De ce calatorim?

Calatorim ca sa ne pierdem si sa ne regasim, sa cunoastem alti oameni, alte stiluri de viata si alte perspective, dar sa ne cunoastem mai bine si pe noi.

Eu uneori plec ca sa fug, alteori ca sa (ma) regasesc, alteori ca sa aflu, sa vad si sa simt. Sau ca sa-mi caut locul cand nu mai sunt sigura ca am loc in locul meu.

Am citit zilele astea un articol care m-a facut sa descopar si alte motive. Nu reusisem sa le izolez pana acum, dar stiu ca sunt acolo, de fiecare data cand petrec prea mult timp pe site-urile cu bilete de avion.

Calatorim ca sa uitam regulile si sa invatam unele noi. Sa scoatem oamenii si locurile pe care le vedem dintr-o lume abstracta, a stirilor si fotografiilor facute de altii, si sa-i aducem in constiinta noastra concreta. Iar apoi, sa oglindim cele doua lumi una intr-alta.

<<We travel, then, in part just to shake up our complacencies by seeing all the moral and political urgencies, the life-and-death dilemmas, that we seldom have to face at home. And we travel to fill in the gaps left by tomorrow’s headlines: When you drive down the streets of Port-au-Prince, for example, where there is almost no paving and women relieve themselves next to mountains of trash, your notions of the Internet and a “one world order” grow usefully revised. Travel is the best way we have of rescuing the humanity of places, and saving them from abstraction and ideology.>>

….

<<For if every true love affair can feel like a journey to a foreign country, where you can’t quite speak the language, and you don’t know where you’re going, and you’re pulled ever deeper into the inviting darkness, every trip to a foreign country can be a love affair, where you’re left puzzling over who you are and whom you’ve fallen in love with. All the great travel books are love stories, by some reckoning — from the Odyssey and the Aeneid to the Divine Comedy and the New Testament — and all good trips are, like love, about being carried out of yourself and deposited in the midst of terror and wonder.>>

…

<<reality is our creation, and that we invent the places we see as much as we do the books that we read. What we find outside ourselves has to be inside ourselves for us to find it. Or, as Sir Thomas Browne sagely put it, “We carry within us the wonders we seek without us. There is Africa and her prodigies in us.”>>

Citatele sunt dintr-un articol mai vechi de Pico Iyer, scriitor britanic de origine indiana. Va recomand sa cititi tot articolul aici si sa-mi spuneti in ce argumente va regasiti.