7 ms·

Why we travel

69 points by ahuja_s 11y ago

simonebrunozzi 11y ago
I fly about 105 times a year (I mean, 105 "legs", not 105 roundtrips), and have been doing so for the past 7.5 years. I would say AMA, but... Not joking... I am taking a flight in 2 hours. SFO to JFK. I don't say this to beat my chest. Traveling for work, like this, is terrible in the long term. I wish there was a better way.
- alexashka 11y ago
  What do you do to overcome the toll it takes on your body?
  - simonebrunozzi 11y ago
    I tried many things. In essence, I try to eat healthy, and exercise in moderation. The biggest though is trying to sleep properly as much as possible. I found that when traveling too heavy for too long, it's hard to do any of these three things above.
- ubernostrum 11y ago
  I've been at the 100k-mile tier with US Airways (and now American Airlines, courtesy of the merger) the past two years in a row. Thankfully, this year I'm dropping down below that; I'll probably clock in around 60-70 thousand miles flown in 2015, depending on how much I do in the final quarter of the year. On one hand, it's much more relaxing to not be constantly away from home and shuffling between hotels and airports. On the other hand, I'm going to miss the perks; might have to switch over to Delta for next year, since AA only provides free upgrades at the very top tier.
ronjouch 11y ago
The first few paragraphs strike a chord, but don't propose a lot of answers, and the end is just a collection of destinations: Why do we travel? (Am talking about recreational travel, not business) A friend of mine was mentioning incoming holidays, to which I asked an open "Anything planned?" question. In her answer there wasn't even the _mention_ of planning to travel, it seemed such an evidence that she just started listing potential destinations, to the point that I got a you're-such-a-party-pooper look when I asked if she considered something else from traveling. This, and a few other similar experiences with friends/colleagues who consume all their time off traveling. Of course, these are just a few data points, and maybe there's no generalization to do (some people like to travel a lot, some less, fair enough). Also, I traveled a fair share too and generally enjoyed & learned from it, but so do I when I simply spend holidays staying in my hometown reading, socializing/partying with friends, spending time with loved ones, coding, gaming, and resting. Now, focusing on the population subset that does feel this urge to always travel, what are the most common "why" for this? Difficulty to "disconnect" if still close to their daily routine? Pure habit? Social pressure? Fear of being unable to find anything meaningful to do and end up disappointed about themselves? Are globe-trotters simply better at feeling energized and reaping benefits from travel that I do? As an aside, will we start to see these travel binges less leniently (and consider less fuel-y alternatives) when we start realizing their ecological impact?
- Excluse 11y ago
  Thank you for confirming that I'm not alone in my curiosity as to why people feel the need to travel at every opportunity. As a recent college graduate, I've watched a disproportionate number of my peers (willing to say ~75+%) default to traveling as their #1 form of recreation if given the opportunity. I guess I understand the college years are a time for people to "find themselves" but I also cannot find a good, common "why" for this fetishized trend of excessive travel.
  - manacit 11y ago
    I find this response to be rather strange, especially as someone who very much enjoys traveling. It's (obviously) not something everybody thinks is fun or worthwhile, but to conflate your peers' desire to see other parts of the world with a 'fetishized trend' that is 'excessive' is very hyperbolic. If I had to guess, I would say a disproportionate amount of your peers travel during their college years because it's one of the few times that you are adult enough to travel on your own and are capable of taking sustained periods away from work/school, most people find themselves saddled with responsibilities once they enter the workforce. That being said, plenty of people continue to travel for their entire life, it's not something reserved for college students. I could give a myriad of reasons why I enjoy it, but I don't think it would be helpful. Suffice it to say, I enjoy experiencing other cultures/foods/geography/people/climates and find it refreshing to be away from home for a period of time.
    - Excluse 11y ago
      I wish I could say that I overstated my claim but that's honestly what it seems like to me. I understand the desire to seek out novelty through exploration but from what I've witnessed it looks like social media prevalence is a strong driving force (for our generation at least). The note about responsibilities during that time period strikes me as a valid reason I suppose.
  - ubernostrum 11y ago
    Speaking as someone more than a decade older than the average college graduate: I like to travel to see and experience things. Until this year I'd never been snorkeling (did that in Hawaii), and I'd never been to an opera in New York (did that on Valentine's Day). Also, given that I work primarily from home, it's nice to take a break and not be where I work.
