Editor’s Note: Guy Tal, graduate in Engineering, is a guest columnist to the Daily Illini. This is the last in a series that details his experiences during a bike expedition down the coast of California with Kamilla Gray Kinard, Ryne Leuzinger and Nora Tien.

Day 8: Mistaken Identity

Riding the train is like hitting the rewind button. Sadly, we’re heading home.

We sit in the observation cart whiling the hours, staring out the window at the hills we knew more intimately days ago, mourning the lack of excitement.

As if on cue, the conductor walks up to me, pulls me aside, and accuses me of smoking on the train. When I point out the absurdity of the accusation—I hate cigarette smoke and I’ve been sitting with my friends the entire trip!—he tells me there are multiple witnesses, and that I may be removed at the next stop.

Well, what can you do, really, when you wake up and find yourself trapped in the body of a cockroach?

Mysteriously, though, the issue is resolved without my deportation. I recount the tale to Ryne, who finds it both amusing and befuddling.

“It’s my long curls,” I explain. “My lady likes them, but they’re a head full of trouble.”

Trips never really end when you think they will, either.

* * *

Some days later, thousands of miles away:

I’m sitting in a cafe in Israel along the Mediterranean drinking sachlab, eating shakshuka, writing these reflections while watching the waves. There’s a storm approaching. The sea is full of human seals, surfboards in hand. Water is water is water.

A woman at another table is getting up to leave, and I watch as she accidentally drops a shekel. Unbelievably, it lands in a crack in the floor. Balanced on edge. I stoop to return it to her and point out the minor miracle.

Outside, the sun is setting and the moon is rising, with all its borrowed glamour, ready to make the rounds. 

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