Who has gone traveling and made met really amazing people?

@Francis,

I knew you'd understand..

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@The Pentacle Queen,

The Pentacle Queen wrote:

Hmm. I might do a language course in Germany if they have the same options. I was shocked at the amount of German I remembered. I used to be able to get by, but not any more.

Yes, do that! Go to my hometown (Munich) and you'll have fun!

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@spendius,

spendius wrote:

Shacking up with a good looking 35 year old nymphomaniac who owns a nice pub out in the sticks. ........ I could go on all day about fun.

You see spendius, you seek "fun" within your rural community and the daily
pub activities. It gives you pleasure and obviously satisfaction when we take
the nymphomaniac in consideration. I am sure, Queenie would be bored to
tears sitting in your pub with all the old geezers - as would I, by the way.
This daily ritual is comforting to you, sheer agony to others. To each its own,
which is perfectly all right, as long as you let others be and don't question
their motivation for things that simple aren't included in your own personal
lifestyle.

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@ossobuco,

ossobuco wrote:

After saying I'd be quiet I'll add some more comments. Earlier in life I tended to travel with one or two girlfriends (which brings up, there were times people would ask us if we were lesbians and look for proof we weren't.. ha ha). I traveled with a boyfriend several times, and later my husband many times. But - by the time I got to my thirties I sometimes travelled alone to go to conferences or see one friend, and enjoyed adding some days onto that visit to do my own wandering around. I don't think it even took getting used to, as I was already used to navigating around big cities and dining alone in a place that seemed full of couples or groups (actually, depending on where you are, a lot of people dine alone). I ended up really appreciating the restfulness of not having to deal with the decision making that goes on with two or more people and walking just where I wanted to, seeing such and such a place as I wanted to. By the time I was way older and spent a lot of time in Italy alone, I thrived on it - the efficiency of it, the choices. Lonely? I wasn't. I met enough italians for conversations to keep myself out of despond, and besides, I was too tired at the end of the day to be lonely.
I also like it when two people can do this sort of travel together, freer than being a constant matched pair of "tourists".

My experience with tour groups is very limited - one day long bus tour to Chichicastenango, a one day wildflower tour from hell in California, my girl scout group going to Washington, DC for a few days when I was thirteen, a group going through the Filoli gardens where the leader kept urging me to hurry and keep up, a group going through an italian pinacoteca with the leader wanting us all together (from that I learned to call ahead and get permesso for a private tour), a day tour with flight to Tikal - that one was fabulous. I'm happier mapping my own trip, or at least being partners in working out the details.. or partners in "let's get there and just check it out". As I age toward decrepitude, I suppose there are some interesting tours I could enjoy, archeology tours for example.. but I can't afford those anyway, or much travel alone either.

Why do I post this - well, as PQ travels more she may start to enjoy more autonomy.

Hey, no you get me wrong. I love being on my own. I did all the capital cities I went to by myself, and really enjoyed all of them.
I'm used to wandering round London by myself just soaking it in. Maybe that's half the issue, I'm too used to it. My main regret about where I went is that I didn't just inter-rail the whole thing by myself, because when you're used to one city navigating another one is surprisingly easy.
I was just surprised the people on the bus and the people in the hostels were only into getting drunk. Bars look the same where ever you go pretty much. Who gives a ****?
Anyway I am going to stop this thread in a bit because it's making me sound whiny.
Thank you everyone for your advice.

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@CalamityJane,

I would so totally love to, I like Munich.
I want to live in Berlin for a year. Berlin was super awesome.

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@The Pentacle Queen,

Hey, no you get me wrong. I love being on my own. I did all the capital cities I went to by myself, and really enjoyed all of them.
I'm used to wandering round London by myself just soaking it in. Maybe that's half the issue, I'm too used to it. My main regret about where I went is that I didn't just inter-rail the whole thing by myself, because when you're used to one city navigating another one is surprisingly easy.
I was just surprised the people on the bus and the people in the hostels were only into getting drunk. Bars look the same where ever you go pretty much. Who gives a ****?
Anyway I am going to stop this thread in a bit because it's making me sound whiny.
Thank you everyone for your advice.

