“People travel to faraway places to watch, in fascination, the kind of people they ignore at home.” Dagobert D. Runes
In Cartagena, this guy seems interesting. His shtick is unique. But I’d avoid him like the plague at home.
I get to see others. I get to meet other people. I learn about new ways of life, new guidebooks, new backpacks, new ways that people who treat the Lonely Planet like a menu and not a list of options criticize how “touristy” everything has become. The people I meet while traveling are not unlike new barbecue sauces; one wants to use words like “fresh,” “bold,” and “exciting.”
Traveling is a way of perpetually being on first dates with everything you see: you’re only in a place long enough to notice its shimmering coast and smile, but not so long that you start to doubt why it’s still economically depressed. You’re not there long enough to feel tired of its excuses, to get severely bored or frustrated with any sort of repetition. The people I’ve met have severe cases of wanderlust: they’re vintage guitar dealers from Seattle named Brian, financial workers from the outskirts of London named Tom, recently-graduated Australians named Sarah and Craig, adorable, 50-something Swedish couples whose names I couldn’t pronounce then and can’t remember now, Irish guys who saved tens of thousands of Euros by working as a cell phone customer service representative for a few years.
Of course, I never get to hear the other side of the story: had they left behind a string of broken hearts of promises? A baby? Defaulted on loans? Were they illegally collecting unemployment benefits while crashing in their parents’ basement, smoking marijuana for two years? Your paths cross for an hour in the lobby of a hostel in Cartagena, or maybe a few days on the coast near Santa Marta. But how hard is it, really, to be nice to someone when you’re both in great spirits, not working, and far removed from the financial obligations and stressors of everyday life?
It’s not just that. My people are those who value travel and discovering new cultures enough to actually prioritize it (instead of making excuses why they can’t travel). As explored by Leaf Van Boven and Thomas Gilovich in studies including “To Do or to Have? That Is the Question,” (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003, Vol. 85, No. 6, 1193–1202), experiences give people more happiness than things. The memories we take of these times ripen like a fine wine; when we spend our resources on things, the quality of our memories deteriorates over time. The memories are sweet because they are short. We remember the end of our car’s days, when it wouldn’t start in the snow or had to spend thousands on a new transmission. But in traveling, we are only given a highlight reel.
