How to Travel
It doesn't matter where you go. (I’m not going to mention any countries because that would make this post sound like ChatGPT.) Just go look at something different for a few days. Scout some locations where you might want to be reborn in your next life. Enjoy the nirvana of struggling to find and then finding the right power adapter. Drink local booze on the street right out of the bottle (in many countries that aren’t the U.S., you are allowed to do this). Join a protest if you see one.
You should do a lot when you go on a trip, but also not too much. Don’t worry about waking up at an ambitious time in a new city. You can sleep until noon in a cloud of a hotel bed and still have the next eight hours to see some things of interest, then eat and drink too much, and then go back to sleep.
For the love of God, do not wait for retirement. Old people are supposed to have money and free time, so their trips aren’t impressive. But if you take a trip while you’re young, that’s very sexy and interesting. Unless your parents paid for it.
Don’t wait for the holidays. Travel at random, off-peak times. Embrace the anarchy of awkwardly timed leaves that inconvenience your boss and coworkers.
But don’t travel too often. You don’t want to build up a tolerance—it is very possible to go to wonderful, exotic places and not appreciate them. Force yourself to sit at home for three or four months until you’re consumed with skullcrushing boredom and it suddenly horrifies you to realize your life is burning away. Then you’re good to go. You should want it so bad that your teeth should be itching as you buy tickets.
Travel, but just don’t make it your whole personality. If “I’ve been places” is your whole thing, people kind of tune you out after a while. And know that if you’re boring, travel won’t fix that; we all know boring people who went on hair-raising expeditions and came back still boring.
And you should probably go soon, before AI takes your job and you don’t have enough money to do anything. Enjoy the unimpeachable luxury of traveling out of respect for your ancestors who never got to. You’re alive, act like it.
Forbidden City, 2007. If you ever wonder how comfortable it is to walk around Beijing in flip-flops and a swimsuit all day, it’s not.
