June 28th, 2026

Today's five stops traced a loop from soaring ambition to quiet confluence. Dubai and Shanghai stand as twin monuments to explosive urban growth, one rising from desert sands to hold the world's tallest building, the other transforming from a river port into a global commercial titan. Inland and eastward, Nairobi sits at altitude in Kenya's highlands, a highland capital born of colonial rail lines rather than coastal trade. Minsk, rebuilt almost entirely after wartime devastation, anchors the flat heart of Belarus, while N'Djamena closes the circuit at the meeting point of the Chari and Logone rivers, a reminder that even in an age of skyscrapers, geography still begins where waters converge.