Myself and my 2 sisters at the farm in Ohio
Travelling as a family when I was younger is drastically different to what I know of travel now. We never travelled outside of North America. Every summer we drove to the family farm in Ohio (from Toronto) and we would sometimes go to Canadian cities like Montreal or Vancouver if my Dad had business there. Lastly, my parents like to golf so they would find cheap flights to Orlando or Sarasota during our cold Canadian winters.
Farmhouse, Ohio – USA
Our trips often consisted of myself and my two older sisters fighting. We would see a museum or two, eat at fancy restaurants and stay in swanky hotels – where we would swim and ride the elevator up and down all day . These trips seemed far more stressful, even though everything was far more organized. Not to mention that 90% of the time we went on vacation it rained. I think my family is cursed.
Orlando, Florida
In many ways travel has changed for me:
- I drink a lot more beer than I did when I was 12
- I move slowly. Stress is low
- I no longer have to be forced to take an afternoon nap
- Swimming pools? I’m lucky if I get hot water in the shower!
- There are no girls fighting me over who gets to press the elevator button or pulling my hair
- Street food is a perfectly acceptable meal
- No one buys me stuff when I’m in a tourist store and say “I like this lots”
- I rarely go to museums
- Culture shock in Asia is different than culture shock at Disney Land (or should I say ‘culture ROCK’ in D-Land? Hur, hur)
Alas, there are still similarities:
- I have to share a room with people that annoy me
- If I pout, and ask politely, I can usually get a window seat on a plane
- My discman may have morphed into an ipod, but I still listen to music the whole time
- I have to tell my parents where I am
- I forget to pack things
- I loose much of the things I remembered to pack
- Everything is so different than it is at home