from all over the world to
see broad Way and they want to go on that
journey alongside with you and the stars on the stage. Yeah,
they want to go with Andre de Shields, who's playing
the character of Hermes. And in this telling of the Orpheus,
(33:53):
and you really see story Hermes is he something like
a train conductor? Right? The very first lines of the
show are you know, once upon a time there was
a real road line, don't ask where, don't ask? When
it was the road to Hell? It was hard times.
And Andre is just such a consummate showman, you know,
so warm and welcoming. I think people do get a
sense when he comes out there that they have a
(34:13):
guide that they can trust who's going to take them
on a journey. He's such an eloquent man, and if
you've heard any of his interviews, but he talks about
like making a contract with the audience that we welcome
you on this journey with us. You might be challenged,
but you won't be harmed. Like there's such as some
sort of extension of his hand that feels very present
throughout the show. It's a strange peace. It's you know,
(34:36):
it does have this above ground world and this below
ground world, and the above ground world is a kind
of unpredictable place that the weather systems are unpredictable. Um,
there's poverty and hunger and heat and cold, and then
Hades Town or the underworld represents this place of relative
security and industrial world underground, it's walled in. It's all
(35:00):
very metaphorical, right, Like there's not a lot about the
show that's literal, and so I think the designers have
done just such a beautiful job of being able to
take us on that journey in terms of the change
that happens to the set when you travel underground. It's
sort of a sleight of hand move on the part
of Rachel Chapkin and Rachel Halkard, our director and scenic designer.
(35:23):
Give me something about your personal journey that you went
through with this production. So it's been thirteen years, um, yeah,
which is a lifetime really yeah, a third of my life,
you know. Yeah. Literally when it began, it was so
I was living in Vermont and it was this d
I Y community theater project. It was me and a
bunch of friends. We traveled around Vermont in this school
(35:47):
bus that was painted silver and it had all of
our sets and props in it. It was an impossible
thing that we did. Like we we had two weeks
of rehearsal or something and a couple of thousand dollars
to make this thing happen, and we did. Like I
remember of this one moment we were loading the sets
in from the bus into this one of these places
we were going to do the show, and I was
carrying together with the director and this other friend, like
(36:08):
these very heavy set pieces. They were so heavy, and
they didn't feel heavy, you know, they felt light to me.
This is gonna sound pretentious, and I never would like
quote Shakespeare ever, but you know, there's this moment in
um Romeo and Juliette where they're like, how did you
get over the wall to Juliette's house and Romia goes
on Love's Light Wings to iver pers these walls, and
(36:30):
I felt like, oh, this is love light Wings and
that that has been present in this show many different times,
you know, um, and it had to do with the
people coming together to make it happen. So after we
did it in Vermont, we did a concert version of
the show. I made an album with some guest singers,
and then we would tour around and present the show
as a concert, so no staging, no props, no costumes.
(36:53):
I would kind of talk about what was happening between
the songs, and we had like fourteen people and a
dog and if team Passenger Van. It was a really
wild time and always on a shoestring, and you know,
but it felt the same, like people were coming together
to make this thing happen. And then I met Rachel
Chapkin in twelve and started to work with her and
(37:13):
started to work on what has become this Broadway production.
And it's been a master class for me in terms
of taking this piece that came really out of the
wild woods, and you know, the music world essentially had
a lot of a lot of the logic, the sort
of emotional logic of the show is musical, and so
trying to mesh that with the world of dramaturgy and
(37:35):
you know what people are expecting when they're paying a
theater ticket and wanting to be led through a story
for me to be And so that again was a
phase of six years, and and we did off Broadway,
we did Edmonton, we did London, and then we finally
arrived at the cur and I don't know what's next.
You know, it does feel like we're sort of on it.
