“I’m so proud of my city — we’re breaking stereotypes,” said Sumaya Keynan, a designer and social media influencer. “It’s called ‘Minnesota Nice’ for a reason. With elections things have changed in America, but Minneapolis hasn’t.”

Trying to understand how Minneapolis became a beacon for refugees — the city also has notable Hmong, Bosnian, Liberian, Tibetan, and Syrian populations — I met with a former mayor, R.T. Rybak. “It’s always been a bit counter to some of the nationalist trends about being ‘America First,’” he said. “Being ‘America First’ in Minneapolis means you understand you’re part of the world.”

As a former milling capital and current headquarters of 3M, Target, Best Buy, and others, the Minneapolis-St. Paul area has always attracted business from across the globe. And organizations like Lutheran Social Services and Catholic Charities have been at the forefront of refugee resettlement in the city for decades. My knowledge of Minneapolis’s landmarks had been limited to the Mall of America. I came to the city expecting to encounter a lily-white sea studded by isolated islands of Somalis trying to float; instead I found a multicultural metropolis, a glimpse of what the future of America could look like. One night I attended a memorial service for the Srebrenica massacre at a Bosnian mosque; another afternoon I hung out at Zizi Boutique, a modest-clothing emporium near trendy Uptown where chic Somali women browse ankle-length pencil skirts and hijabs. After dinner at World Street Kitchen, I sampled quirky flavors like avocado lychee and Turkish coffee toffee at Milkjam Creamery — both businesses have cult followings and are run by a pair of Palestinian immigrants.

“If someone wants to get away from the rhetoric of building walls,” Mr. Rybak said, “they should come to Minneapolis.”

I had crisscrossed the country expecting to find cowboys and megamalls, humble churchgoing folk and racist old grandpas. But it’s hard to distill a nation into a series of tropes, no matter how easy Third World-bound travel writers make it seem. America is as much the cowboys bowing their heads to pray for their livestock before lassoing them in a ring as it is the New York couple who spend their summers rodeo-hopping, only missing shows to observe the Sabbath. It’s the Nashville mosque partially funded by Cat Stevens, so fitting in Music City. It’s the Venezuelan Elvis cover singer who hails the king for “the fulfilling of the American dream.” It’s malls not far from the Mall of America that are more African than the ones I frequented in South Africa. It’s the family reading from Sarah Palin’s autobiography while waiting in line at the National Civil Rights Museum, and it’s the B&B in Montana where I found a Quran on a bookshelf. America is Tom’s Barbecue, a Memphis institution where a Palestinian-American owner keeps separate pits for pork and halal beef; it’s the Indian-Southern fusion at Chauhan in Nashville, where the existence of chicken pakoras with soji waffles and tandoori shrimp and grits confirms my suspicions that there’s a lot about America that’s already pretty darn great.

I returned from my trip a few pounds heavier, not much wiser, but with some unexpected new interests. Weeks later, I looked up a familiar song on Spotify and blasted the volume as I sang along: “I was sittin’ there sellin’ turnips on a flatbed truck, Crunchin’ on a pork rind when she pulled up, She had to be thinkin’ this is where rednecks come from…”