Multiplayer 11y ago
Alain is one of my favorite contemporary authors. Check out "The Art of Travel" from 2002 for more in this vein. "The Architecture of Happiness" and "The News" are also excellent. Actually, everything I have read of his has been thought provoking and well written.
- shenanigoat 11y ago
  Agreed. I also really enjoyed Status Anxiety. For those who want to condense the reading experience, here is a 2.5 hr documentary version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1MqJPHxy6g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1MqJPHxy6g.
Paul_S 11y ago
Perfect timing as I'm going on a holiday next week and I don't know what I want to do yet. I travel because my friends live around the country. I have no other good reason. I have lots of bad reasons though. Foremost is that my attitude changes once I no longer feel I'm at home. I don't know why that happens. I wouldn't go to a cafe/pub during the day in my hometown but I feel free to do so on my holidays. I chat people up, I meet strangers, I even hitch-hike. There is NOTHING stopping me from doing all this here, yet I don't. As soon as I get on a train and move a few dozen miles and I all my inhibitions are gone.
- alexashka 11y ago
  It's pretty straight forward - you most likely won't see them again, so you feel free to burn bridges. You can burn some bridges where you live too, but then you'd have to deal with the consequences :) ps. This is why alcohol is so popular - it all of a sudden 'doesn't count' because it wasn't me, I was drunk :) How convenient
- ahuja_s 11y ago
  I don't know what is better about traveling (specifically the leisurely kind) - is it that there is some kind of comfort in escaping your daily life or is it the new experiences you find in a new place with new people? I know someone who goes from Singapore to Germany every year for pleasure. He has done it for the past 8 years. It's his "favorite" destination. I guess for someone like him absolute "newness" is less important but "escape" is more important. For others who live by the count of number of cities/countries/continents they have "covered" traveling seems to be a mission in itself. They travel for "newness". I would say that a common answer to the "why" might be that we all like to escape our lives at some point or the other. Traveling provides that along with entertainment.
ilaksh 11y ago
Most people don't travel because they can't. Traveling is a type of large-scale consumption that re-affirms self-worth through wealth display.
- schmidtc 11y ago
  That's not entirely true. Travel can be done on the cheap, many people don't even explore their own city. People who don't travel find a million excuses, but it usually boils down to fear of the unknown.
  - ilaksh 11y ago
    "On the cheap" like the 1200 pounds the other guy said he spent?
    - Paul_S 11y ago
      That's minimum monthly wage where I live. You need context for figures like that.
      - rawTruthHurts 11y ago
        That's almost triple the monthly minimum wage where I grew. All things considered, he's making a good point.
- saryant 11y ago
  I keep seeing this attitude any time travel comes up on HN and I still have no idea where it comes from. The idea that travel is nothing more than banal consumption for the purpose of puffing up your Instagram account is absurd on the face of it.
- Paul_S 11y ago
  What about people who travel cheaply. I went on a 3 week holiday last year (I work full time) and it cost me 1200 pounds. OK, I might have spent a couple hundred more to buy things like a backpack and boots since it was the first time in my life I went on a holiday (not counting holidays with my parents when I was a teenager) but I'm getting a lot of use out of them and plan to get even more.
jasonkester 11y ago
I can never read travel writing. It just puts me into this manic state where I glaze out and start thinking about getting back on the road. If I'm going to find out about a place, the only way to do so is to go there. So if you're asking why folks like me travel (75 countries, 3 laps around the world, maybe 5 years total abroad and moving over the 10 years before I simply moved overseas for good), the answer is that I've never even considered the question before. Ask an alcoholic why he likes alcohol. Ask your little cousin why he likes his phone. It's the thing you arrange your life so that you can do. It's that important. If you have to ask why, that's just a sign that it's not for you. And that's fine.
- ronjouch 11y ago
  Interesting. Were you raised by globetrotter parents, or is it a penchant that developed over the years?
  - jasonkester 11y ago
    No. My folks did "vacations" of the standard 2-weeks-on-a-beach variety. Usually without the kids. I didn't start traveling on my own until I was like 25. That was a 3 week trip to Thailand. Then a couple years later I did 2 months across Europe. Then a few years later 9 months across Africa and the Mideast, but by then all hope of working a regular job with regular time off expectations was lost. The "how" is easily explained though. I program computers for a living. That's the only skill I know of that pays more than four times what regular people make, and is happy to dish it up in the form of 3 month contracts. It's the ultimate enabler for the modern addicted traveler. Add in the more recent trend toward remote work, and you can pretty much travel as much as you like. As long as there's internet, everything works out.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
