It's just about New Year's resolution time, and no doubt many of you are going to vow to go on vacation in 2008 -- and this time, really really get away, unplug, leave the email and the cell phone behind, and completely disconnect from the daily grind.
I get the urge to do this, but I think that's a waste of the precious few vacation days that you'll actually take this year. Because the truth is no matter how much you try, and no matter what you're likely to forget to pack, the one thing that you never really leave behind when you hit the road is ...you. So why fight it? Traveling -- and this is so whether for work or for pleasure -- is an ideal time to get the perspective on your daily life.
Of course, it can be hard to figure out how to get that perspective in the midst of the fun, merriment -- or exhaustion and overwhelm, depending on the kind trip you're having. So how to do it?
You'll first need to have some downtime. Remember: you are not a presidential hopeful in the week before a primary, you do not need to schedule ever single moment of every single day of your trip. (I have trouble remembering this myself, oh how I hate the idea of "missing" something. But you can't do it all anyway, and isn't it better to do less and enjoy what you do more?) By the same token, consider taking some time to reflect during travel's particular meditation time: sitting on a plane, a bus, a car, a train. You don't need to watch a movie, listen to an iPod, read a magazine, you could...just...think.
Of course you could do all of that without ever leaving home. The particular benefit of reflecting on daily life when you travel is that you bring the wide-eyed attention that you'll pay to unusual surroundings back home with you--even if it's for just a day or two. So to heighten that experience, try to pay attention to the to the familiar in the unfamiliar. You will perhaps look at a gas stations just a little bit differently after you've pondered what "Sjalfsali" means on an Esso station in Reykjavik,Starbucks after you've seen it guarded by a solider in Beijing.
type="image/jpeg" width=332 height=415> Houhai Starbucks. Photo by Alison Stein Wellner © 2007
Similarly, it's interesting to try to preserve some of your daily routine when you're traveling, and to note how that goes. The insights I've gathered from this range from the sad commentary on our educational system -- I have learned more about how to convert meters into miles by running on treadmills than I ever did in school; to the useful travel tip -- do not run on treadmills on cruise ships in bad weather if you do not enjoy being seasick; to the simply entertaining: I really like knowing that the way to order an egg white omelet in Honduras is to ask for it "sola la clara".
You may see your neighborhood grocery store or drug store differently after you've shopped for necessities somewhere else. And actually, visiting a supermarket or a drugstore is a great way to get familiar with a place, and as well an excellent low-stress activity on a day that you're fighting jet lag. Just look at the fun that Canadian writer Eva Holland had visiting a Target in Syracuse.
Of course, paying attention to what you see in this way by running it through the filter of your daily routine can also help you to make sense of the culture you're visiting. A great deal of my daily routine involves coffee, and my notebooks are filled with a dismaying amount of information on coffee houses. So, this past spring, I traveled to New Zealand to attend a design conference. On day one, wandering around Ponsonby Street shopping area, I'd noticed a café sign that proudly proclaimed that it was the "2nd Best Café in Auckland" -as of 2003. Was it modesty? Bragging? Some new hybrid of the two? Either way, it amused me.