Travel has made me a better communicator.
Travel has allowed me to be a lot more patient.
Travel.
Travel has completely changed my life.
I have found that I have a hard time making my own decisions especially the final decision.
I am constantly asking people around me for their opinions or just to make my decisions
for me.
I find that when I travel, especially by myself, I have to make my own decisions.
There is no one else around me to make those decisions for me.
I'm forced to do it.
This has really helped me to grow and it has also helped me to learn a lot more about my
likes and my dislikes.
Travel has made me a better communicator.
Not just learning lingo and languages from all over the world but it gives me more to
talk about when I meet people.
Everyone has a Heritage.
Everyone comes from somewhere.
When I meet somebody from Spain, even if I am traveling in Germany, I have been to Spain.
I can now talk to them more about their country having been there myself.
I think travel has changed me in a lot of ways.
I am definitely more independent and as funny as it might be to say, I think I am a lot
smarter.
I know a lot more and maybe I care a lot more about the world and the events that are happening
because of travel.
It has increased my desire to meet new people and to go and see all kinds of amazing, awesome
things.
Travel is one of those things that transforms people and you become a more developed and
well rounded person just by the experiences that you have.
For me, I have realized that travel has changed me in the way that anything I have done has
been a result of going out and making it happen.
Nothing is going to be given to you but the more you put yourself out there, the more
uncomfortable you are willing to be, the more amazing the experience almost every single
time.
I think travel has changed me in a variety of ways.
The two most important are: I have a greater sense of empathy.
When we travel and we go to different places, you can see how the culture is and how it
is different and how people interact with each other and for me, when we see people
back home in the States that are maybe new or just moves or have immigrated, you have
a greater appreciation for what they are going through and you can relate.
Well the first time that I really started a big trip, I went to Australia when I was
19 and it was like a world opening.
We were with two friends and we traveled around the whole continent and it was so amazing
not having an end goal but just the experience of traveling and meeting new people and learning
new languages.
It was just mind blowing and it completely opened me up as a person.
Travel has allowed me to be a lot more patient with life in general because you deal with
a lot of situations where you are having to wait for stuff or stuff goes wrong or things
are not working out as planned and you are dealing with transportation getting to and
from places.
Having patience and learning that while time is valuable you also need to just relax and
let time go and not get so frustrated or upset or stressed out about the little things that
are happening because in all reality, they are just little things.
Sort of without even knowing it, travel has given me the most comprehensive education
I could have ever received and it occurred to me recently as we were looking at a map
of Leipzig and I saw the highway around the old town and I was like well obviously that
is where the city wall used to be.
The fact that that is just common knowledge that pops into my head now is amazing.
I think that travel just starts to fill in the gaps of knowledge and you start to see
how everything is connected once you see all the differences and similarities of various
cultures.
When you listen to me talk I sound American or Canadian.
I'm actually Czech through and through.
I happened to move abroad when I was 13 years old and went to an international school and
I ended up sounding like this.
I actually speak 4 languages now.
I have lived in 5 cities and I'm 23 so yeah.
It's been quite a game changer.
I remember my first trip to Latin America and I remember having to catch a bus and the
bus was supposed to leave at about 10:30am.
So I got there at 10:20, had my bags packed, my tickets printed, all these things and I
get there at 10:20.
Then it was 10:30.
Then it was 10:45 and I thought I had missed it.
People were not around and I was trying to find out what was going on.
I found someone who spoke English and they were like oh no, the bus leaves at 10:30...
or 11:15.
No one really knows.
We are waiting for the cook.
He was supposed to be here with his four chickens.
He's not here.
We're going to wait for him.
And that shook up my world because we live in a world that is very highly organized and
sometimes we get thrown off by small little things like that.
When things do not arrive on time, when things do not work out our way.
What travel teaches you are that when things don't work out how they are planned, it is
usually fine.
You can take that lesson back to real life and that is actually quite valuable.
Flexibility, tolerance, and patience are very underrated in this world and those are all
skills that travel teaches you.
Overall, I would say travel made me a happier person.
As someone who grew up in Germany, which is quite the perfect place, everything works
here and you can get a job really easy and we have a good running economy, you get locked
up into this everyday life really quickly.
You start worrying about small issues and if you go out there and you see how this world
actually works and the problems that are out there, you start appreciating little things
and you become a happier person.
Well I'm an introvert so... people scare me.
When you go and travel you are forced into social situations and just being immersed
in people and different languages and stuff, you have to communicate with them to get around.
You are forced to actually acclimatize into societies and all these different things and
I think that helped me a lot to become more adventurous and more confident around people.
When I first started to travel I wasn't really afraid of the unknown or of the places I went
to but to be all by myself and to have to handle myself out there, yeah.
Travel changed that and made me feel confortable with myself more and more.
Travel changes you.
It changes your way of seeing the world.
It gives you a perspective that you did not have before and it allows you to connect with
people that you never knew existed.
The way it changed me personally is that, when I traveled on a motorcycle around the
world, I got to meet the local people that have never seen a tourist before.
People that have never experienced another culture before.
So when I was able to basically see how people were living and surviving in different parts
of the world, it was very uniquely enriching to myself for myself to realize how difficult
the world is for a lot of people and the best thing I could do was provide a different perspective
and experience and spend a little time with them.
They say travel makes you more of what you are but I think travel makes you more of what
you are not.
If you're introverted, you are going to have to get out of your shell.
You are going to have to expand your comfort zone and do things that you are not used to.
If you are really extroverted, you are also going to have to get used to spending some
time alone.
So over the past 7 years, I have found, as an extrovert, it has made me a little more
introverted.
So now I am more balanced and that is a good thing.