There's Always Time to Travel

After having spent the better part of the last half a year traveling around in the States, I feel that I have in some sense taken on a traveler mindset. When traveling around different states in the US, I was always moving around with an attitude that I would want to take in as many new sights and experiences as possible. Because everything seems so different and interesting, it made me move around with much expectation but because of there, I felt that I had so much more to see and learn than if I had traveled around with certain ideas of what I wanted to do and with a mental checklist of the things I want to see. (My tons of photos taken on my travels can attest to that!). As I’m definitely not a “plan-in-detail” guy, a lot of the times, I was just randomly wandering around making up travel plans on the spot from whatever seems the most convenient. Everywhere I traveled to, I was armed with an open mind and a ready camera. Many times, I also picked up unexpected ideas and insights on my travels too. (A very crappy example would be when I was looking to see if there was a pinball machine on a cruise ship and suddenly understood why there wasn’t :P )

But, after returning to Singapore, it initially felt like “Gee, now that I’m home, this spells the end of my traveling experiences.” Or at least I thought for a while.

Suddenly, I thought, why not just be a traveler wherever you are? Even at home? Then I realized that being a traveler was not so much where you are than the mindset you take towards your life and experiences you have. I suppose its kind of like the difference between how a young kid looks at a new thing and how someone much older looks at it. The kid would probably be curious, turning the object around and around to look at it from all angles, thinking “I wonder if it can change it shape? Or color? Or make some sound”? I think older adults are constrained by experience. The experience that tells them not to look further beyond what something looks like on the surface.

The same goes with a traveler mentality. It’s the mindset that wherever you are, you bring with you a healthy overdose of child-like curiosity and openness to new experiences. There ain’t anything like learning or experiencing too much, no matter where you are.

That’s why I travel everywhere with my camera these days. Always snapping pictures of different experiences and sights.

Everyday is a new travel with new experiences. Live it to the max.