Namrog84 11y ago
Am I the only one who couldn't read the article? It only pointed me to some registration pay wall. and when I did skip it brings me to the sites main page and not the article? :(
- ahuja_s 11y ago
  Here, try this. I put it on my Google drive for you: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k...
Ace17 11y ago
"The farther ones travels, the less one may know."
ahuja_s 11y ago
See here if you don't have FT subscription: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k... Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2015.
quantisan 11y ago
I've been traveling in Europe for 2 months now. Writing this in Gothenburg, Sweden. Not taking the plane since I've arrived and have taken my leisurely time across 8 countries serendipitously around Eastern Europe and Baltic. What I've come to realize is that travel disrupts my notion of normal. As Alan Kay puts it, "normal is just a construct". Everything are different when you're traveling. From the obvious like language and culture, to the subtle like where to buy fruits. I feel like a child again when everything is new to be experimented. That breaks down my usual routine and my expected notion of self completely. I am more stimulated, creative, self reflective, and outgoing (as /u/Paul_S also mentioned). It's like when you move to a new team / school or fall in love with someone new. The first few weeks/months is like a Wonderland.
- nagrom 11y ago
  That's funny because I had the same feeling originally about there being no normal. But, when I traveled more, I came to a completely different conclusion. Maybe you will too? I've travelled extensively over the last decade before settling down about a year ago - I spent time in Europe (west and east), Russia, China, Japan, Australia, Subsaharan Africa, the Amazon and North America. What I find fascinating is that you can figuratively draw sets of what each culture cares about. The intersection is, more-or-less, what it means to be human. Obviously you need a significantly large sample size, but broadly speaking everyone wants somewhere comfortable to sleep and family and trusted, non-familial companions. Everyone wants what they consider to be good food (although the definition of 'good' changes somewhat). Everyone wants to look after their kids and have some sort of ritual to pass on knowledge culture and usually possessions to their offspring. Most cultures have music and dancing of some sort - both participatory and as entertainment. Every culture wants what it considers impressive to be considered impressive by outsiders. Every culture I've seen is more open to outsiders when they smile - I've learned to smile, to use body language and to relax more in unfamiliar surroundings. Once I started to see these commonalities, I realised what's unique about my own culture - I started to understand myself better, and see myself more in relation to the society in which I was embedded. I became kinder, and more understanding of people seeming stupid or ill-educated; I became less tolerant of people behaving aggressively or using status-hierarchies to dominate others. And, like you, I became more creative and outgoing. I suggest keeping a diary of your attitudes, if you can. Travel diaries are very cool :-)
rosser 11y ago
It's so very timely for me that this showed up today. I'm on the first day of a 3-4 month around-the-world trek, sitting in an airport between flights, and this is exactly why I travel: to stretch myself; to step outside of my habituated, and ultimately unconscious norms; to be available for all the unexpected little gifts that life can shower you with if you just get the hell out there and get in their way.
switch007 11y ago
I don't travel as much as I used to and I think it's mainly because I'm too shy, and I feel more like a sightseer and less like a traveler that wants to connect with each new place. I've come come back from trips and wished I had been more adventerous in meeting new people; even places where I speak the language. Also, flying is a pain in economy. Flights are busier, more crammed and less comfortable than 7/8+ years ago. I'm glad I did a lot of traveling including living abroad when I was younger. I still crave foreign culture, but I can seek that out at home through language/cultural exchanges, hosting travelers, and of course movies/news/etc online.
ahuja_s 11y ago
I remember when i got myself a bike in Singapore (cars are very expensive here $100k+ for a Volkawagen Polo and most people take the bus, train or cabs), i felt so happy because i gained a new degree of freedom. I could eat at new places and see new things. When i drive a car back home in India, i feel an even greater sense of freedom because i can go farther. Extrapolate to flights. Maybe, the farther you can go to look for newness, the happier you feel.

