Whether in your own back yard, across the province, across the country, or across the pond, there are so many lessons to be learned from travelling, mixing, mingling and having conversations with others.
· My country
· Your country
· Our country
· Another country
Language barrier
Travelling to a country where the language is not your own comes with challenges for sure. Consider too, the opportunity to really appreciate how when others come to Canada to visit, perhaps live and work how important it is to have patience and understanding. It is amazing to connect with others where the message is located in the hand gestures, the facial expressions, and any number of non-verbal ways creates a conversation as well.
I had this pleasure in Spain while standing in line. It was a very long line and would take some time to get to the end. The woman behind me, close in age, spoke very little English, I spoke very little Spanish, but we managed a conversation for the hour that we were in line.
Through hand gestures and searching for familiar, yet simplistic words, I learned that she had honeymooned in Canada almost 30-years ago at Niagara Falls and had always wanted to return to see our spectacular mountains. She had a real affinity for Canadians. She had two daughters and thought her village outside Madrid was simply the best place in the world to live and how happy she was to share it with me. I learned more about the culture, the people, the REAL Spain from that woman who spoke so little English and me so little Spanish, than from any tour guide.
The things that matter
· A smile goes a long way
· Corresponding body language matters … a lot
· Generally, people love people
· Most people love to help
· People love conversation
· People love the opportunity to tell you all the great things about where they live
· People love to hear all the great things about where you live
· Finding synergies is fun
· Flamenco is a dance. Flamingo is a bird in Florida.
· A “ditch” in Ireland is actually a rock wall, but the Irish don’t consider it a rock wall, just a place to stack all the rocks they’ve managed to pick out of the soil
· Other places may at first seem very different, they are so very similar
· Pictures may say a thousand words, but there are never enough pictures to replicate the real thing
· The best “pictures” are the memories
· Moments matter
· Along the journey, remember to stop and look back and enjoy the view
· Remember where you came from, to value where you are going
· There is no destination, there are only resting points until the next lag of the journey begins
Quotes to inspire the next lag of the journey
“People travel to faraway places to watch in fascination, the kind of people they ignore at home”. Dagobert D. Runes
“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” Saint Augustine
“The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.” Lao Tse
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow mindedness.” Mark Twain
“Not all those who wander are lost.” J.R.R. Tolkien
“All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” Martin Buber
“A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.”
“Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travelers don’t know where they are going.” Paul Theroux
“It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the end.” Ernest Hemingway
“Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.” Flaubert
“This is your road, and yours alone. Others may walk with you, but no one can walk it for you.” Rumi
“There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign.” Robert Louis Stevenson
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Note: this was written without the aid of Artificial Intelligence (AI)
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