The Busy Dreamer Still Dreams There are only two types of places in the world: Place's I have been to, and places I have yet to go to.

“More left, no… more right! Yes! Right there. Now the next one! Put the paprika over here, yucca there, and starfruit in the corner. Place the Hess and Florida avocadoes in separate lines and align the Matouk hot sauce display. Well done!” From the grocery store on the corner of Church and Utica Ave in Brooklyn, the Caribbean somehow emanated through the odd spaces in-between the perfectly stacked earth-tone Tetris blocks.

Looking down, the fragmented tan bricks paved into the road began to skew unevenly as we walked uphill into the depths of the sunny Dominican village. We held the mark of our Asian race across our skin, and carried the weight of the gospel. Reaching what seemed to be a formidable starting line, we begun to scope the area for targets – the motorcyclists and their girlfriends in the auto shop, the mother hanging a dripping-wet, patterned blanket over the hot black fence of her balcony, or even the solo mid-teen boy cashiering a humbly-stocked deli. We decided to divide into groups covering different parts of the village, to reconvene at a quarter after noon.

My group walked over to an elderly woman cradling her foot. ¿Abuela, que pasó a tus pies? Through the faint, black strands of hair covering her face, she whispered, this happens often… It isn't uncommon for us here at La República Dominicana… Pulling her left foot over her right knee, she showed us an infection rooted at the bottom of her sole – a mixture of brown and black scabs, still fresh, and and still growing. Our pastor explained that drinking unclean water can spread infection, which typically emerges in our feet. It was remarkable to me that clean water, a basic necessity I could attain by turning my sink on, was something people here did not freely possess.

She prayed with us as we asked for her to be healed. And as we left, she handed us a few chinola fruit. Hard, green, and rather unappealing from its outer shell, I was disinterested. But, the moment it was cut open revealing its guzzling, greenish-orange seeds, I wanted to try it. Loading sugar on top of it as I was instructed, I lifted a spoonful to my mouth.

Now this was real, passionate fruit. No, not the Starbucks Passion Iced Tea kind, but a taste I would permanently remember a country by. The spectrum of flavor as I knew changed, as did my view of travelling the world and understanding different people’s issues.

At a quarter after noon the Caribbean was just within my reach.