fifteen: travelers in transit

Oops.. it has definitely been a while since I've touched this blog, but since it's summer and I have four weeks left of complete freedom I can do some catch up. So between grad and now I've been keeping busy with some travels which brings me to a group of people I always find very memorable. The random people I meet while getting to my travel destiatnions... for some reason so many of them tend to be interesting and make my trip seem more complete. Especially on those boring domestic flights where the destination is all I have in mind. Yet, I often find myself sitting beside people that won't allow me to just plug in my earphones and fall asleep.

For example, there was the very nice lady from London, England whose connecting flight was delayed and had just spent the past 24 hours in transit and in airports. She was quite frumpy and her breathe was quite bad, but she was still chipper enough to make pleasant conversation. Or the two sisters from Alberta buying the latest entertainment fodder with the last of their money to make the 16 hr flight to Vancouver slightly more bearable. There was also the cute grad student from small town Manitoba making his way to the big city, who was a bit homesick. Other times it's retirees returning to their permanent vacation home, trying to sell me on how great Phuket is because the side they see is the gated community surrounded by pristine beaches and golf courses. Once there was a nice old man who exhausted his kleenex pack on me as I couldn't stop missing home only minutes after leaving. Then there were the business travelers rushing off the plane to continue on to work, but not after giving me their card in case I ever needed anything from them. I could continue listing the brief snipets of the people I remember from airports and planes, but that doesn't really explain how they impact me as a person.

Of course, to me all these people to me are only mere slivers of who they really are, but everytime I enter an airport and I get the feeling of how insignificant I am. Outside of my comfort zone where a day never goes by without a familiar face, a warm smile, or a friendly touch, I am allowed to observe how people act when they are in a place where no one really knows them. It reminds me of how the world can be simultataniously big and small, and how humans all have this need to connect. I don't know when society decided that reaching out to someone can be considered rude, unwanted, or creepy, but a geninue courteous interaction makes me think about others instead of single mindedly heading towards my destination. Honestly, I don't want to be the one who gets left behind in a fire because my music is on to loud and I'm completely zoned out to the things around me.

It has been so nice to just slow down, turn off my blackberry, spend time with the people who are presently there with me. Sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong time, don't get me wrong I love technology for the most part, because it allows me to stay connected and keeps me entertained and has probably made me more productive, but it takes me away from where I often am. Traveling is about enjoying the moment, and travelers remind me of how I want to be more 'present' in my daily life.

I'm not even too sure what it means to live in the present, but I do know being without a phone was very refreshing. Meeting up with people the old fashioned way forced me to plan ahead and to be more considerate of the time of others. And I hope to practice that more in my day to day life here.