People kept on telling me how traveling is good, I should do it when I am young and when I still can. Those who travel, keep on talking about all this spirituality, this awesome life. They prove it with all these beautiful pictures on Facebook. People say they learned so much from traveling. They can not just go back to their country and live the same way. Instead of homesickness you can not relate to your home any more. It takes some time to function in it again. Lots of them just leave again, bit by the travel bug. But nobody really talks much about what is wrong with their home, their society. Or what makes traveling so interesting.
What did you see and learn exactly? Who ever tries to explain that? What do people think I will learn and see if they say I also wanted to do that? Do it before you can’t anymore…I am already too old, I already have my life with all these responsibilities. My mom just went back to Belgium from 3 and half months of traveling at the age of 57. Too late to learn? I already knew I was not happy in Belgium. I already questioned my society. But I learn more and more about it every single day. I feel more appreciative about it now. I am still learning to be happy. I am sometimes still living the rules of my society, but then outside of it. In another one. Although I am not fully in that other one either. I am pretending. But I am bad at it. I look different. I look like a white person from some European country. Belgium? Where is that? I can’t fool them. I am like a celebrity. People want to show me off on their Facebook. Selfie? Those spiritual tourists are fooling you with their beautiful pictures. Or themselves? They like to show the beautiful life you are missing out on. But lets be honest. It is dirty and ugly on this side too. The truth is that most of them are running away from something and still did not figure out shit. They are supposed to be happy, since they are living the dream. People are missing out on this. Some of them are partying as hard as they can and forget a lot on the way. Change reality. Get the most out of their leisure time. Bungee jumping trough life. Leisure time is not everything, you know. There exist people that are perfectly happy by living a simple hard working life. The kick of traveling, of leaving everything and everybody behind, goes away. And is not the same as it used to be, I guess. When we did not have social media to show how we are living such a happy life. I feel like I am just simply existing. And that is fine. Who needs more? You will not get much more anyway. Having a purpose of life is only just keeping yourself busy. Same as working. You can have a day off, a free day. A day off of existing and being more than that. Counting the days until I have free time. I think what other travelers miss is spirituality in our society. That is why they post pictures of them doing yoga in the mountains, that and because the yoga pants make their butt look sexy. I am not sure if they are closer to reality or further away from it. But I am sure that they will not photograph the ugly truth. How horrible it is to be surrounded with other tourists. They don’t show how fake and plastic these tourist attractions can be, as well as the conversations over and over again, or how dirty these countries can be, or ours. They don’t talk about their toilet experiences. They sure are experiences, it is nothing as we are used to. Everything is excused by ‘it is their culture’. They don’t talk to much about how they are treated differently as a foreigner. They only have very local experiences. Wether that guy owns a tourist agency or not, I was hanging out with this local guy. I tried this local food in the best place to get it, recommended by trip adviser. You can say all these things about China, what an awesome culture and history, but they are not all boeddhist monks. Most of them don’t believe in anything. We show all these countries like in a travel guide. Pretty nature, nice culture, nice people. But they are also changing and modern and having the same simple rules. Money is power, life is better on the other side, modernization, changing, not indefinite. Business. White is the color of the rich. People use bleaching products to be white. Not all Indiers are saddu’s with the diaper pants. Travel guides forget about diversity, contrasts, contradictions. No country can be told trough tourist sites and world heritage. Only by experiences, and they are different every time and with every person. The world is diverse. Very little travelers try to actually understand cultures and their changes and diversity, flexibility and growth. It is about the people, what they produce in behaviors, art, products, food,… These individuals, and them in a group. My view might be deluted sometimes, my experiences not a good generalization, but I am trying to explain myself and my experiences through stories in an attempt to let people touch the reality I am experiencing as a culture, a country, a people and me as a being, trying to enjoy myself and life. My world in our world. Try to enjoy being old, try to enjoy not traveling, see the diversity on your side of the world. In any way you still can do whatever you want. It is up to ourself to enjoy life, where on earth. The other side looks very much the same.
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