Why Travel?

… Because it’s a big world out there! Contrary to what you’d usually hear from most people about this being a small world … Abre los ojos (open your eyes). We have got something like seven point five (7.5) billion people living in some one hundred ninety three (193) countries, islands, icelands, highlands, grasslands, flatlands and just about any kind of land that’s kind enough to be inhabitable by man.

Sure, modern technology and the awesome powers of the computer have made connecting with people in any part of the globe as easy as looking out the window and waving hello to your sexy, beautiful next door neighbor. In that sense the world has indeed gotten smaller. But topographically? Hey, we’ve got countries with seven or eight different time zones! If that ain’t big, Goliath must have been a tiny, dwarfy wimp!

Why Most People Pack Their Bags And Use Up The Entire Limit Of Their Credit Cards To Travel

We travel because the real world is entirely different from the personal worlds in which we live. Knowing, appreciating and sometimes, even embracing this difference make us better persons. Remember what our wise old folks used to say? “To find happiness you need to try and live in the moment.” The thing is … nowadays, that’s almost impossible because we’re so caught up in that nine-to-five trap eking out a living. Our mind moves in a sort of a habitual motion, unaware that all those “great moments” are just passing us by. But, when you travel and go to places you have never been to, meet new people, immerse a bit into some unfamiliar ways and customs, your mind IS there! For the first time, you would be experiencing so much that with zero effort, you’d get to be present “in the moment.” It’s a marvelous way to give your life a delightful rock-the-boat jolt!

Here are some of the other great, wonderful reasons why travel should be a part of your immediate or medium term plans:

• You would become more knowledgeable. Travel won’t turn you into the friendly, resident geek of the neighborhood, but you would learn how to shy away from pre-conceived ideas and prejudices you might have about places like China, Pakistan, Tibet or some remote island nation whose natives happily greet each other by waving their left hands but not before they rub their palms across their armpits. But hey .. keep an open mind. It’s simply their way of life.

• You will discover your better self. When you go traveling from one country to another or hopping from island to island, you will frequently find yourself challenged as in learning how to communicate when everyone you’ve been introduced to speaks no other language but Swahili. You’re challenged when asked to join a conversation and voice your opinion about the Afghanistan issue or when you want to negotiate the price of a fascinating ancient-looking Aztec heirloom necklace that you’re 100% sure would look spectacularly beautiful around your neck You’re challenged every time you step out of your comfort zone, when your friendly hosts ask you to try fried field rats without any catsup. And when you find yourself suddenly in an unfamiliar, foreboding, sleazy part of a city and a sense of fear creeps up, you’re challenged as well. The good thing is that you know the only way to overcome these is by opening up your mind. When you’re faced with such challenges you will inevitably come away a better person.

• You will develop your capacities for empathy and human compassion. Friendly talks you hold with total strangers, understanding some aspects of an unfamiliar culture, meeting people from different walks of life, sharing feelings and experiences which may be different from your own allow you to raise your capacity for empathy and human understanding. 

To be sure, there is a whole slew of other reasons why travel is such a terrific idea other than it gets you far, far away from your can’t-hold-her-tongue mother in law. There is that getting-away-from-it-all and revitalizing promise of Rome’s ancient ruins and La Scala’s classic operas. There is that sense of adventure that will enable you to vicariously feel like Indiana Jones discovering some prehistoric skulls of the Neanderthal man in Guatemala. Most of all, there is that recognition and realization that what we sometimes deem to be ugly or repulsive, is, to some nation, some culture, some people really beautiful.