This is my first time writing since I arrived “home” in Hilo, Hawaii.
This is the part of travel that many travel writers don’t discuss— the end, the interim between one dream chasing mission and another, the period of stasis interrupting adventures.
I personally do not deal with this period of time very well.
As a person who loves travel, trying new things, hearing many languages, meeting new people, and learning about architecture, art, history, and other cultures, living on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean is far, far less than ideal.
The place that I come from may appear to people passing through as a beautiful, small sea side town— but appearances come with a price. A fraction of the reality is this:
It has a terrible education system, a sky-high crime rate (for such a small place), is lacking in opportunities of any kind (good luck finding a good job or starting a career), has absolutely nothing to do, is “cheap” but still has a disproportionate cost of living, and is constantly hailed as a great place to live with literally no evidence of such a thing being true. So when you tell people that it is not the right place for you, they insist that maybe you are not trying hard enough to be happy or need to just “think more positively”.
That being said, I can honestly say that the threat of lava, hurricanes, and tsunamis is the least stressful thing about living here.
There is always a reality behind every place that you visit. There are always people living their every day lives there— working their jobs, tending to their families, and just trying to stay afloat. I think that many tourists tend to overlook this. There is no such thing as paradise.
One of the only things I appreciate about this place is that it taught me so much about how necessary it is to grow, how much I actually love my family (I never, ever would have come back if I didn’t), and how to conduct myself as a person in the world (mainly through examples of how NOT to be, as seen through locals and tourists here).
So here is to the travelers whose flight feathers have been temporarily plucked, those who need time to regrow their wings or refill their wallets.
I’m there with you.
My beloved ari,
I have to cry when reading this…I can feel it deep in my heart. Often I had this feelings and got angry and sad , when I saw, how they showed a perfect paradise to the tourists but behind this people dont have nothing and have a bad life while rich people in paradise…
And while they talking about, how much they were travelling, they never saw the truth. Thats not travelling.
I’m living in a place in Germany “where other people going for holidays”….cause it’s the biggest lake in Germany and it’s the warmest place and “a 4 country corner ” , so we have a lot of tuorists here. But most of them are living with the people here and not in big hotels . And you can stay here and find a job and you can start a carrer. A lot of people came here and settled down, cause they love it.