Tag: Narrative

A poet and avid traveler had a journey from the mainland to the islands of the Caribbean where he had always dreamed of going to. His journey was planned ever since he was a little boy, and never got the chance until he was an adult. However, the people that told him to go, also told him to “tread lightly” and that he could be tricked at some point there. Knowing that he was an outsider and was obvious since he was traveling from a distant land. The poet was looking for an authentic experience outside of what he was used to and decided that he would play it by ear when he got to his destination. When he got into the market at the shore, he saw many stores and stands with food, and signs saying the “Best [insert food] in the world”, and other attractions that could be for him. He knew of places to go to down towards inland of the island because he had heard of great pieces of art, and statues that were advanced for their time, and not to forget, the more modern shops that reminded him that this place was still a place where people lived. He had walked for some time before he had gotten past the touristy attractions and got to real shops. He wondered to himself, what was the normal thing to do at a place like this? What is a traditional day like? And what is the significance of this journey? What experience can he grab from this place that no other tourist had experienced before?

Although the monumental sites are cool and the beaches are fabulous, but he wondered if it was a good idea to steer away from the “traveler norm” and wondered what someone does on a day to day basis. And thought of his own life back at home, and wondered if the traveler’s norm is really so much different from the normal life. He gave it some thought about whether or not he visits monuments in his home town and realized that he has only done so when he walks to work in the mornings.

The poet realizes in a flash that he had not heeded the warning of the place trying to trick you. While it didn’t trick him literally, the concept of something authentic was right in his face the whole time, and he had decided to not listen to it until now. He pondered whether or not the market was a “front” and if there were no tourists coming if there was ever an opportunity for the market. The poet had decided to take a walk deeper into the island on the roads and went wherever the roads had taken him in the end.

As a person who has been confined to the US and its territories, I have surprisingly always had this itch for travel. While most of the time when I travel, its for a family vacation, or just to visit family. While this can sometimes be difficult to control where I want to go, it does not limit my imagination to where I can go next. And while each time I travel is nerve-wracking, I’m convinced that after the struggle of the journey, that there’s always something to look back at after the fact and something to be happy about and reflect upon once at the destination.

The question of the “why” we travel to be something related to curiosity, or something that is hidden deeper inside of us. Sometimes that why comes along with an “I need this” or just some time to explore aimlessly. In the reading for this assignment, Iyer says that

“…we travel, in essence, to become young fools again — to slow time down and get taken in and fall in love once more”.

When he writes that there is a falling in love once more with whatever we are doing, it hints that there is an idea of the fall. That we all have a curious tie to this love in nature, or whatever passions you have, and there is this moment where you have this enlightening experience to travel.

I’ve haven’t specifically had an enlightening experience, but a moment of enlightened realization of nature and of myself. Before coming to school, and during this whole summer I had developed this sensation and feeling of anxiety and “corona depression”. I was self-aware but hadn’t come to terms that I was living, but I was not “alive”, and that this Pandemic had left a toll on my mental health. A couple of weeks before I moved back to DC I was driving to a campground in the Adirondacks with my family and had insisted to myself that this was a reset that I possibly needed. While the driving wasn’t taxing, the time had felt like forever once I moved into the second half of the trip. It was my impatience needling, and my desire was growing. The desire to do something other than sit, and in the moment, I wanted to just walk, or even run the rest of the way then drive.

Once I had gotten there, I drove up to the campground I was staying at. All were separated by about 100 ft of space, and the grounds were as empty as a ghost town. I practically saw 20 people in total close to me, which gave me this sense of isolation. I had to go for a run at some point by myself, and since I was in the Adirondacks, I felt as if this were the perfect opportunity to “explore”, or to just run and be relaxed and in the moment.

When I first started on my route, I wanted to see as much as I could, so I decided on an out and back. A few miles in I was surrounded by forest on these isolated roads, which towered me and made me feel as insignificant in size as I could feel. It was relaxing because there were no cars, and (since it was the Adirondacks) I saw multiple mountains in the distance. They looked as if they were small and distant, but I knew better since I could see some up close eventually and would get to feel the real size of the mountain.

I fell into a Xen mode where I had zoned out and wasn’t thinking about anything except for that the pine trees around me created this contrast with my surroundings to create a tunnel where I felt insignificant. Suddenly I had stumbled upon a clearing in the forest where power lines were leading through. I was curious to see what the view looked like, and as I passed, saw this mountain in the clearing, and had really felt the sense of where I stood. On my way back, I sat down on the side of the road in the dirt, and just sat down and took in the view. While not the biggest mountain ever, I had this feeling of relishing the moment since I was by myself, and as in the middle of nowhere as I could be. At this moment I had fallen in love with the nature around me and proceeded to explore more of what was unknown to me. This time that I had was something that I needed, but it was important since I had this feeling of excitement and wanting a whole lot more than what I originally wanted.