Travel
isn’t about landmarks, shopping and souvenirs. It is about meeting people. Connecting
with them. And sharing kindness, writes Andrew Drummond Law.
I meet new people every year. At work, through my social
circle, and on my travels.
Some of us connect with so many new friends on social media
we have hundreds, perhaps thousands of friends.
Robin Dunbar, a famous anthropologist and psychologist, found
that the average maximum number of people that our brain can handle is a social
group of 150. Relationships involving trust and obligation, where you still
have that personal touch, and you are not just another profile picture and
username.
Of these, 50 are close enough to invite home for dinner, but
only 15 are your inner circle, with whom you can confide and turn to for
sympathy. Five is your close support group of best friends, often your family
members.
Sorry to all you social media addicts that claim to have 500+
“friends”. The big news is…you do not.
When traveling you meet random people in passing, either
just to smile at, talk briefly, or share transportation with. Sometimes there’s
a moment of need and a brief moment where you can choose to stop and help, or
walk on past them. A connection can be made, ignored, or missed too easily.
Open your eyes and ears.
There is nothing new about being kind and generous to
strangers on your travels.
But it is becoming less common, as we insulate ourselves
from our physical surroundings with technology, using our smartphone and its
online reviews, rather than make conversation with strangers, asking for
directions and opinions on places to eat, visit and shop.
Here are some suggestions and thoughts that are guaranteed
to not only make you feel like a kind human being again, but will also help someone
this year:
Compliment a complete stranger while on your travels. Say
something nice, smile or wink at them. You’d be surprised how breaking the ice this
way can sometimes lead to an invitation, or friendship of a lifetime. Travel is
very stressful for some people. Make it enjoyable for them.
Look for opportunities where you can help someone. When
boarding your flight, help that aunty with her heavy cabin bag, and lift it for
her into the overhead locker. You too will be old and shorter one day, and also
carrying double your permitted weight limit in your carry-on bag.
While waiting in transit at KLIA and KLIA2 airports, twice,
in as many months, I have encountered foreign tourists needing local currency
to buy a drink or meal.
With a very short stopover time and unfamiliar airport, it
is not always easy to change money. So buy them that fast-food they crave, cup
of coffee, or sugar filled chocolate bar that their poor jetlagged stomachs are
crying out for. Help feed them.
Catching a bus from Madrid to London I met a guy who claimed
to have lost his wallet. I paid for his bus fare home to the UK. He promised he
would pay me back. The other passengers quietly suggested to me he was a conman.
Maybe he was. But I helped him, and they didn’t. He never paid me back. I still
believe he was genuine.
Until recently, I always ignored the postcard sellers on my
travels. They would chase me down the street, harassing me as I explored local
landmarks. I considered them a nuisance. I would argue with them. I didn’t want
to buy from them, as I could take my own good photographs.
Now I realise the error of my ways. Maybe I did not want to
buy the postcards for myself. But I should have bought them from the young children
selling them. And shared the postcards with my friends and family members as
souvenirs.
They are just trying to earn a living. Me spending five
dollars on postcards has a far greater impact on their lives, than me saving
five dollars.
This year I am making a concerted point to be kind to people
I meet on my travels, because what goes around comes around. Kindness. Pay it
forward for 2015. And if someone winks at you, it’s probably me.
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