If you have never traveled internationally before, the idea of doing can seem daunting. Travel in any form is stressful at times, but once you successfully reach your destination, you are free to have fun and make your trip something truly special. International travel, should you choose to try it, can be a highly rewarding experience, and there are so many ways in which your journey can stay with you forever.
While reading books or surfing the web can teach you a lot about the world, visiting foreign lands allows you to connect with them more deeply. By taking a guided tour around a city or visiting a museum, you can learn a place’s history from its own people, see what history has left behind, and contemplate about how remnants of the past fit in with the present. You can marvel over how ancient artifacts, like Bronze Age cookware, and historical monuments, like statues of revolutionary leaders, survived to the present and feel a greater appreciation for the journeys these artifacts took before being preserved behind glass. The best photographs of remarkable works of art and architecture, like the David statue in Florence, Italy, or the ruins of a medieval castle, can never compare to seeing these beautiful structures with your own eyes.
Traveling internationally also gives you the opportunity to participate in authentic cultural experiences, like watching a traditional dance performance or trying the authentic local cuisine. You can also have interactive, educational, breathtaking, and heartwarming experiences unique to each place you explore, such as feeding and petting the friendly deer in Nara Prefecture in Japan, baking delicious soda bread on an Irish farm, or witnessing the construction of Spain’s Basílica de la Sagrada Família in real time.
Exploring other cultures doesn’t stop at the culture of the place you are in, though. Many countries are multinational states with high immigrant populations, making them cultural melting pots. It’s not uncommon to find a Greek restaurant in Ireland, a Turkish restaurant in the Netherlands or an Indian restaurant in the United States. Additionally, if you happen to be close enough to the border between two countries, you can spend a day in a neighboring nation on the same trip, even if most of your time is primarily spent in one place.
Another wonderful part of international travel is meeting people. Studying abroad is a fantastic way to make new friends, not just from the country in which you are studying, but from all over the world. When you’re on a guided tour, a good tour guide can be the highlight of the day, educating you with fun facts and entertaining you with jokes throughout the tour. Whether your tour guide is warm and soft-spoken, calm and collected, loud and theatrical, or delightfully deadpan, a passionate and dedicated one can make your trip extra memorable.
In addition to enjoying the sights, eating the food, and meeting the people, international travel is a major opportunity to learn how foreign countries function, struggle, and thrive as a society. Every place has its own strengths, weaknesses, and history dealing with various issues. For example, if you come from a country with high pollution and visit a country with cleaner cities, you can acknowledge that your country needs improvement but feel hopeful knowing that it can be done. Countries can learn a lot from each other and benefit from doing so.
Lastly, when you travel internationally, you may notice that the tourists in the place you are visiting come from all over the world, showing how connected and curious people are. Don’t be surprised to be in a museum tour group with people from multiple continents speaking several languages, all bonded by the fact that they love exploring the rest of the world and learning about its diverse collection of histories and cultures.
So, if you are ever able to travel internationally, doing so can positively impact your life in various ways. With every mile you travel, your perspective on the world shifts, leaving you with special memories to cherish for the rest of your life.