69 points by ahuja_s 11y ago

I fly about 105 times a year (I mean, 105 "legs", not 105 roundtrips), and have been doing so for the past 7.5 years. I would say AMA, but... Not joking... I am taking a flight in 2 hours. SFO to JFK. I don't say this to beat my chest. Traveling for work, like this, is terrible in the long term. I wish there was a better way.

alexashka 11y ago
What do you do to overcome the toll it takes on your body?
- simonebrunozzi 11y ago
  I tried many things. In essence, I try to eat healthy, and exercise in moderation. The biggest though is trying to sleep properly as much as possible. I found that when traveling too heavy for too long, it's hard to do any of these three things above.
ubernostrum 11y ago
I've been at the 100k-mile tier with US Airways (and now American Airlines, courtesy of the merger) the past two years in a row. Thankfully, this year I'm dropping down below that; I'll probably clock in around 60-70 thousand miles flown in 2015, depending on how much I do in the final quarter of the year. On one hand, it's much more relaxing to not be constantly away from home and shuffling between hotels and airports. On the other hand, I'm going to miss the perks; might have to switch over to Delta for next year, since AA only provides free upgrades at the very top tier.

ronjouch 11y ago

The first few paragraphs strike a chord, but don't propose a lot of answers, and the end is just a collection of destinations: Why do we travel? (Am talking about recreational travel, not business) A friend of mine was mentioning incoming holidays, to which I asked an open "Anything planned?" question. In her answer there wasn't even the _mention_ of planning to travel, it seemed such an evidence that she just started listing potential destinations, to the point that I got a you're-such-a-party-pooper look when I asked if she considered something else from traveling. This, and a few other similar experiences with friends/colleagues who consume all their time off traveling. Of course, these are just a few data points, and maybe there's no generalization to do (some people like to travel a lot, some less, fair enough). Also, I traveled a fair share too and generally enjoyed & learned from it, but so do I when I simply spend holidays staying in my hometown reading, socializing/partying with friends, spending time with loved ones, coding, gaming, and resting. Now, focusing on the population subset that does feel this urge to always travel, what are the most common "why" for this? Difficulty to "disconnect" if still close to their daily routine? Pure habit? Social pressure? Fear of being unable to find anything meaningful to do and end up disappointed about themselves? Are globe-trotters simply better at feeling energized and reaping benefits from travel that I do? As an aside, will we start to see these travel binges less leniently (and consider less fuel-y alternatives) when we start realizing their ecological impact?

Excluse 11y ago
Thank you for confirming that I'm not alone in my curiosity as to why people feel the need to travel at every opportunity. As a recent college graduate, I've watched a disproportionate number of my peers (willing to say ~75+%) default to traveling as their #1 form of recreation if given the opportunity. I guess I understand the college years are a time for people to "find themselves" but I also cannot find a good, common "why" for this fetishized trend of excessive travel.
- manacit 11y ago
  I find this response to be rather strange, especially as someone who very much enjoys traveling. It's (obviously) not something everybody thinks is fun or worthwhile, but to conflate your peers' desire to see other parts of the world with a 'fetishized trend' that is 'excessive' is very hyperbolic. If I had to guess, I would say a disproportionate amount of your peers travel during their college years because it's one of the few times that you are adult enough to travel on your own and are capable of taking sustained periods away from work/school, most people find themselves saddled with responsibilities once they enter the workforce. That being said, plenty of people continue to travel for their entire life, it's not something reserved for college students. I could give a myriad of reasons why I enjoy it, but I don't think it would be helpful. Suffice it to say, I enjoy experiencing other cultures/foods/geography/people/climates and find it refreshing to be away from home for a period of time.
  - Excluse 11y ago
    I wish I could say that I overstated my claim but that's honestly what it seems like to me. I understand the desire to seek out novelty through exploration but from what I've witnessed it looks like social media prevalence is a strong driving force (for our generation at least). The note about responsibilities during that time period strikes me as a valid reason I suppose.
- ubernostrum 11y ago
  Speaking as someone more than a decade older than the average college graduate: I like to travel to see and experience things. Until this year I'd never been snorkeling (did that in Hawaii), and I'd never been to an opera in New York (did that on Valentine's Day). Also, given that I work primarily from home, it's nice to take a break and not be where I work.

