Life as a traveler is beautiful. The things you see and learn and the people you meet... it's hard to describe, if you have never traveled. Your mind has to open up, if you want to enjoy the ride, otherwise you just keep comparing what you see and do to what you already know and can't appreciate the fact, that although something is different it can also be good, especially when it comes to people. Because everyone has a different cultural socialization, not only depending on where they or their parents come from but on many different factors.
I think for a lot of travelers this is a natural process and they end up with friends from all over the world. And just by hanging out with people from other countries you can learn so much about the culture and the history of other countries. These are the kind of lessons no book, no teacher, no school could ever teach you.
And with some of these people you become really good friends. You travel with them for a while or share a dorm, you meet them at the kitchen table of your new hostel or the pub crawl and meet up again the next day or you might have surfed their couch or you're both working at the same shitty bar, because you ran out of money. No matter how you've met and how long you've known each other but with some of them you click in a beautiful way that makes you smile just thinking about them. It doesn't even have to be in a romantic way. You just love hanging out with them and getting to know them. And you become friends, like the best of friends. Friends you never ever would have met, if hadn't gotten on that plane and left home to go on an adventure. And for a while these new friends are part of that adventure.
But since you, maybe even both of you are on the road it means that you will part eventually. It's just the way it is as a backpacker. You move on, to see new exiting places and meet new people. And you have to say goodbye to the people you've met. Sometimes that part seems to be hardest when you're traveling. You wish you could just shove your new friends in your backpack and take them with you but the only way you will be able to stay in contact with them is through the internet. I hate to say it, but thank god for Facebook. Over time you lose contact to them. Their faces become blurrier in your mind and the moments you've shared are not as clear in your memories as they once were, eventually you even forget some of those people.
But a few of these friendships and relationships might last. I know a few people that have met at one hostel or another and they are still friends, still talk online, skype a lot and visit each other every now and then, even though they are continents apart. I know people that have become lovers, are still together and even might get married and have children one day - or already have. Some of these people are from the same country, some are from different continents, but somehow they have found a connection despite all differences... they would have never met, if they hadn't been traveling.
There are a lot of people I have met along the way and had to say goodbye to over the years and there will be many more. Sometimes it is brutal, because they've really become loved ones. And I wonder what they are up to now and if I will ever see them again, if they ever think of me...
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