Final Thoughts

I really enjoyed this class, as I thought I would before selecting it. This class was not for any academic or requirement filling purpose. It was a last ditch attempt to take some interesting classes before I graduate this May. Being in Stern I have not had the opportunity to take many interesting or engaging classes. The reason I knew this class would be interesting is because the subject matter is so fascinating. Travel is an integral and often confounding part of life. There is this innate desire within most people to travel. What I like to call, “the grass is always greener on the other side” attitude is very prevalent among all of us. There are so many different possible motives for travel: monetary, social, professional, discovery and so on. Some of the greatest and most memorable movies are the so called “road trip” movies. Where the main character and usually a couple of friends hop in a car and head off. Sometimes there is a defined goal, get white castle burgers at any cost; sometimes it is more loosely defined, find something better than their current situation. There is something within us that is drawn to and can relate to this type of movie. While studying the readings, I tried to understand them from the point of view of these philosophical questions. Why did Columbus devote his life to discovering other lands? Why did Ibn Batuttu decide to leave his small town for a life of travel without any resources or friends to travel with? Sometimes these answers were pretty clear and straight forward, other times not so much. However, overall reading these works and the discussion of them helped me to come to a somewhat better understanding of travel and the reasons behind it. It seems to me from time to time we all feel that need to escape and have a natural curiosity for what else there is in the world. As we mature from childhood to adulthood we begin to question what we know and want to know more about what we don’t know. There is an intense desire to learn more about the world and understand where other cultures are coming from. I think most of us agree that this can be done in only a very limited way through a textbook. This is why so many of us turn to travel. Just as we begin to open up to travel as we enter college age, we begin to turn away from it as we get older and the realities of life set in. Jobs, families and other responsibilities happen. This makes it harder and harder to travel as one gets older. That’s why I hope to do the after graduation obligatory one month of travel this summer with a few friends. I know I will be thinking of some of these works as I embark on my travels, so for this I am glad I took this class.