Multiplayer 11y ago

Alain is one of my favorite contemporary authors. Check out "The Art of Travel" from 2002 for more in this vein. "The Architecture of Happiness" and "The News" are also excellent. Actually, everything I have read of his has been thought provoking and well written.

shenanigoat 11y ago
Agreed. I also really enjoyed Status Anxiety. For those who want to condense the reading experience, here is a 2.5 hr documentary version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1MqJPHxy6g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1MqJPHxy6g.

Paul_S 11y ago

Perfect timing as I'm going on a holiday next week and I don't know what I want to do yet. I travel because my friends live around the country. I have no other good reason. I have lots of bad reasons though. Foremost is that my attitude changes once I no longer feel I'm at home. I don't know why that happens. I wouldn't go to a cafe/pub during the day in my hometown but I feel free to do so on my holidays. I chat people up, I meet strangers, I even hitch-hike. There is NOTHING stopping me from doing all this here, yet I don't. As soon as I get on a train and move a few dozen miles and I all my inhibitions are gone.

alexashka 11y ago
It's pretty straight forward - you most likely won't see them again, so you feel free to burn bridges. You can burn some bridges where you live too, but then you'd have to deal with the consequences :) ps. This is why alcohol is so popular - it all of a sudden 'doesn't count' because it wasn't me, I was drunk :) How convenient
ahuja_s 11y ago
I don't know what is better about traveling (specifically the leisurely kind) - is it that there is some kind of comfort in escaping your daily life or is it the new experiences you find in a new place with new people? I know someone who goes from Singapore to Germany every year for pleasure. He has done it for the past 8 years. It's his "favorite" destination. I guess for someone like him absolute "newness" is less important but "escape" is more important. For others who live by the count of number of cities/countries/continents they have "covered" traveling seems to be a mission in itself. They travel for "newness". I would say that a common answer to the "why" might be that we all like to escape our lives at some point or the other. Traveling provides that along with entertainment.

ilaksh 11y ago

Most people don't travel because they can't. Traveling is a type of large-scale consumption that re-affirms self-worth through wealth display.

schmidtc 11y ago
That's not entirely true. Travel can be done on the cheap, many people don't even explore their own city. People who don't travel find a million excuses, but it usually boils down to fear of the unknown.
- ilaksh 11y ago
  "On the cheap" like the 1200 pounds the other guy said he spent?
  - Paul_S 11y ago
    That's minimum monthly wage where I live. You need context for figures like that.
    - rawTruthHurts 11y ago
      That's almost triple the monthly minimum wage where I grew. All things considered, he's making a good point.
saryant 11y ago
I keep seeing this attitude any time travel comes up on HN and I still have no idea where it comes from. The idea that travel is nothing more than banal consumption for the purpose of puffing up your Instagram account is absurd on the face of it.
Paul_S 11y ago
What about people who travel cheaply. I went on a 3 week holiday last year (I work full time) and it cost me 1200 pounds. OK, I might have spent a couple hundred more to buy things like a backpack and boots since it was the first time in my life I went on a holiday (not counting holidays with my parents when I was a teenager) but I'm getting a lot of use out of them and plan to get even more.

jasonkester 11y ago

I can never read travel writing. It just puts me into this manic state where I glaze out and start thinking about getting back on the road. If I'm going to find out about a place, the only way to do so is to go there. So if you're asking why folks like me travel (75 countries, 3 laps around the world, maybe 5 years total abroad and moving over the 10 years before I simply moved overseas for good), the answer is that I've never even considered the question before. Ask an alcoholic why he likes alcohol. Ask your little cousin why he likes his phone. It's the thing you arrange your life so that you can do. It's that important. If you have to ask why, that's just a sign that it's not for you. And that's fine.

ronjouch 11y ago
Interesting. Were you raised by globetrotter parents, or is it a penchant that developed over the years?
- jasonkester 11y ago
  No. My folks did "vacations" of the standard 2-weeks-on-a-beach variety. Usually without the kids. I didn't start traveling on my own until I was like 25. That was a 3 week trip to Thailand. Then a couple years later I did 2 months across Europe. Then a few years later 9 months across Africa and the Mideast, but by then all hope of working a regular job with regular time off expectations was lost. The "how" is easily explained though. I program computers for a living. That's the only skill I know of that pays more than four times what regular people make, and is happy to dish it up in the form of 3 month contracts. It's the ultimate enabler for the modern addicted traveler. Add in the more recent trend toward remote work, and you can pretty much travel as much as you like. As long as there's internet, everything works out.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

Namrog84 11y ago

Am I the only one who couldn't read the article? It only pointed me to some registration pay wall. and when I did skip it brings me to the sites main page and not the article? :(

ahuja_s 11y ago
Here, try this. I put it on my Google drive for you: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k...

