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4 May 2005
American softies
Traveling wimps
By Terry Riley
I’m happy that our government here in the good ol’ U. S. of A. looks out
for us by requiring businesses to comply with certain safety standards.
You know, "promote the general welfare" and all that. For the most part,
these requirements help us go about our daily lives and our travels
without having to worry about airplanes colliding, bridges collapsing, or
rats—or at least too many rat parts—in our food.
But
there is a problem that is caused by these rules: They soften us up. They
assign our safety and security to be the responsibility of others. They
eat away at our self-reliance. They allow us to develop no accountability
for our own welfare. And the only time we exercise initiative related to
personal responsibility is when flipping through the Yellow Pages in
search of a virulent lawyer to represent us in suing some poor schmuck who
was not in compliance with a particular ordinance.
Indeed, many Yankees are so affected by our tightly reigned society that
when they travel to countries with fewer safety regulations or they visit
nations where safety codes go unenforced, they become traveling wimps. The
moment they step from their tidy airliner compartments onto the wobbly
stairs in St. Somewhere, many American softies become completely
discombobulated with the reality of having to watch out for themselves.
And many of those tourists can hardly wait for their trips to end so they can
reenter the security of that aluminum tube.
In a strange way, however, it is precisely this lack of requirements to protect us from who-knows-what that is part of the
adventure of traveling. And sometimes it’s even part of the charm. Let me
offer some examples.
Streets: I’ve walked on miles of foreign sidewalks, many with gaps unexpectedly
appearing in the concrete that were large enough to swallow pedestrians
whole. I’ve moved along avenues with no barriers to keep me from tumbling
into traffic or from falling from rather precipitous heights. I survived
these streets, and when I arrived at my destinations, I was often greeted
with warm smiles and cold beer.
Hotels: I’ve stayed in local hotels so poorly lighted that I needed
a flashlight to find my way down the hallways at night. And forget about
reading in the rooms—fifteen watts of illumination was barely enough to
see my way to the john at night. But the vistas provided from some of the balconies of these same
properties have been more dramatic than any franchised hotel in town.
Restaurants: I’ve not often seen automatic dishwashers or cooks in
hairnets at local cantinas. And stray dogs and cats, not to mention
monkeys and iguanas, roaming the floor and sometimes the tables would
freak out Western health inspectors. I've lived to
tell about dining in these establishments, and I’ve experienced some of
the most delicious food to be found anywhere in the vicinity.
Too bad for American softies who ride in air-conditioned tour buses,
sleep in look-alike McHotels, and eat in sparkling restaurants. They’ll
miss out on the genuine adventure of travel. The rest of us? We’ll
survive, and we’ll often—not always, but often—have more enjoyable and
rewarding travel experiences.
© 2005 Applied Psychology
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