Travel Thoughts

Sitting on the plane from Seoul to Manila, I type in Microsoft Word and will upload this later to Blogger.  It's my 4th flight in just a few days, but I'm holding up pretty well.  Induced by travel, my head is full of thoughts that range from the deep to the shallow.

As I rode on the airport shuttle this morning from the Best Western back to Incheon airport, I was thinking about the word foreign.  Though simple in definition, its connotation can be strong.  Latin America and Europe do not feel foreign to me.  They may feel different, but not foreign or completely new.  Some places even feel familiar like I belong there.  It’s my first time in Asia, and it truly does feel foreign.  It’s not just that I don’t understand any of the words around me—I can’t even read any of the characters.  I see only one other Westerner in the giant Seoul airport this morning, and that surprises me and increases this foreign feeling.

But then, there are also the parts of travel that make the world seem smaller…like the friendly Filipino couple who sit next to me on the plane and live in Lakeland, FL, or the way all children are similar no matter their language or culture.  There is the universal comfort of things like a hot shower and a Starbucks chai latte, which tastes the same from Zacatecas to Seoul. 

I am also fascinated by the way that the language part of our brain works.  I have already found myself wanting to speak Spanish to the people around me, or translating a question in my head that I need to ask an employee.  It’s my natural instinct – if the people around me aren’t speaking English, my mind assumes it should speak Spanish.  I don’t know what it is like for people who speak multiple foreign languages, but I would imagine whichever secondary language they learned first is the most ingrained in them and their “default” mode.

Enough travel reflections for now, I’m going to watch a TV episode on my computer. :)