Last Friday of the month, 25 of October, 14 members of the Discussion Group talked about travelling.
Felicity led the topic which was not as simple and easy as it appeared. The general view normally is that travelling broadens the mind and helps us better understand people living in foreign countries.
But during our discussion, it appeared that might not be the case.
One of the first comments was that a lot depends on what type of travelling you are doing; business travel, holidays because people are tired and need rest, a trip to say, India, to learn about the country and its culture or students visiting different countries for a year working so simply ‘backpacking’.
A few comments were about frequent travellers who in the main are sufficiently wealthy people, who can afford it, like it and because they feel good about it themselves.
In general people from the rich West are visiting so-called “third world” countries but we don’t see many travellers from those “third world” countries visiting Europe or America for pleasure.
Other critical comments were especially addressed to cruises. Big ships or smaller luxury ships and boats come to different ports and bring crowds of people, damaging locations where they stop, for example, Venice. Such travelling is related mainly to food, entertainment and comfort and is not designed to broaden the mind or improve the worldview of the traveller.
It looks like today travelling is just one more form of entertainment and consumption without any significant benefit impact on the mind.
We had a few different opinions as well. One of them was that it is possible to travel on a budget and enjoy travelling, that it is a good way to see things from a different angle and even to help children or young students by arranging contacts for studies abroad or by some other ways.
Besides, a lot of countries heavily depend on tourism which brings them a significant amount of income. They developed infrastructure to attract tourists. In our modern world, when travelling is available for many people, it is just another industry which like all the other industries has an impact on the environment and nature. It has nothing to do with broadening travellers’ world view or their minds.
We agreed that for travelling to broaden the mind a person should consciously choose to learn about the country they are visiting, which is not easy if they have insufficient or none-at-all language knowledge. Students, probably have a better chance to understand new cultures, learn customs and even make friends because visits and work in different places definitely give such opportunities.