Oh, no, don't stop it, I'm enjoying it. Didn't think you were whiny, and I'm glad you've experienced what I was talking about. Didn't mean to sound all "you'll grow into it".. I didn't know your experience, but I take you for an independent thinker. I agree experience on your own can spoil you for group hullaballoo, or ceaseless drunkeroos - I'm not your greatest group person, hate to be herded, although I'll put up with it if it's worth it. I might not be the right person to talk to about all this. I might have to shoot myself on a cruise.

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@CalamityJane,

There's no need to get sniffy Cal.

In an argument in the pub tonight with a Scotsman over devolution in which I was maintaining, just for fun of course, that the sooner Scotland was independent the better, as many maintained at the time of American independence, I learned that television, antibiotics and smooth road surfaces were iuvented by Scotsmen which I knew but hadn't quite realised what earthshaking inventions they were until this guy rhymed them off in quick succession.

Show me something as interesting as that that you learned whilst travelling.

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@ossobuco,

Yeah, well I do think I've learned that if anything, I am capable of just going off and doing stuff.
No, you're a good person to talk to about it.

Anyway, next time I will plan it myself and go completely alone.
I never really considered the implications of going on a bus when I booked it. I just kind of thought 'well people are never normally horrible' instead of thinking about what it would be like to be on a bus with people I find annoying.

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@spendius,

Quote:

Show me something as interesting as that that you learned whilst travelling.

Once I was on a bus while I was traveling alone in Greece and this elderly Greek peasant lady sat on the seat next to me and she smelled exactly like my mother - she must have used the same soap or powder or detergent or something - but it was such a strong and immediate sense of comforting recognition in what was to me such a foreign place- that I almost started crying (I missed my mom - hadn't seen her in almost a year at that point).

Anyway - what I learned is that people are people wherever you go. I think that's pretty interesting - and a very important thing to learn.

I'm going to Florence with my daughter at the end of October. I'm looking forward to that as she is studying A-level art and has more of a formal understanding of the history and methods of art than I do and it'll be fun to have her teach me. I also really enjoy her company.

I've found that I like traveling with one like-minded person moreso than alone or with a group. I think that's because I'm constantly looking and observing and I like to have someone to say, 'Oh look at that - what do you think of that?' and then have a discussion about it and that's not possible when you're alone and harder to do when there's a whole big group of you.

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I was reading Mr Bodelsen's classic, Studies in Mid-Victorian Imperialism, which is the sort of zone I prefer to travel in, and I came across this quote in a footnote.
It was taken from J.A. Froude's description of his fellow colonial passengers on his boat trip back from New Zealand.

Quote:

Of these I liked none. They were, as a rule, vain, ignorant, underbred, without dignity, without courtesy and with a conceit which was unbounded. Middle-class democracy is not favourable to the growth of manners, and, with all my wish to find it otherwise, I had to contrast them, not to their advantage, with two or three English youths among us, who, though belonging to the same social class, might have been another order of beings.

On a bus that sort of thing must be insufferable and what with the heat and the glare and the constant biological considerations dramatically so.

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@spendius,

I rode a bus once.

from Winslow AZ to Nashville. just before July 4. took 2 days.

quite an eye-opener it was. hot, sweaty. lotsa stops and changeovers. and crying babies.

and twice we all hadda go through a line to make sure we were not carrying a weapon.

(i did not complain)

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@spendius,

Well, this is common and the sad fate of the erudite traveler.

However, there's also, once in a while, some exceptional events, like an encounter I made in my way from India.

The one you qualified of "boring"...

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@Rockhead,

How can one complain when the journey is voluntary? Froude had been "working".

On a lost cause.

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@spendius,

spendius wrote:

There's no need to get sniffy Cal.

