Why we travel – A session of introspection!

Traveling
costs a fortune, has no long term returns, and leaves you exhausted at
the end of the ordeal. Why would any sane person travel? Why won’t one
simply save the money, buy a few policies and get rich instead? Why not
spend the few days off of work in the peace and tranquility of your
home? Relax and recharge before you have to saddle up for that new
business project that will give you your next big break!

When someone asks this question, almost always with a tone of
incomprehensibility and often with a hint of disbelief mixed in, a good
approach is to simply quote a Thoreau or a Frost, thus emphasizing not
just your profound knowledge in literature, but also making it look like
you know what you’re talking about. However, the fact remains that most
travelers don’t share a common agenda for traveling. Some travel to
chase their dreams, some to run away from their past, while some, like
me, just wander around with no real purpose, may be even hoping to find
theirs at the end somehow.

When
I was asked by a fellow photographer, one I’ve grown to respect over
the years, to maintain a travelogue, I decided to put it at the end of
my to-do list with no specific deadline in sight. Every time I had the
urge to write something down, I started questioning my qualifications as
a writer. Surely, the world wouldn’t miss yet another average travel
story by yet another wannabe traveler without a unique story to tell.
Surely, the world wouldn’t miss my substandard grammar or my dreadful
writing skills. So why write?

The
biggest roadblock, for me, was to understand whether my stories are
worth telling, or more importantly worth listening to. So, I made myself
carry a pen and a notebook every time I traveled somewhere, and forced
myself to write down my epiphanies as and when they occurred. After a
month’s work of writing down more stupid things than I thought I was
capable of, I realized I was going in circles. I was trying to find an
answer without having a question, a paradox! So I changed my writing
style, from writing random words of enlightenment from time to time, I
started writing down questions as and when they occurred to me.
Questions that, if answered, might just help me realize what it is that I
seek through my adventures. Questions, that took me more than a year to
answer.

Off all the questions I had in my mind, I felt these two were paramount:

1. Why do travelers travel?
2. Is traveling only about being a non-conformist or is there something more to it?

Do
remember that these aren’t questions meant for the readers, but simply
my chain of thoughts as I try to analyze our urge to travel and explore.
Now that we have cleared that, let’s address the first question.

So, why do we travel? As
I’ve already mentioned, everyone has their reasons, but every single
one of them seem to have one thing in common – the insatiable desire for
new experiences. What kind of experiences, you ask?
Doesn’t matter, trying out a new cuisine can be just as thrilling as sky
diving from 10000 feet. Meeting a fellow traveler who makes you realize
how little you know about life, can be just as big a revelation as the
first time you dive under the ocean. Experiences vary, as do people and
their tastes, but to understand that we are hungry for new experiences
is to understand the essence of traveling.

Moving
on to the second question, why would anyone want to suffer the
discomfort of traveling? It costs a fortune, with no long term returns.
Is it just about being a non-conformist or is there something more to
it?

The answer to that is cleverly hidden in the concept of value. It costs
a fortune, true! But it has some of the best long term returns that you
can think of, provided you value those returns.
Travelers travel to experience new things in the present, and to gain
incredible friends and memories in the future, as long term returns.
This is not something that I’ve just made up, ask anyone who dreams to
be a full time traveler, and they’ll tell you the same thing. Frequent
travelers seem to make friends with each other faster than any other
kind I’ve ever encountered. There’s no pre-friendship politics, no
favour exchange necessary, and most importantly the judgment of one’s
character is postponed till one actually gets to know another. They
value the long term returns of memories and friends a lot more than the
petty interest accumulated in the savings account.

Sure,
it can be about being a non-conformist for many, but that’s a big part
of the thrill. To conform is to do what everyone else is doing, and
that’s a morbid thought. Sure, it costs a fortune, but if your value
system aligns with the returns that traveling provides, every penny
spent is worth it. It is only once you learn to appreciate this value
system, you realize that traveling is the only expense that makes one
richer. I doubt anyone, when faced with imminent death, would be upset
that they didn’t work and save enough money.

To conclude this rather long (and probably pointless) article, I’d quote one of my favorites:

Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of
arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid
in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out,and loudly proclaiming —

“Wow! What a Ride!”
— Hunter S. Thompson