World Cup, traveling, and life

 The World Cup is going on right now in the US, Canada, and Mexico.

The two major stories on social media seem to be the frustrating application of technology to enforcing rules, primarily offside; and the other story is how foreign visitors are loving so much about America.

There are so many great stories of visitors loving the scenery, restaurants, people, culture, and so much more about the US.  While certainly some of the videos are done in a way to drive engagement with an American audience, I can't help but recognize so much of the love these people are expressing is genuine.  One of the big things said is European visitors thought America would be a disaster, that they wouldn't feel safe or welcome, that they would have a miserable time in the State, and this attitude came from the never ending negative commentary from the world news media.  But once they got here they realized that was all a lie and used to drive division and hatred of the States.  That years of indoctrination was undone by actually visiting the country.

I just saw a really fun compilation video with a new song (probably AI generated song but real video clips) of people from all countries celebrating and uniting during the World Cup.  I love it!  Certainly a part of this is the welcoming nature of Americans, also the excitement around international sporting events.  But I think a bigger thing is how we can get along with anyone if we focus on our similarities rather than our differences.  Everyone is focusing on our love of the World Cup and we are realizing how similar we all really are.  We are not allowing our differences to drive our engagement but our similarities.

I love traveling, and part of the reason is that I can meet people from all over the world, learn about their cultures, and feel a sense of comradery with them.  This is one of the things I loved when I was on the International Folk Dance Team at BYU.

My family is taking off next week on a 3 week long road trip out to Virginia and back.  It will be so much fun, I've been looking forward to a trip like this for years.  This will put us so much closer to achieving our goal of visiting all 50 states before Liam graduates High School (he will be a Junior this next year).