Ace17 11y ago

"The farther ones travels, the less one may know."

ahuja_s 11y ago

See here if you don't have FT subscription: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k/view?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BymUSeJD4sLzTGdkaVVURkFab0k... Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2015.

quantisan 11y ago

I've been traveling in Europe for 2 months now. Writing this in Gothenburg, Sweden. Not taking the plane since I've arrived and have taken my leisurely time across 8 countries serendipitously around Eastern Europe and Baltic. What I've come to realize is that travel disrupts my notion of normal. As Alan Kay puts it, "normal is just a construct". Everything are different when you're traveling. From the obvious like language and culture, to the subtle like where to buy fruits. I feel like a child again when everything is new to be experimented. That breaks down my usual routine and my expected notion of self completely. I am more stimulated, creative, self reflective, and outgoing (as /u/Paul_S also mentioned). It's like when you move to a new team / school or fall in love with someone new. The first few weeks/months is like a Wonderland.

nagrom 11y ago
That's funny because I had the same feeling originally about there being no normal. But, when I traveled more, I came to a completely different conclusion. Maybe you will too? I've travelled extensively over the last decade before settling down about a year ago - I spent time in Europe (west and east), Russia, China, Japan, Australia, Subsaharan Africa, the Amazon and North America. What I find fascinating is that you can figuratively draw sets of what each culture cares about. The intersection is, more-or-less, what it means to be human. Obviously you need a significantly large sample size, but broadly speaking everyone wants somewhere comfortable to sleep and family and trusted, non-familial companions. Everyone wants what they consider to be good food (although the definition of 'good' changes somewhat). Everyone wants to look after their kids and have some sort of ritual to pass on knowledge culture and usually possessions to their offspring. Most cultures have music and dancing of some sort - both participatory and as entertainment. Every culture wants what it considers impressive to be considered impressive by outsiders. Every culture I've seen is more open to outsiders when they smile - I've learned to smile, to use body language and to relax more in unfamiliar surroundings. Once I started to see these commonalities, I realised what's unique about my own culture - I started to understand myself better, and see myself more in relation to the society in which I was embedded. I became kinder, and more understanding of people seeming stupid or ill-educated; I became less tolerant of people behaving aggressively or using status-hierarchies to dominate others. And, like you, I became more creative and outgoing. I suggest keeping a diary of your attitudes, if you can. Travel diaries are very cool :-)

rosser 11y ago

It's so very timely for me that this showed up today. I'm on the first day of a 3-4 month around-the-world trek, sitting in an airport between flights, and this is exactly why I travel: to stretch myself; to step outside of my habituated, and ultimately unconscious norms; to be available for all the unexpected little gifts that life can shower you with if you just get the hell out there and get in their way.

switch007 11y ago

I don't travel as much as I used to and I think it's mainly because I'm too shy, and I feel more like a sightseer and less like a traveler that wants to connect with each new place. I've come come back from trips and wished I had been more adventerous in meeting new people; even places where I speak the language. Also, flying is a pain in economy. Flights are busier, more crammed and less comfortable than 7/8+ years ago. I'm glad I did a lot of traveling including living abroad when I was younger. I still crave foreign culture, but I can seek that out at home through language/cultural exchanges, hosting travelers, and of course movies/news/etc online.

ahuja_s 11y ago

I remember when i got myself a bike in Singapore (cars are very expensive here $100k+ for a Volkawagen Polo and most people take the bus, train or cabs), i felt so happy because i gained a new degree of freedom. I could eat at new places and see new things. When i drive a car back home in India, i feel an even greater sense of freedom because i can go farther. Extrapolate to flights. Maybe, the farther you can go to look for newness, the happier you feel.