The digitalization of travellers
I’ve posted before about the fact that technology getting into the world of backpackers (see ‘Home is just an internet cafe away‘). I find it a fascinating subject really. I’ve just come to realize this: I AM THE embodiment of the digital traveller - or close to it anyway. During my first travels I had a rickety old walkman with two or three tapes, and a camera that was as simple as it could get. I am now armed with an MP3-player and a digital camera. Instead of writing letters, I have set up this online travelblog. I booked my flight via the internet and have an E-ticket which will carry me there. I digitally booked my hostel in advance for the first few nights in Mexico City… and the entire list is bigger, much bigger.
And the funny thing is: it all seems so normal to me right now. It kind of makes you wonder what travelling was like before the technological boom. Take Jack Kerouac. He had nothing, he just went and did and experienced and wrote (hooweee - did he write!). Somehow travelling in the Beat days seems more real & rough. Physical distances had so much more meaning. On the other hand, I’m also completely convinced that people still have the choice to travel as Beat as they like. The perfect example is Tom Thumb, an English bloke who travelled from England to India on a budget of well.. nothing.
He’s written an absolutely fascinating book about all his experiences, which is digitally available on his website. As a little appetizer, here’s the first paragraph of the first chapter of his book called ‘Hand to Mouth to India’:
“I walked out one midsummer’s morning to hitchhike to India with no money at all. I had with me my clarinet, a sleeping bag, a ticket for the boat to France and a couple of loaves of date bread so as to be sure of not starving to death within the first day or two. I paused beneath a giant billboard poster of Tony Blair smooching the street with his smarmy, sinister smile and then walked on to exchange grey cities for palm tree beaches, politicians for snake charmers. A stranger in my hometown, I walked down to the coastal road with little but my freedom on my back.”
The entire book can be found at http://www.tomthumb.org/travelbooks.shtml
James
