An entry in the TFS Travel Journal
Since many people have asked what (if anything!) we’ve learned or concluded from all of our journeys, we thought we’d share with you some of our feelings after this year of travel. These reflections are presented in no particular order, and please don’t extrapolate too judgementally from these narrow observations; we don’t intend this to be a complete summary, rather to communicate just the most immediate gist of our experiences.
First and foremost: the United States is the greatest, most wonderful country on this planet. Period. There, we’ve said it. One can probably never adequately appreciate the freedoms, opportunities, selections, varieties, beauty, etc. that exist here and are perpetually being expanded upon.
This is not, in any way, to denegrate any of the places we visited (though some deserve it!), only to reaffirm something that many people seem eager to forget. It is also not to pretend that the U.S. is free from its many problems, but for a great many people we’ve met around the world it would be the preferred place to live.
We tried (and will continue to try) to always appreciate having the good health to enjoy all this traveling. We each had a few days of various afflictions, and they really served to make us aware that a. it just doesn’t matter how wonderful and fabulous a place is, if you don’t feel good, it’s difficult to enjoy any of it; and b. we were not always in places where we’d want to see what kind of medical care we’d have received if needed. (see bullet point above!)
It’s easy, but often wrong, to glorify and romanticize foreign places and people simply because they’re foreign.
In fact, people are so much the same around the world, and most of those that aren’t are wishing they could be more like the rest of the world (or at least their idea of it) and are attempting to get there. Sure, there are tribes and little villages of Maori (some of them) and Masei and Hmong who cling to their traditional lifestyles, but for the most part people all over the world wait on line for ice cream with their children, want to see American movies and television, want better health care, kvetch about their spouses (with a similarity and universality of topics eerily familiar to us all), and, especially, want more money (even a primitive Masi village elder upon hearing that women in America can earn more than men immediately said “hmmm, so I could marry 6 or 7 of them and have lots of money!”).
That all being said, what we call multi-culturalism is indeed a growing phenomena worldwide, and will continue to be so since as the world becomes more homogenious, people will more and more reach out for a greater sense of reaffirmed identity.
Most big cities are becoming so similar as to be less and less individual and interesting.
Many of them are certainly still interesting in their own ways, but these tend to be the historical legacies - architecturally or artistically (Venice, Amsterdam, Florence), or have natural and unique attributes (Stockholm’s archipeligo, Table Mountain in Capetown). But it sure seems that very few places can resist McDonalds, The Body Shop, Pizza Hut, etc.
If you’re going to speak only one language, make sure it’s english!
It’s beyond comprehension how much truly varied and beautiful art - painting, ceramics, fabrics, furniture, architecture - exists throughout the world;
It’s also amazing how much quality local, indigenous music can be found in most countries;
The U.S. has gotten way overboard as far as political correctness goes. Most of the rest of the world can deal with racial differences (genuine and not so) in a casual and matter-of-fact way that would be simply unacceptable to many “enlightened” Americans.
When checking into a hotel room that has a clock/radio, before you go to sleep, make sure the alarm isn’t set. (and especially not for sometime in the middle of the night)
We sure learned a few things about several of our friends!
And you reeeeaaally get to know someone after being with them almost 24 hours a day for months on end.
It will be a while (if ever!) before we can go to a zoo without feeling a bit of sadness;
It’s good to travel with a few bars of your favorite soap (now, about those beds and pillows. . .)
Traveling with the laptop computer was definitely a mixed blessing.
Having access to the net, to news and to email certainly took much of the isolation out of being far away; the net will probably soon replace CNN as the fix of choice for traveling info junkies. And the emails certainly allowed us the comfort of knowing that all was fine with everyone back home.
But — how much were our exotic experiences and accompanying feelings affected by having so many friends, and so much familiarity, always at our fingertips? We’ll never really know, but we won’t be taking any long trips without it!
We’ll never take for granted cheap airfares and plentiful non-stop flights!
Nor will we ever complain about the condition of the roads in the U.S. (traffic, yes)
No, we still don’t know a good travel agent. We’ve worked with many, and while some were reasonably good at some things/places, there’s just no substitute for doing your own homework (even a little goes a very long way), and making sure your plans are a function of your likes, desires, style, etc.
