Do you want to see the world? Have you travelled much? Outside your country, not just from one bit to the other.

What stops you from living in another country for a year or two? Would you do it if you had the chance?

I've grown up thinking it was normal to want to see the world, so I'm interested to know if everybody feels that way.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Answers

(bit of background to that)

When you grow up in New Zealand you have a desire to see the world bred into you - you know that life is good there, but you always feel that there must be great things happening everywhere else (it's a small country at the bottom of the world thing). So we all head overseas after university - currently, there are more NZers aged 24- 28 outside the country than in it, and the government has had to devise tactics to ensure everybody will want to come back again one day. It's not an issue - we'll all go back there one day - it's one of the most beautiful countries on earth, after all! But to stay in one country all your life? Isn't that stagnating?

But I've met so many English people who haven't even been to Europe, let alone seen anywhere else. And from what I've read in a lot of journals, people seem to view moving from New York to LA the most earth-shattering thing possible. It always amazes me.

For me, living in another country has been the best thing I've done. It's taught me self-reliance, and opened my eyes to people and cultures which I had never experienced before.

When I have kids, I'd rather send them travelling for two years at the age of 18 then pack them off to university straight away - nothing broadens your horizons like seeing the world.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Hey, a move the distance of NY to LA is a pretty big move. Don't knock that. If your friends and family are all in one place (California, for instance) and you move to another place (Boston, for instance), it's not going to be easy.

That said, I know what you mean. I burn and yearn to live in Italy! Unfortunately, I don't speak Italian, and I've heard that finding work in Europe is just about impossible for Americans, anyway, if you don't want to be a barmaid.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

When I was younger I traveled a lot, then went through a period when I didn't do much at all. I've started traveling again [just back from Scotland]. I'd like to live in the UK for a while, if possible.

There are parts of the world I want to see and others I've no interest in. I have no interest in going to China, for example. Or Russia. I don't feel like I'm obligated to "see the world". I'd rather concentrate on the places that I have an affinity for.

That said, I can't understand people with no interest in traveling--at least somewhere.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

I'm not that interested in travelling. There are a few specific places and things I'd like to see, but generally I'm just not that curious. Also, I feel like you can't get a real feeling for what it would be like to live there by just visiting. And I'm too attached to where I do live to want to live somewhere else.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Jackie, I wanted to travel ever since I could read books; I can actually trace my interest in England back to watching the royal wedding (shut up) in 1981, when I was only four, and to a talk my second grade teacher's daughter gave about her student teaching in the UK, when I was 7.

I can't relate to people who have no desire to experience life outside of their own country and familiar surroundings, but that's just me.

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

I not only *wanted* to see the world, I did it. Several parts of it anyway.

I lived in Italy as a child and the Azores and Germany as an adult. I've traveled all over Europe, plus I've been to Australia. I've also lived in several regions of the US (some parts of it feel like a foreign country). I want to travel more, but time and money constraints are keeping me from it now. When I finish this damn Master's degree....


-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

I was fortunate to be able to live in London for about a year, and now I travel a lot for work, and I think it's incredible. A lot of people say they "wish" they could travel, but.... But what? The airlines run lots of specials, $300 (or less!) round trip airfare to Europe----if you want to do it, it's cheaper than Disney World or even Boston.

At heart I'm a homebody, but hopefully someday I'll have a family that I can transplant with me to some exotic land (England's exotic, isn't it?).

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2000

Clementine, you've heard right: it really is not easy for non-Europeans to find work here.

And believe me, you may think you want to live in Italy, but you really don't. Visit, sure. Even spend a whole summer, or a year studying. But you don't want to move here. Trust me on that.

As far as traveling goes, I've lived in Australia, Germany, and (obviously) Italy, and traveled a bit here and there as well. I think it's a wonderful thing that truly changes you.

I sometimes find it hard to talk to people who've never traveled abroad. Then again, I don't like a lot of the expats I've met, either, so maybe it's just me.

Let me make an amendment, here: travel truly changes you when it's done right. I know a number of people who've used up multiple passports, but it all just glanced right off them, apparently, as they still have the same narrow-minded, ethnocentric outlook they started out with.

(and just to make this perfectly clear, I'm not referring specifically to Americans: I'm thinking mostly of Italians I know who do the whole two-exotic-vacations-a-year thing, but can't bear to leave the country without a stock of Barilla in their suitcase. I mean, really!)

