“Aren’t you afraid?”

This is one of the most common questions we got on our first 300 day trip. And a question we heard even more frequently before last year’s four month trip to Mexico.

Let me tell you about a Belgian couple we had breakfast with in Campeche, Mexico last winter. We were staying at the wonderful Hotel Castelmar.  A pasta tiled, colonial building with the rooms surrounding an open, flower filled courtyard. Here in this gorgeous courtyard is where breakfast is served at communal tables.

I was on my third cup of coffee when The Belgian Couple asked if they could join us. As always at communal tables, conversation came easily (after three cups of coffee). The Belgians were travelling all over Mexico, escaping the harsh winter back home. He spoke some Spanish and English (…Italian, Dutch, German.). She spoke only French.

Tattooed, hip, she about 30, he in his 40s. We talked about travel, of course. First Belgium. Ron had been to Brugges and Brussels, I have not been… yet.  Then we talked about travel in Mexico and other places – Europe, Asia, North Africa. They were clearly seasoned travelers.

“What about the United States?, I asked. “Any plans to visit there?”

He looked a bit stricken. Seeing this, she pressed him for a translation. Then she also took on an embarrassed look.

“No”, he replied. “No plans.”

“Oh really. We’ve traveled all over the States. There are some amazing places to see, New Orleans, New York, the Badlands…”, I replied, eager to share stories of my country.

He looked embarrassed as she shook her head back and forth. “We are too afraid”, he said. “Too many deaths, too many guns. We have no plans to travel in the U.S.”

It was one of those times where I had been excited to talk about the extreme beauty found in my birth country. The friendliness of the people, the music, the culture. But nope. Not gonna happen.

They were right. The U.S. is a violent place. We are a gun toting, pry it from my cold, dead hands, Second Amendment touting culture. Shootings happen with enough regularity that some have become immune to it.

Today’s sad example, the shootings in South Carolina.

And these stories, occurring several times each year, and not limited to any particular places – cities, suburbs, small towns, the countryside –  these are the stories that make the foreign press. We are well known for our gun culture. And the random deaths it brings.

It’s at these times that I get patriotic, wanting to both defend and trumpet my country. But I’m left with nothing to say. Left only sad and embarrassed.

Let me ask you. Last time you traveled to some amazing spot in the U.S., like Breckenridge, The Grand Canyon, the coast of Maine, how many Europeans did you run into there? Not too many. Certainly not equal to the number of Americans that travel to Europe.

No, I’m not afraid in Merida. Nor was I afraid in Malaysia, London or Morocco. Ron always tells people that he’s not afraid because he was raised in Elizabeth, New Jersey outside of New York. His first watch was found on the ground after a street fight. And back then, the gangs were mostly using knives. The ease of obtaining a gun is a relatively new thing.

I will not be the only person who blogs today about the need to make some serious changes to our gun culture and our mental health system. There will be a lot of better written, more widely read comments over the next week or so.

But then, as always, it will recede back into the background, along with the quiet sobs of a new widow or childless mother.

“I want to be in America. I want a gun in my hand”, the man on the radio sings as I write this morning.

Not so much, friends. Not so much…