Going places was a relatively new thing for me, having had few trips that left my home state until after I was 17, and then I got on a plane and went to Brazil.
I did not really understand it or know that it would happen, but my perspective on the world has changed with each trip.
Not just the trips to places where people have an amazingly different life and I am struck dumb staring at something that is, to them, of course, amazingly common...oh no.
Even the trips I have made to the next town so I can visit the flea market or those I made across the country, camping at each stop...even these.
Is it just watching the pavement curve and the landscape fall and rise?
I would like to think I have seen a bit more of the U.S. than I have the rest of the world. I am not sure yet why this is important to me.
Maybe the significance of being familiar with my own nation comes from talking to far too many people who I label pretentious because they are more pleased to have traveled to other countries than to have visited their own nation. I am not sure if it is an issue of nationalistic patriotism, I think I would like people to have actaully seen a bit of the U.S. before they talk about it in huge sweeping gestures that seem to describe all those Americans who do not live in major cities as idiots...
Thankfully I have learned to limit my conversations with people who like to think most Americans are idiots and who also may have threatened to move to another country after Bush came into his second term...why go? I mean...we were needed more so than before! Of course, this talk died down and people went on with their lives and other were jolted into becoming much more politically active!
I am willing to consider that I am jealous that I have not traveled more....maybe with more cash and time, etc. etc.....I am basically suggesting that it is important to be open to learning from each travel experience, any travel experience....any experience actually.... and to not belittle places that are close simply because they are close and not foreign.
So I have been around the U.S. a bit, and here is a cool site I found that helps me show it.
create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.
I have also made it a point to try to visit the America's before I moved into the the Eastern Hemisphere. Again, I am not sure why exactly...but now you can judge me for the nations as well as the states I have visited...
create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands
It is, no doubt, important that Americans travel. Americans of all ages and classes need to see how other people live, not just in their own country but in others. Seeing how life happens for other people helps us develop. It hits us in a strange place that takes weeks, months, maybe years for the full processing and integration to occur and the effects to be felt in our waking life where we can then have compassion and imagination for others.
Just a few miles down the road or a 24 hour flight around the globe, its worth it.
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