Two Tickets to Anywhere: Why Choosing Between Asian Dreams Keeps Me Up at Night

Someone asked me last week where I’d go if I won two airline tickets to anywhere. I laughed and said, “Somewhere in Asia,” then spent the next three days obsessing over whether I meant Japan, India, Malaysia, or Thailand. You know that paralyzing moment when you have too many good options? That’s where I am right now, staring down retirement in a couple of months and realizing I’ve been so busy working on global development projects that I never properly dreamed about where I’d actually want to go.

The thing is, after thirty years of emergency flights to crisis zones and conference rooms in capitals I barely saw, I’m finally at the point where I can travel for me. Not for work. Not because there’s a deadline or a disaster or a meeting I can’t miss. Just because I want to understand something about the world—or maybe about myself—that I haven’t figured out yet.

Growing up in the Seychelles with grandparents from three different continents taught me that every culture has its own way of staying sane. My European grandfather meditated by tending his garden. My Indian grandmother found peace in elaborate morning rituals. My African great-aunt solved everything through movement and music. I’ve spent decades learning that what works for your neighbor might not work for you, and what works for you might change completely when you’re facing a new life stage.

That’s probably why I can’t just pick one Asian destination and be done with it.

Japan: The Appeal of Organized Zen

Japan calls to me in a way that feels almost urgent. There’s something about a culture that’s figured out how to be both intensely modern and deeply traditional that makes my organizational brain happy. I’ve been practicing Kyokushin Karate for fifteen years now, and every time I work through the forms in my hotel room after a brutal day of meetings, I think about what it would feel like to train where these movements actually came from. Not in some American dojo with fluorescent lights and motivational posters, but in a place where the philosophy behind the punches actually makes sense in context.

I imagine myself in Tokyo, learning to find stillness in the middle of organized chaos. The city’s supposedly the most in-demand destination right now, which normally would make me run the other direction—I’ve had enough of crowds and competition. But there’s something appealing about a place where efficiency is elevated to an art form. After years of struggling to maintain mindfulness practices while managing impossible schedules, I’m curious about a culture that’s built meditation into the architecture of daily life.

India: Beautiful Chaos and Ancient Wisdom

Then there’s India, which terrifies and fascinates me in equal measure. I’ve worked with Indian colleagues for decades, and their ability to find profound calm in the middle of absolute madness has always impressed me. When I’m practicing yoga at 5 AM before a sixteen-hour workday, I sometimes wonder what these poses would feel like in the place where they were born. Would that downward dog hit differently on a beach in Kerala? Would I finally understand what my yoga teacher means when she talks about “finding your center” if I were surrounded by people who’ve been centering themselves for millennia?

But India also represents everything I’ve spent my career trying to fix—poverty, inequality, systems that don’t work for everyone. I worry I’d spend the whole trip in work mode, seeing problems instead of experiencing peace. Maybe that’s exactly why I need to go there as a tourist, not a development worker. Maybe I need to learn what it feels like to be a student instead of someone trying to solve everything.

Malaysia and Thailand: The Practical Paradise

Malaysia and Thailand feel like the practical compromise, and I hate that I’m thinking practically about my retirement dreams. Both countries have this incredible mix of cultures that reminds me of home—that comfortable feeling of being somewhere that doesn’t expect you to fit into just one category. Thailand’s apparently back to full tourism strength, which means amazing infrastructure and terrible crowds. Malaysia feels like it might offer some of the same spiritual and wellness experiences without quite so much competition for space on the beach.

I keep imagining myself in Thailand, finally taking one of those meditation retreats I’ve been promising myself for years. Sitting on a beach at sunrise, practicing forms I learned in a strip mall in Maryland, finally having time to think about what comes after a career spent trying to make the world more sustainable. The whole wellness tourism thing that’s supposedly exploding right now—I get the appeal, but I also wonder if I’m just falling for marketing when what I really need is time to figure out what wellness actually means for me.

The Deeper Question: What Am I Really Seeking?

Here’s what nobody tells you about planning meaningful travel in your fifties: You realize how little time you’ve spent thinking about what you actually want, versus what you think you should want. I’ve been to Madagascar, Mauritius, the Comoros—gorgeous places, important work, but always with an agenda. Always trying to accomplish something. The idea of traveling just to see what happens feels both luxurious and slightly panic-inducing.

The truth is, I think I’m drawn to Asia because it represents everything I haven’t figured out yet about slowing down. My Western mind wants to make a spreadsheet of temple visits and cooking classes and sunrise meditations. My multicultural upbringing knows better—it knows that real understanding happens in the quiet moments between planned activities, in the conversations you didn’t expect to have, in the ways a place changes how you breathe.

Beyond Destinations: Learning to Travel Without an Agenda

Maybe the real question isn’t Japan versus India versus Malaysia versus Thailand. Maybe it’s whether I’m ready to travel without an agenda for the first time in my adult life. Whether I can handle going somewhere just to be curious, without needing to save anyone or solve anything or come back with a five-point plan for improving my life.

I suspect the answer to where I’d go with those two airline tickets has less to do with destinations and more to do with timing. Am I ready to go to Japan and sit with the discipline of zen meditation, or do I still need the chaos of India to shake me out of my controlled approach to everything? Would Thailand’s beaches teach me to rest, or would I spend the whole time feeling guilty about not being productive? Could Malaysia offer the cultural complexity I love without overwhelming my need for some actual peace?

What I’m really asking myself is this: What do I need to learn about being still? And which corner of Asia is going to be patient enough to teach someone who’s spent three decades moving at crisis speed how to finally slow down?

I still don’t know where I’d use those tickets. But I’m starting to think that uncertainty might be exactly the point. For someone who’s made a career out of having answers, maybe the most radical thing I could do is travel somewhere that will teach me better questions.

The only thing I know for sure is that wherever I end up, I’ll be practicing my morning forms in a place that understands the connection between movement and stillness in ways I’m just beginning to discover. And maybe, for the first time in years, I’ll have enough time to pay attention to what that actually feels like.