What are evidently universal and basic human desires, combined with the importance and creativity of the travel industry has made several places while not interchangeable, at least pretty damn familiar: Napa Valley, South Africa’s Winelands, Hawkes Bay in NZ; Queenstown, Aspen; Lake Tekapo in NZ, Lake Louise in Canada; beaches in Fiji, Bali, the Carribbean. This list could go on and on, but the point is that not everything foreign is worth the effort to travel to, or is even that foreign!
Sure, it was great to go mountain biking in New Zealand, walk on a glacier in Norway, and see the sunrise over Borobudur Temple, but everyone can find their own Bali or Golden Triangle or Magical Mountaintop that works for them. That may be on the deck of a home in the woods, in the faces of their children, on a chessboard, or an infinite variety of personally fulfilling, affirming and actualizing quite attainable experiences.
That all being said, we certainly do have our favorites - experiences we’ll never forget or can’t wait to return to, and these include (in addition to those mentioned above): Torres del Paine National Park; the people in New Zealand; the World of Birds; the food in Thailand; our day in Halong Bay; the many wonderful and amazing gardens we’ve visited (Hidcote, Kirstenbosch, Christchurch, etc.); the unique beauty and solitude of Venice; walking into the Crater Lodge after the night of the termite hatch; driving the Troll’s Way; the faces and roots of Angkor City; hiking the Dolomites; our Swedish massages in Sweden; the empanadas in Buenos Aires; the hours spent on the Serengetti; the cornucopia of scenery (and rainbows!) on New Zealand’s South Island; Neta’s pasta sampler; the catwalks at Iguazu.
Honestly, though, these just begin to scratch the surface of our memories, which will be entertaining us for a long while. (and we’re certainly not done traveling and exploring!)
Don’t get us wrong — we wouldn’t trade in even one day of our travels (well, maybe one or two days do come to mind. . .) and feel that we’ve taken something from virtually every experience. Moreover, by stepping outside of our familiar, comfortable routines and being presented with - and successfully dealing with - different and challenging situations, we’ve gained a renewed sense of self-confidence.
(Of course, it’s not as though we’d never had challenges before, but in our travels we’ve done things (some of our own choosing, some not) that have left us with an inner comfort in our abilities to deal with, and react to, unanticipated circumstances)
We’re hopeful that all that we’ve seen and experienced will allow us the perspective to view things when they happen to us in a broader context and to not take things too seriously or get too locked into any type of rigidity.
It’s doubtful that - unlike many people we met - we’ll ever live with 15 family members in a small, cramped apartment, that mass genocide will take place in our country, or that we’ll desperately want to move our family and become citizens of another country. So we’ll try to remember that when we have a bad day at work, when someone cuts in front of us and takes our taxi, when our car needs yet another repair, or when some eagerly-anticipated plans get rained out.
and finally,
Milton had an experience while in New Zealand that hopefully will serve as a template for the rest of his life:
when we were in Sedona (Arizona) in November, we stopped in at a “psychic fair” that was taking place that weekend. The guy who did Milton’s reading was spookily, though entertainingly, accurate and insightful about a variety of topics and details. He then said that it was very important to go to New Zealand; he didn’t know exactly why, but it could involve an experience, meeting a person, a revelation while there, whatever, it was just important to go there.
While our time in NZ was indeed special, nothing so mystical actually happened, or at least not that we’ve yet identified. However, the knowledge that such a thing was “destined” forced/allowed me a receptivity to things and to pursue things that I most probably would not have otherwise. If someone, for whatever reason, gave me the name of someone to look up or call, I made myself do it; I read magazine articles and the local newspapers with a heightened awareness and interest (was there perhaps a new business or investment idea here?); I struck up conversations with people I probably wouldn’t have - i.e., instead of just reading on a plane or bus, I’d chat with our neighbors; we played the lottery. All in all, it made for a wonderfully - and tangibly - more heightened experience, and enabled me to see, feel and absorb things that in all honesty I wouldn’t have made the effort to otherwise.
It’s certainly been said before (to wit, “Every once in a while you can get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if you look at it right” - Hunter/Garcia), and though it may not be possible to live every day, and to approach every experience, with that level of awareness tucked away but not forgotten, I’m certainly going to try.
Yes, it probably sounds a bit trite and new-age, but going through life with the belief that something significant might happen today, or on this trip, or during this meeting - but only if you are open to it, or make at least an effort to facilitate it (whatever “it” may be) - will allow you to experience life as though wearing a glass mask, instead of just opening your eyes, underwater.