Why do You Travel?

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Why do You Travel?

2016-01-14

Travelling has become a buzzword in recent years, as more and more young people took gap years for global travelling to gain richer and more varied experiences, or resigned from work in the name of “going out to see this big world”. In the meantime, the significance of travelling has been put forth and confused a lot. So, why do you travel?

It never really occurred to me until recently as travelling came naturally to me as part of family hobbies, and indeed one of the few good habits my father ever taught me besides keeping accounts. Before I was ten, we usually travelled to our neighboring cities and counties and the memory is so vague that only the old photos could dimly remind me of those family trips in my early childhood. Then as I grew older, we began to visit more places in summer, most of which were mountains, such as Mount Tai in my hometown Shandong, Mount Huang in Anhui and Mount Lu in Jiangxi. Though a little fat girl at that time, I enjoyed climbing mountains a lot, as we usually started at six in the morning, took a rest every one hour or so, cheered each other up by chatting or singing, until we finally reached the top after five or six hours. The last hundreds of stairs would be the toughest as your physical strength was on the brink of exhaustion while the stairs were always the steepest, so you got to hold your breath and make it until the last moment.Often we sweated a lot, our legs became stiffened, and the destination seemed so far away, but the beautiful scenery alongside was more than rewarding: dense forests, tinkling streams, chirping birds, graceful welcoming pines and stones resembling images of objects and people. It was the time when you were in full communion with nature and all the fatigue seemed worthwhile. I love climbing mountains.

Then with I getting financially independent and gradually happy again, our travelling team got changed and became stable, consisting of my mom, my aunt, my cousin and me since 2009, and each summer we travelled to one province or two for five to ten days. I’d plan several months ahead, making up itineraries, booking tickets and hotels, searching for information, etc, and despite little fights and accidents now and then, each trip was more enjoyable than expected. I remember we took a random stroll along the Qinhuai River in Nanjing, and recited the namesake poem together when we chanced upon the Black Dress Lane. I remember our humble but hearty meal at a courtyard halfway up one of the hills at Zhangjiajie Park in Hunan after a whole day’s exhaustion and that we got up at four o’clock next morning, waited for the sunrise and yelled with other tourists when the sun finally came out. I remember we finally came to Jiuzhaigou Valley in Sichuan, the most beautiful scenery in my mind for years, and instead of taking eco-cars and got off at every major valley as other tourists did, for two days we chose to walk along the plank paths into the depth of the forests, and felt the great serenity and supreme beauty of each valley suddenly appearing in front of you like little drops from heaven. And I remember we rode horses at a prairie in Shangri-La, Yunan for the first time and all of a sudden a rainbow came out and formed a perfect picture with everything.

It is said that travelling is the best test for a couple, as if they could get along well during the trip when each other tend to show their plainest or even worst sides, they’ll probably able to tolerate each in daily life, and it rings true to a family as well. It is during travelling that we understand and care more about each other, from sharing food, carrying luggage to putting others’ interests and demands on top, and it is when you share the beautiful scenery with your most beloved ones that they stop being mere objects but vivid pictures touching your soul. That’s why, we, after so many years, still stick to the family trip every summer, and will keep on with it in the years to come, as long as we can.

2012 means a lot to me as I travelled abroad for the first time. I participated an exchange project and visited many cultural institutions in Berlin and other three cities in Germany for a month. I enjoyed the friendly smile from strangers when I went jogging in the morning, and loved it when I took a rest on the meadow in front of museums, and it is the great accomplishments of the human beings in the past and their different lifestyles in the present that appeal to me most. From that time on, I began to dream bigger, and made good use of every holiday available. This year I’m planning to pay visits to Greece, Britain and Egypt and I know my journey of exploring the world will never end.

Nowadays many young people take travelling as escaping, escaping from the mundane life they’re facing every day and fancying everything’s gonna be better once they return. But returning is even difficult than starting off, as travelling is never the cure. As a matter of fact, you have to make yourself be in the right track in study, work, relationships and so forth, before you could fully enjoy yourself on the way, or your life would remain a mess wherever you go. So there’s actually no significance in travelling; travelling is among the experiences adding joy to your way of life already there. So just enjoy it.

Again, why do you travel?