Thursday 10 December 2015

Travel and writing - there is a catch

You are bombarded by stunning pictures of beaches, architecture, natural wonders and amazing sights that can be found around our globe. All the time. You dream of travelling. You'd love to quit your boring office job and go on that one perfect journey around the world. Preferably with a one-way ticket. You've watched and/or read "Eat, Pray, Love". You know what happens: you learn new languages and find love... Right? 



As well as writing, I love travelling. Not the process itself; airports are evil and designed to irritate, trains are loud and dirty, cars are dangerous and don't even get me strated on sailing. I went on a cruise once, to Norway, and after two days spent on the open sea, on the luxury Queen Victoria liner (!), I fancied kissing the land in Stavanger, taking a bus to Oslo and flying back home (at least it would've been quicker...)

Queen Victoria of CUNARD
But exploring new places is unmatched pleasure. The learning curve is incredible. And it changes you, in a way you love.

Juicy colours of Barcelona. Are they really so intensive? You need to go there and check for yourself, don't you?
However, there is a catch. The world is not photograph-perfect. Take my trip to Catalunya. Barcelona - what a fantastic city! Crowded, though, very crowded. And extremly hot. All coastal towns and villages were moved there straight from a fairytale. But my husband and I like to explore the unexplored, and we went inland, to a town called Manresa. It looks picturesque and friendly, doesn't it?
Manresa...
WRONG. It was full of one-way streets, very narrow, where we could barely fit with our small rented Peugeot. Also, its walls were covered in graffitti demanding independence for Catalunya, some slogans being a little too extreme... And the immigrants seemed a prevailing group there, which in conjunction with all the signs on buildings looked like a spicy issue boiling in a hot pot of political soup. It made you think: who demanded independence for Catalunya in Manresa? A bunch of Muslim residents? Catalan people, who are not Spanish, but sort of are, for an ignorant tourist like myself? Some unknown extremists?

It took us some time to navigate out of a maze of narrow streets, and we drove away. We had a week of holiday, and it seemed more relaxing and easier to just spend it on the beach, in the sun. But the sights you see cannot be unseen. Honestly, I can't name the beaches I sunbathed on, but Manresa has been stuck in my mind for the last three years. And even now I still wonder: was that first impression even right? Can I judge the place based on one-hour visit? Doubtful.

All this leads me to think that travel has become a business - money-making machine, trying to lure you in, playing on the fact that we, humans, love to explore. But so do cockroaches, and the last one my husband encountered in a bath, whilst in Spain, died under his shoe. Mind you, it attacked before, so it died a valiant death...


Does that mean we shouldn't travel? By all means, no! The more you travel, the more you gain... and perhaps the more depressed you become, discovering there is a skip right next to that perfect beach in Tunis. But it opens your mind. And, best of all, it makes you want to write.


No comments:

Post a Comment