We're on a train and it and it just keeps
rolling and it's bigger than me, and it's bigger than
(37:58):
any of us that have been working on it. Maybe
the train is to everywhere. Okay, um, let's talk about
New York as a destination. It's like the final thing
to talk about, Like people come from all over the world,
and there's a kind of responsibility to create something for
a broad Way. You're taking on a responsibility because New
(38:19):
York is that place. And I think that as someone
who performs hair or has a business hair or in
any of those ways, you like representing New York. And
that is so crucial to me because it's the sense
of the universe. I I agree. I agree with you. I. Um,
you know, I grew up in a very rural place,
(38:41):
and um, New York was always my dream city. You know,
it took a long time before I got here, but
it wasn't necessarily Broadway that was the draw for me,
you know. I I sort of my romantic notions about
New York are like the Chelsea Hotel and you know,
the folk scene in the village in the sixties and
like Patti Smith and Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen and
(39:02):
that type of stuff. But then you know, there's so
many scenes going on in New York. And once I
tapped into Broadway, and you know, to be working on
this show on Broadway and to be rehearsing at like
Newford Second Street Studios and there's like the TUTSI guys
were upstairs, and you know, my Oklahoma friends were at
the bar like after hours. It does just feel like
(39:24):
such a beautiful camaraderie of artists in this city. And
you know, whatever the scene is, if it's folk music,
if it's Broadway, if it's jazz, you know, there's so
many worlds. So yeah, I feel like it's just a
tremendous privilege to live in this town and and to
be a representative of the arts scene here. It's that's
beyond my wildest dreams. You know. I'm just happy to
be in town. You know, this is like not a
funny story, but I just thought it was interesting in
(39:45):
the context of like what different ways you can travel.
And when I was eighteen, there was a bus ticket
you could get. It was a Greyhound bus ticket that
you could take any bus in the USA for a month.
And I got that ticket, and I did it by myself.
It was such a glorious you know, just me. I
was eighteen. I was reading like Carouac or something, just
(40:08):
like on a great hund bus, you know, overnight wake
up in San Francisco or like Knoxville, Tennessee, or New Orleans,
and get out the bus station, meet some random people.
It was a pretty formative experience for me. That is
what I'd like to inspire. I hope you and your
(40:28):
voice today inspires people to go and do that. It's
not necessarily Greyhound, Deltas available, whatever, whatever. Peter Pan is
the one, right, I always see it like rushing up
Fifth Avenue. Um, but I want to inspire people to
take those journeys to not fear take Pampa spray with
(40:50):
you a few months or like whatever it is. But like,
why are we in a fearful state to do that
stuff now? I mean, I understand that bad things happen
everywhere all the time, yes, but and listen studio with
us again today no one's paying attention to Huh, it's
not about you today all. But really, just take those journeys,
(41:11):
like get on a bus, go somewhere wild, and instead
of thinking about it, just feeling it. Right, that's the
whole show. Two seasons of this for the next year.
This is all I'm going to be talking about. It's amazing.
I love that. And it's so true that, you know,
to be on the ground someplace is so completely different
from reading about it in the news or you know
(41:32):
what whatever sense people have about a place from outside.
And I know, you know, you were talking about Cairo,
And when I was in college, I studied abroad in
Cairo and I did some traveling in the Middle East,
and I remember, you know, you read the what is
the stuff that the government puts out about don't go
to Lebanon Earth propaganda yeah, yeah, and then and then
on the ground in any of these places, even a
(41:53):
place that where there is a war or violence, and
I haven't been in a country like that, but that
there are people. You know, there's people everywhere, and there's
little kids like playing in the street and they're going
to school, and there's people trying to sell you a
piece of fruit. You know, there's just people everywhere. That
is what the show is about. It's about finding the
(42:14):
humanity and showing that there's humanity everywhere. Like we need
to stop the idea of the Middle East or scary Africa. However,
these horrible tropes that are out there, because none of
that stuff truly exists. The world is open with you. Well,
thank you for being with me and spending a little
(42:36):
time with me. Thank you so much for having me
pleasures so wonderful, and NA has me inspired to completely
forget that I even have a phone. And that is
the power of art. So let's take the advice from mother.
One photo that's all your need. So I have a
(43:01):
plane to catch, but if you'd still like to reach us,
go to Everywhere Podcast on Instagram, Everywhere part on Twitter,
or the website at Everywhere Podcast dot com. Of course,
I couldn't have done any of this without my executive
producers Christopher Hats and the loveliest of lovely Holly Fry.
(43:21):
A big thank you to my lead producer and editor
Chandler Maze and also co editor and creative of the
soundtrack Tristan McNeil. I am your host, Daniel Scheffler, and
as I'd like to say, good boys go to heaven
and bad boys are everywhere.
Everywhere News
Host
Daniel Scheffler
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