So this is the end. It was pouring rain when I left
After I checked in, I walked around the city for a final time around Marienplatz and elsewhere. I don't know how anyone could ever get over the glockenspiel. It really touches a raw nerve because it is so out-of-place, yet makes perfect sense all the while. When I was waiting for the S-Bahn this morning, a nebbish businessman approached me and spoke English very, verrrryyyy slllooowwwlllyyy because he wanted to know if the S8 traveled to the airport. I played along for a second and said yes and then proceeded to ask him where he was from. Looking embarrassed that he mistook me for a non-English speaker, he said
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6:45 a.m. en route to
I had my first cup of coffee that was decent in many days. It is kind of sad that United Airlines has better coffee than I could afford on this tour! I really don't want this feeling to end. Ever. For as lonely as times got, it really was the life for me. I knew it when I went to
This world is so vast that it is difficult to comprehend. But through struggles and differences among people comes understanding for the better of yourself, as well as your native culture. Once we as a collective humanity learn that we aren't all the same culturally and that we can acknowledge our differences and use them for the better of our world, then real progress can occur for all of us. Until then, governments will continue to control their peoples with fear and coercion, and immigrants will be ghettoized in their adoptive nations. The experience of traveling independently is like no other because you see firsthand how locals live and how your lives overlap and differ. Struggling is part of the beauty. If there is no struggle, then it isn't real.
As much as I wanted to be with people during the heights of loneliness throughout, it was refreshing to have no ties to anyone or anything. All I can think about right now is the next step, the next adventure, and all of the people that I have yet to meet. Once you start traveling, it is so difficult to stop. The only things that stand in the way are finances and jobs. Working is necessary to finance experiences like this. I need to find a job where I can travel readily. In time, in time!
As I wrote in my first entry before the tour began, there must be something encoded in our DNA that calls for movement from place-to-place, from here-to-there. Humans were not meant to lead sedentary lives in offices. It counters our physiology. Therefore, a nomadic state of being is natural. After all, humans were nomadic hunter/gatherers for hundreds of thousands of years! To me, the only thing that makes sense is to keep going. I don't care if it is four days, seven days, 10 days, 21 days, 88 days, what have you. I have to keep going.
Ian Wright, the Globe Trekker host, once said, "There is nothing magical about a rucksack, passport, and boarding pass. You just do it, meeting new people and exchanging ideas along the way. There is no rule." Wright is very true. That is what travel should be about! Home is meant to be left at home. It is about getting so far out of your comfort zone that you struggle a bit, learn about the local culture, and exchange stories, all the while returning home with an expanded worldview. The hard part is letting go and allowing yourself to take the plunge. You learn to rely on yourself, and that translates across cultures. There are no rules.
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Monday, 7 April 2008, 9:18 a.m., Cleveland, OH, my front porch
I live a few minutes away from Lake Erie and it is always nice to come home to a body of water, even when it is still frozen. I thought that I would wait for a few days to do the final entry from this tour so I could decompress, sleep, and make sense of it all. I don't know if I will ever know what all of this means. I am glad that none of this is self-evident. If I could understand it all, then I would be doing myself a disservice. Now I sit on my front porch with morning coffee listening to The Microphones. It is funny how things always stay the same here. The feeling of "home" is here and always has been. My eyes have been opened even further. I feel more aware and completely unaware at the same time. I would rather be unsettled than content. The more freedom that you allow yourself to have, the more complex your worldview becomes. Independent travel is frustrating, stressful, painful, humbling, upsetting, heartbreaking, boring, exciting, liberating, and unforgettable at the same time. It is both a physical drain and rejuvenating. But I wouldn't have it any other way and I do not intend on stopping anytime soon. After the final flight to Cleveland Hopkins Int'l and the long walk through the terminal, I can only think about doing it again. And again.
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