i learned a new word today.

As I was waiting for my Swedish Berry ice tea (easy on the ice, please) to appear on the wooden platform of Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, I couldn't help but notice a broad-shouldered gentleman with beautiful long dreads, holding the hand of an even-more-beautiful little girl, eagerly biting into a peanut butter cookie approximately the size of her head.

Immediately, my eyes were drawn to the man's wrist, just north of the intertwined hands. On his wrist in dignified, bold letters it read:


u b u n t u


I couldn't help myself. I had to ask what it meant.

(i hope you're ready for this, because i certainly wasn't)

Ubuntu, in Zulu, translates to "I am because you are." After a serendipitous conversation with the man and his 3'5 cookie enthusiast, I came to realize what a beautiful word I had the pleasure of stumbling upon. It turns out that ubuntu is a very expansive concept - about humanity and humility. Ubuntu is a way of thinking, a way of relating, and a way of being.

Later in the evening, I shared my newly discovered word with a dear elderly Persian friend-of-the-family over dinner; she managed to put the icing on my ubuntu cake by so sweetly stating, "I want to ubuntu."