In an argument in the pub tonight with a Scotsman over devolution in which I was maintaining, just for fun of course, that the sooner Scotland was independent the better, as many maintained at the time of American independence, I learned that television, antibiotics and smooth road surfaces were iuvented by Scotsmen which I knew but hadn't quite realised what earthshaking inventions they were until this guy rhymed them off in quick succession.

Show me something as interesting as that that you learned whilst travelling.

I am not sniffy at all, spendius. I just told you in so many words: to each its
own and live and let live! Everyone derives pleasure in life from different
sources. Who are you to object to what it is or who it is?

That's fine that you met a Scotsman who told you about their earthshaking
inventions. I don't really envy you for that revelation, but it certainly was
a highlight in your life, so I will acknowledge it as such.

Every time I travel and even if it's just out of state, I find something interesting and enjoyable, even if it's just a lone cactus growing in the desert, or sitting next to locals in a small diner in the middle of nowhere. They certainly have a different life than I do, but I enjoy hearing about theirs and
be trapped in their world for a few hours. It is always what you make of
it, and life in general.

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@CalamityJane,

Quote:

Who are you to object to what it is or who it is?

There are a lot of people who are pretty fed up with you travellers whizzing backwards and forwards. I've read that asthma in kids living near Heathrow is way over the national average. And taking lead out of petrol was an official and expensive recognition that exhaust fumes are harmful. And not just in relation the lead. And there's the unholy racket. And the transfer of exchange to countries that are not always friendly.

I am perfectly entitled to object.

They come on the News saying that 2 million people have flown out on holidays as if we are all missing something. And there's 58 million who didn't fly anywhere.

Television, anti-biotics and smooth roads are dramatic world changing events. Each separately. All three from one small country is interesting.

Live and let live.

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@spendius,

Okay I give up - you win!

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@CalamityJane,

And I resisted asking you how you would like it if the locals from the middle of nowhere came round for a bit of entertainment and plonked themselves down and sat and watched your customs and returned to their huts and discussed it all.

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Personally, I love it when folks come to visit.
Showing them the local delights and the beautiful area I live in.
I feel bad for you Spendi... It must be awful living in an ugly place with nobody really interesting to talk to. No wonder you don't want people dropping by.
I realize not everybody can live in god's country, but there must be something worthwhile in your neck of the woods. Something that causes your bosom to swell with pride when you cast your hardened eyes across it. Surely you can find, with in the confines of your meagre existence, one thing, one small area in which you might find some pride, a place, a person, some bit of stunning history you would be willing to concede might, just might be worth the visit.
Come on, give it a go. I challenge you to find one bit of brightness.
I really think you can do it.

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@Ceili,

I gave up swelling with pride after my sojourn where the oil is pumped out. The human race is horrible. We all live in God's country. Or none of us do.

But I'll admit it would likely be awful in an ugly place with nobody interesting to talk to. But I can only guess.

What do you find interesting about talking about interesting conversations? We have them in the pub. We don't discuss them. We don't talk about ourselves like a sociologist might.

We talk about cricket, sex, football, stiff necks, cricket, shagging, the EEC, devolution for Scotland, growing tomatoes, cheap dope, Carol's boob job, betting, necking, beer, the accident last night, interest rates, feeling up ladies frocks, Sat's band, cricket, horseracing, jam making, local property prices, how things have changed, skinny leggings--that's all I can remember from tonight. I've forgotten last night but there would have been some similarities I should think.

On the bit of brightness there was Michelle's cleavage last Sat.

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I grew up where the oil was pumped, but not the same place you were soured in. Beautiful prairies and wild life. I now live near the mountains and sea. We are welcoming the world in a few months for a huge bash.
I truly couldn't careless what you or anyone discuss in their private tete-a-tetes but I will remember the conversations I've had, with strangers and friends alike.
But then again, most of us have more than a pair of fun bags to turn to for inspiration.
I will remember to steer clear of your pedestrian life and hope that anybody that I meet in the future will not come from your perspective.

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Who has gone traveling and made met really amazing people?

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