Something I’ve noticed is that, in general, Irish people are very well traveled. And they like to talk about it. As such, I’ve gotten some interesting pieces of advice about travel from people I’ve met here so far.
1. Pavel, adviser in DIT’s international office: Pavel actually decided to permanently move to Ireland because of an exchange program he did when he was in school (like the one I’m in now). He said ever since then, he was never satisfied staying in one place. He has since married a woman from France, and they live here with their two boys and one more on the way. Before they get too much older, he said, he wants to move some place else. It’s time to move on, he told us with a faraway look in his eyes. You are going to always have this urge to see more, he said. Pavel has a lot of friends that stayed behind in his native Prague, and they don’t understand his desire to just keep moving. His story reminded me how life changing these kinds of experiences can be.
2. Michael, DIT professor: Michael is a professor of mine at DIT. When we met, he told Taylor and I to look on discount travel websites like Ryanair, where prices to European destinations are often below 20 Euros, and to just buy the cheapest ticket, even if it’s someplace we’ve never heard of.
3. Richard, DIT professor: In the introduction to his Studies in Documentary class, Richard ran through a brief history of documentaries as we know them. Early documentaries showed brief snippets of places far away. In time when people were rarely able to make it even to the next town over in their lifetimes, these pictures were undoubtedly amazing. Obviously in the modern world, such pictures wouldn’t have quite the same effect. We have Rick Steves, Planet Earth and National Geographic that make it their jobs to show audiences what it’s like in every corner of the earth. Paris, New York and Beijing are recreated for us daily in newscasts, guidebooks and movies. Diminished is the sense of surprise and adventure that once accompanied world travelers. We have, in a sense, seen the places we travel to well before we even get there. So, Richard’s advice to us was to go places without guidebooks or maps in attempt to fight this phenomenon. That feeling of adventure and exploring is one to seek out and treasure.
Abby Eisenberg 