The first self reflection

The first leg of the journey is over and I’ve reached my temporary final destination in Beijing. Now it’s time to change travelling buddies, destination, climate and language. At least for this trip the currency, time zone and way of travelling will still remain the same. Next stop: Tibet, Mt. Kailash and Mt. Everest. For three weeks we’ll be trekking thru Tibet and the Himalayas. I don’t know what to expect apart from cold weather, a tense history as well as present, a hidden non-recognized culture, sore muscles, hard hikes and loads of fun. I can’t wait to be on the top of the world!

Looking back on the first couple of weeks of my trip, I’m somewhat amazed about how much you can learn about yourself in such a short period of time. I bet by the time I get home I’ll probably rediscovered a whole new me… So far it’s not the grand revelations, but more so small things that I never had to actually encounter to rethink.

First of all I’ve finally admitted to myself that I’m not a big city person who likes running from one tourist attraction to the next. In most of the larger cities we’ve visited so far, there’s been a time limit on how long we have to do the “mandatory” tourist sites. From one museum to the other, then a building that played an important role some time ago in the country’s history, before you head off to one of the three wonderful cathedrals the city rightfully can brag about. I had to get to Beijing before I actually looked in the mirror and asked the question: “why?” I’ve thought a lot about it and come to the conclusion that travelling thru certain cities comes with an expectancy of things you are suppose to do. You can’t go to Paris without seeing the Eiffel Tower, New York without Times Square, Kuala Lumpur without the Twin Towers, Beijing without the Great Wall, etc. These “rules” have been made up along the way and have become huge income sources for both private and state driven corporations. It’s amazing how much you can milk a tourist attraction like the Great Wall; there is no end to it! Today’s society created this monster called need-to-see-places, and if you don’t do what is unconsciously expected of you, you’ll be the odd one out who gets all the “whats” and “whys”, which one of course have to answer over and over again. I won’t deny that I wouldn’t be without the wonderful experience we had at the Great Wall (both times), but when reflecting around the reasons I do these things in the first place, I strongly dislike concluding that my to-do-tourist-o’meter is on autopilot. I started to dread coming to a new city where there were more to-dos, but it only took me a few second thoughts before I had a chuckle and decided to be both a sheep in the herd and the odd one out. I figure it’s a doable combination.

Second of all I’ve experienced how affected I get by being around grumpy and ppl who lack the ability to smile. The transition from Russia to Mongolia was enormous, and in fear of turning into a cliché, it truly was night and day. After about 10 days in Russia where smiling, not to mention laughing, I believe is prohibited, coming to Mongolia where you were greeted with a smile and a friendly face seemed like you had died and gone to heaven. The level of service and friendliness I experienced in Russia was next to nothing. If you politely asked them something in English with a spasiba added to it, they’d give you the famous sigh and a reply in Russian. Another example would be if you only had big bills to pay a smaller sum. Once again the sigh was to be expected. Turns out Russia isn’t all that interested in tourism and their way of thinking seems to be that we’re lucky to have them as opposed to they’re lucky to have us. This we encountered numerous times while working our way thru Russia, not to mention the restaurant cart at the Trans-Siberian which eventually turned into a farce. In order to underline how extremely non-tourist friendly it is, let me mention that there is no tourist office in Moscow (!). Honestly, we all agreed that Russian politeness is an oxymoron. I tried to ignore the feeling of not being welcomed and just go with it for the most of the time, but I didn’t understand how much it had affected me before I got to UB. It felt like waking up to life again after feeling suppressed and uncomfortable – which had become the natural state – and coming to understand how much impact a smile, friendliness and a kind word really have on me.

First lessons have been learned, and meeting and greeting ppl all along the way will most likely put me into quite a few situations where self reflection is inevitable and almost required. As long as there’s a smile along the way, I know I’ll do fine.