China Then and Now

It’s been 12 years since my first trip to China. In fact that trip in January 1996 was my first trip out of the US (other than Canada). In those 12 years I have visited over 20 countries for leisure, work, service and adventure. That averages out to almost two countries every year!

It was interesting to spend a week in the first place that I traveled abroad 12 years after that experience. Throughout the week I found myself seeing sites and flashing back to that first trip. I also spent a lot of time reflecting on just how much I have changed since that first experience abroad. Here are a couple of my thoughts…

Things shock me less – The different and unfamiliar seem more familiar and expected. Streets filled with rickshaws and motor bikes…rural villages with no running water…cities with insane pollution…being stumped about how to communicate…chickens being killed and defeathered in a back alleys of restaurants…whole pigs being cooked on spits… unique foods and tastes…unfamiliar customs… shacks… dirt roads…grand palaces…magnificent waterfalls and wildlife…humbling historical sites and ruins…mysterious and grand religious sites…hawkers… beggars…new sights…new sounds…new smells – these kinds of things don’t surprise me much anymore, in fact, I expect to experience them when I travel (and I can be disappointed when I don’t find them).

Now don’t get me wrong – this doesn’t mean that I am not still in awe of the places that I visit and that traveling has become banal or ordinary to me – quite the contrary. Even though I may have less “head spinning” moments I think I’m actually able to absorb the experience in a deeper way because my head IS spinning less.

Being catapulted into a place that is completely different from any place I’ve ever been is one of things I love about traveling. Learning about a new place, a new history, a new culture and how to navigate it all is exciting to me.

Things scare and intimidate me less – I am a worrier by nature (like you didn’t all already know that!). When I first traveled abroad independently and when I led service learning trips abroad I worried and stressed about EVERYTHING. Where do I buy the ticket? Will they understand me? Where will I eat? How will I order? What if the train doesn’t stop at my stop? What if the rickshaw driver didn’t understand me and takes me to a totally different place? How do I call the contact person? What if I don’t find a place to stay? Did I get on the bus in the right direction? What will I do if our luggage doesn’t show up? I can’t do that or go there because I don’t know what to do or how to do it!! I could go on and on with examples of my neuroses.

Just recently I have realized that I worry less and less about these kinds of things. It is now harder to catapult me completely out of my comfort zone. I think years and years of travel has shown me that things always find a way of sorting themselves out. No matter what happens or how seemingly bad or hopeless a situation may seem things always work out in the end. It helps that I’ve become familiar with what kinds of “unexpected” or unusual things to expect when traveling in different cultures. Knowing how to ask the right questions, learning tricks for getting information I need, strategizing about how to communicate through language barriers, understanding customs, reading cultural nuances – all help in making things go smoothly. I’ll never completely recover from my worry affliction but now I try not to let these worries consume my entire experience. I try to be smart, be proactive, be polite, be assertive, pay attention and trust the process.

I approach the experience differently – I find myself spending less time documenting my travel experiences by taking pictures and collecting paraphernalia and more time experiencing/observing and reflecting/writing. This voyage especially has reminded me that traveling is less about what I’ve seen and more about how I process what I’ve seen and how it changes me. I used to collect stuff and take pictures that I thought people would think was cool. Now I know that people don’t really care about my trips rather than a couple of quick shots. What is more important is what I am learning, how I am changing, what I am taking away from the experience. I need to choose places and experiences that intrigue and draw me rather than hitting all the big, exciting, “expected” travel sites and destinations.

This current voyage has been a struggle for me for many reasons (many of which I have shared here). I think one of those struggles has been around the fact that I didn’t realize until now just how independent and travel savvy I’ve become. Traveling on a ship used to feel like a safe, easy way to get around the world (and don’t get me wrong it still is) but now it sometimes feels restrictive to me. Also, I’ve been hitting some big “sites” and popular countries on this voyage but most of them haven’t excited me or enticed me much. Have I "outgrown" this type of travel? Not really - I just think I'm ready to explore other, different ways of traveling.

These reflections have been good lessons to learn because it helps me to decide and shape how and where I want to travel in the future. As always I’m looking for travel to teach me more about me and once again it has not let me down. As we begin the next voyage in just two short weeks with 10 more countries before us all I can say is bring on the lessons!