When my family lived in Beijing, China, during my middle school years, we traveled around Asia so often that, as unbelievable as it may sound, I got sick of it. I actually threw a fit when my parents announced our next travel itinerary.
After COVID-19 trapped us all at home for months, there was nothing I wanted more than to travel again to satisfy that longing we all share to see the world. After all, if you’re young, there is no better time to fulfill that longing than right now.
Though a college student’s sleep-deprived, caffeine-filled body might not feel like it right now, it is in the best shape it will ever be. It can run on three hours of sleep, operate with a fast metabolism, and adjust quickly to new environments, time zones, and food. There is no age better for traveling to a foreign country. Young tourists get the traveling experience without getting sick from trying new food, battling jet lag, and feeling aches and exhaustion halfway through a touring day. Traveling will not be such a pleasant ride a few years down the road.
Along with possessing a healthy, sprightly body, young people’s worldviews are still developing. Their habits and beliefs are less set than they will become in their thirties and forties.
Not only does traveling enable young travelers to expand that lens through which they see the world, it is also a soul-altering experience. They are far out of their comfort zone in the presence of culture, languages, landscapes, and people so different from them. But in doing so, they expose themselves to a formative novelty. Young travelers walk the same paths as historical figures, witness the wonder of the diversity with which God created the world, and learn about lifestyles that would have been unfathomable to their imagination.
When young travelers meet those whose circumstances are less fortunate, such interactions inspire gratitude and compassion in the heart of the travelers — both important values to instill in one’s youth. Young travelers see people that are also trying to make it in this world, though in very different ways. Through expanding their own horizons and feeding that hunger for knowledge, travel fills young people with love for the wondrous world God created them in. Oftentimes, travel makes the experience of returning home all the sweeter because young people can develop an appreciation for what they already have: the joys of their own homes, and the beauty of a simple, “boring” life.
Anyone can travel, but traveling well is another matter. Not everyone knows how to navigate a foreign city, book the right hotels and restaurants, and track down the best places to go. There’s nothing like traveling to force young people to make wise decisions, confront uncomfortable situations, and interact with different kinds of people. Do I brave that sketchy alleyway or walk an extra three minutes to the museum? Eh, time is money. Oh, look — the hotel I booked doesn’t exist. Maybe next time I’ll avoid discount hotel websites. Do I have a good chance of contracting ebola from using this bathroom? Let’s find out — ebola cases aren’t very prevalent here anyway.
Experiencing such different circumstances can peel back layers to expose our real levels of maturity. Our experience of the world is a mirror to who we are; travel is a journey of self-discovery. As Lawrence Durrell wrote in his essay, “Spirit of Place”: “It is there if you just close your eyes and breath softly through your nose; you will hear the whispered message, for all landscapes ask the same question in the same whisper. ‘I am watching you — are you watching yourself in me?’”
The cost of traveling is certainly an obstacle for college students. But that’s where reasonably weighing costs and benefits comes in, because all good things require some degree of sacrifice. Thanks to my parents’ frugal financial choices when it came to purchasing material possessions, I got the opportunity to travel often. Through budgeting and saving, college students can travel without breaking the bank. It’s not easy, though: They’ve got to really want it.
And what is the pay-off? The privilege of traveling the world, living in different countries, and experiencing the diversity of human culture. It was an experience my parents prized over material possessions, because experience stays in your memories, in stories you tell others, and more importantly, it becomes a part of who you are forever. You may not be rich in possessions, but you can be in experience. Travel while you’re young, before the plague part two dawns on us — you won’t regret it.
Megan Li is a sophomore studying economics.
