The merits of slow travel

Vagablogging :: Rolf Potts Vagabonding Blog

The struggle to slow down is one well known to many travelers, especially if our time in a given place is limited.  To take in the sights, to eat the notable local cuisine, to see the arts and hear the music – travel "to-do" lists can be inexhaustible and overwhelming (and pointless…).  So, as Lindsey Rue encouraged last week, slow down and enjoy the music.  Take your time.  Study the landscape, note the lines of convergence all around you, the architecture, the faces and clothing of the people on the streets, the nuances of the cultures and interactions before you.   Drink deeply and breath easily.

Sound simple enough?  It's often not.  It takes a conscious effort – one that can be alien to those out of practice.  But it's worth it…

Consider Van Gogh.  Aside from his slow descent into an all-encompassing depression, he's known for his vibrant post-impressionistic paintings of rural France.  Particularly his depictions of Olive groves and Cypress trees (Most notably "The Starry Night").   On paper, there is nothing about his work that smacks of brilliance, yet what ole Vinnie did better than anyone else at the time was slow down.  He saw, through his powerfully unique artistic eyes, the way the breeze teased the Cypress trees and how the light and form shaped the Olive groves.   Vincent, while not a notable traveler perhaps, is an excellent poster boy for slow travels, for taking things in slowly, revisiting the same scene over a day or week or months to broaden his understanding.  Through this he was able to possess the beauty he witnessed and capture the moment.  He took the ordinary and, through deliberate study and pain-staking art, made it extraordinary.

We can't all be Impressionist painters, but we can capture the moments that are happening all around us.  If, and when, you next find yourself in an outlandish location trying to avoid an embarrassing sequence of moments (from linguistic mishaps to cultural misunderstandings), stop as soon as the situation allows and recognize the scene, the setting, the light, the people.  Step back from whatever self-imposed, artificial pace you may have adopted and instead spend an afternoon on a park bench with a sketch book, a journal, a camera, or simply an open mind, and if you can accomplish this, you're tapping into the same perspective and approach to life that Van Gogh and other artists rely upon – to intimately know the world through slow and purposeful study.

Before I get off my soapbox, here's a reference point from my own travels – I snapped the accompanying photo while hurriedly rushing through NYC's Museum of Modern Arts in 2010 (8 hour lay-overs…love 'em, hate 'em or use 'em).  I rather like the shot.  It's doesn't fail or excel on any artistic level, but it does tells about a moment.  To most it's about a young man who is experiencing what is arguably Van Gogh's greatest work through his phone rather than through his eyes.  One could say that it speaks to the level of disconnection we have in today's society; of our inability to separate ourselves from technology.  I can't speak to that.  What I can say is that the moment the image speaks of to me is my own and that is a moment of loss.  I spent ~60 seconds watching him fumble the phone out of his pocket, waiting for the camera app to load, frame his shot and then take the picture (rinse, wash, repeat…).  I wasn't basking in the brilliance of Van Gogh's work at all, but was instead trying to capture another person's moment and not capitalize on my own.  Being in the city only on account of a layover, I was pressed for time, and after taking the shot didn't stop to truly revel in "The Starry Night". My mind had already turned to the setting sun, my bus connection back to JFK and the trans-Atlantic flight I was about to board.  So caught up in taking pictures and worrying about the logistics of my trip, I had lost the moment.

In our travels, we would do well to take a step back from anything resembling a hectic pace and go slow, for the experience is less about the going and more about the being.

Wishing you happy, and slow, travels.

Original article can be found here: The merits of slow travel