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

There's no "right" way to travel, nor does having an extended visit in a place make you a superior traveler. Some people have limited amounts of time and money. Every trip everyone makes is experienced through their personal prism.

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

Well, I already live in Paradise (a major metropolis in Southern California, not L.A.)spoiled by great weather, swayin' palm trees and plenty of gorgeous flora and fauna.

Okay, I'll say it: I have no desire to see the world. None.

I'm afraid to fly (I know, I know, I could get killed at any moment on the I-5)so that sort of narrows it down to road trips.

My best vacations ever are within a two-hour radius of my home. Laguna Beach, Newport, Dana Point, Malibu, Palm Springs, Idyllwild. Even San Francisco is just an all-day drive away. I even like Los Angeles!

So, I'm just boring that way.

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

about 10 years ago i was convinced I'd wind up a glamourous expatriate in Paris, working for/as a photographer or something (correspondent for the new Yorker)? I got to live there for about 5 months, and have been back twice to Europe and travelled quite a bit, once for a 6 month stretch, including Morocco. I've been to israel as well.

I think as I grew older, I realized that I am very american and I don't mind at all. i like feeling invested in this country, and it is my home. that said, I was also too lazy to do the work I would have to do to live abroad (go into finance, become fluent in another language, have the looks of a model, get married). I got sucked into american society, into paying taxes and stuff, and it just got complicated.

I'm constantly envious of those who make their lives outside of their home country by choice. I think I could definitely find a year off and get my not-as-adventurous partner bitten with the travel bug. or we'll have to take separate vacations! there are some places I'm not as interested in (China, for one), I think I'm mostly interested in places because of their cuisine or music (india, brazil, west africa)! However, travelling for a year is hard work.

I heard a wonderful program on a sunday npr about a family who took a year to go around the world (or maybe 2) in the 60s, the daughter put together all these tapes they'd made on teh trip. really fabulous. I treasure the months I've traveled more than almost anything, and I think it would not be that hard to make the sacrifice in my career (and cd collection..you miss out on a lot at home when you travel, at least, I did, pre-internet) to do it again...

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

If you're the child or grandchild of someone who emigrated from Ireland, you can get an Irish passport, which will, I believe, allow you to work anywhere in the European Community without the multiple hurdles Americans otherwise face.

(I've heard the same thing about children/grandchildren of Italians, but I'm not at all sure about that. I am quite sure about the Irish one.)

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

I love to travel, and have travelled extensively after flunking out of college, in 1979. I packed up my motorbike, and went off around the world, until a crash in northern India sent my bike to Honda Heaven. I was inspired by a British man who did the same thing in 1973 and wrote a book about it. On the way I was able to participate and observe aspects of life off the beaten track, as well as playing tourist in the bigger centres. Growing up in a rural area in Canada,this enabled me to find work on farms in Europe for a couple of weeks to replenish the coffers, as I knew the basics of farming, and most farmers are not too fussy about work permits etc.

Now that I am older, I have accumalated things, like car payments, a mortgage etc. and my trips are reduced to 2 or 3 week wanderings about the North American Continent.

I still have itchy feet, a hankering to see what is around the next corner or over the hill. Now, its just that the corner is a lot closer than it used to be.

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

I've been moving around within the US and outside of it since I was less than year old.

I've lived in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Washington DC and Virginia and now San Francisco.

I've also lived in France, Belgium and Switzerland.

I've travelled all over Europe.

I often suffer from a sense of homelessness and rootlessness -- a feeling that I don't quite belong, even in my "home" country.

At the same time, I still have itchy feet -- I long to see Africa, East Asia and Australia, to visit Antartica ... to get to know my home planet better.

A lot of my journal is about both that struggle to feel at home, and that continuing desire to see it all.

I honestly can't imagine living anywhere longer than 4 years or so -- because it's outside the realm of my personal experience.

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000

No, but I would love to! World travel *and* travel around the US. I've often dreamed of getting a pickup truck and a tent, and driving all over the country, national park to state park to chili festival to Fourth of July fireworks to blues festival....mmmm.

What holds me back? Money, mostly, and a couple of pets who detest travelling. (Actually, my dog would go if we could walk!)

Just this morning I was looking at a National Geographic photo spread of Bryce Canyon, in Utah, practically drooling on myself. *sigh*

-- Anonymous, May 04, 2000