January… time to plan travels (Part I)

Every January a large scheduling sheet was passed to each of us in our department so we could place an X on the weeks we requested for our annual holidays. I worked in the corporation for almost 26 years so the habit to look in January for anticipated travels is still with me. When I started working there in 1982 it was hard to make traveling plans so long in advance. There was no Internet with quick information. I had to go to our library to do my research and much of the information was dated. Then I would write – slow mail since there was no email and long distance telephone was expensive – to the hotels or bed and breakfast to make reservations. I remember how I wrote to a bed and breakfast in Chester, England in the early 1980s with anticipation but three weeks later they replied that they were full for that date. I had to start my research all over again.

Vintage postcard of Chester circa 1906 (this was before I went there!)

I still like to make travel plans in January but also other months, long enough in advance of the trip to allow for full research and reading on the area, the history, the authors, et al. My love of travel started when I was 6 years old, after World War II, when my mother and I took a ship to Istanbul, Turkey to sell my grandmother’s house and bring her back with us to Paris (my father’s mother.)

Painting by Robert Otto Nowak, Austrian 1874-1945

It took more than 10 days for the ship to go from Marseille to Istanbul because it had to stop many times. My mother told me “look at those black things in the water” I saw them and asked “what are they?” my mother replied “they are unexploded naval mines so the ship has to move slowly” “why?” “Because the ship would blow up” (and some already had prior to us.) I did not fully understand the implication but since my mother was staying in the cabin being sick while the ship was moving I had a great time being free to run on the ship with other little children. I especially remember an English girl and an Italian boy and started talking to them somehow. I liked this trip so much I decided I would travel always and also learn English and Italian.

Painting by Maurice Prendergast, American 1895-1924

I have traveled to many countries and islands – some more than once like when going back to France, England and Italy and some just once. Here is the list in alphabetical order (I am not counting stops at airports like Jeddah, Saudi Arabia): Algeria (3 times or 3 X) Barbados, Belgium (many X) Canada (9 X) Denmark, Egypt (4 X) England (many X) Ethiopia (2 X) France (many X) Gabon, Germany (2 X) Greece (2X) Grenada, Iceland, Indonesia (including Bali), Italy (many X) Jamaica and

Japan, Laos, Luxembourg (2 X) Malaysia, Malta, Mexico (2 X) Monaco (4 X) Morocco, Netherlands (3 X) Netherland Antilles, Portugal, Russian Federation, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, San Marino, Senegal, Singapore, Spain (2 X) Saint Pierre et Miquelon, Sweden, Switzerland (2 X), Thailand (2 X) Tunisia (4 X) Turkey (2 X) United Arab Emirates – Dubai and Sharjah, United States (46 states) Vatican City, Virgin Islands, Uzbekistan and Yugoslavia = 48 total and I hope to make it an even 50 this year. I also learned to speak English and Italian (with a spattering of Russian and Arabic.)

“I have not been everywhere, but it’s on my list.”
-Susan Sontag, American author 1933-2004

Traveling to all these cities, states, islands and countries has kept my mind open and alive. Learning the various customs, religions, history, visiting monuments, historical sites, museums, speaking to the local inhabitants and eating their food have challenged my perceptions and expended my experiences. When I was little and declared I would travel all over the world adults said that it was too expensive. They said growing up and realities would cure me of this dream. I kept the dream alive all these years and vagabonding is in my heart. I am still keeping dreaming and hoping - I think that each one of us is the master of our destiny and in control of our fate so why not keep on dreaming - and planning trips. I keep hoping that I can travel and be a vagabond as long as I am able.

Hope, painting by Edward Burne-Jones, English 1833-1898

"DREAMS"

Hold onto dreams
For if dreams die
Life is like a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
– Langston Hughes, American Poet, 1902-1967

We can always find a door that will open for us

Picture of a door I photographed in Florence, Italy (with my old film camera) click to enlarge

One of my blogging friends commented that I was not a “vagabond.” I guess since the term most commonly refers to a “vagrant” or “hobo.” In French, however “vagabond” or “vagabonde” in its feminine form has various meanings: 1) someone whose imagination travels and 2) who travels or wanders without set ideas and 3) who is eccentric and whose mind goes from subject to subject - an eclectic mind.

Here are some more pictures I took with my old film camera

from top left: Kamouraska, Quebec, Canada – tailor shop in Dubai, UAE – the tomb of author Karen Blixen (1885-1962) who wrote Out of Africa, Rungstedlund, Denmark – House of Renoir Cagnes-sur-Mer, France (click to enlarge)

Now that I am getting older and time is slipping away, travelling, far and near, is still a top priority. You never know when you won’t be able to take the next trip, or when life will stop. There is still a lot to learn. Travels will stay with you for a lifetime as a wealth of experiences but also as interior journeys expanding your knowledge and awareness. Traveling in your own country is fine but it is not like being in a foreign land – you feel vulnerable and it changes you in a way and humbles you. You can empathize with people from very different social, economic and cultural perspective. To read about traveling or watch travel shows is most entertaining but it's not at all as being over there. You cannot turn the page or turn off the television. First hand exposures increase our objectivity and explain differences. It challenges our perception and sharpens our understanding of other cultures. It makes us see things from a different angle than the accepted “home” angle and realize that “our way” is not always the only way or the best way. It destroys ethnocentricity. Travel intensifies living and gets around preconceived ideas about foreign places.

Wanderlust has been in my blood all my life but I do understand that travelling does not affect everyone like this. Some will say – how can you afford it? It is a matter of priorities. Some people at work would envy my travels but then they would tell me about their new boat or flat screen, high definition television they just bought. With that budget I could arrange a great trip in another country. We go on a budget, travel frugally and sometimes do not decide where to go until we see a great deal, and then decide to go there. Since this is getting long I will give examples of some of my trips, on a budget, in the second part of this post.



So, this January, as in many Januaries, I have already made plans to travel to another state and in another country during the months ahead. I will take photographs there and bring them back for future posts.

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do... Explore. Dream. Discover." -Mark Twain (1835-1910)