SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL

My love for travelling, exploring new places of interest, making discoveries in cultures has always been a passion  many are yet to experience. I have been to several tourist sites across the country yet on each other visit, I discover something different. A newness, which was not there on my last visit though sometimes hidden but others times is displayed boldly. From meeting people, food, music, the drive and the sheer abundance of life unending, displayed in its grandiose elegance, in bold fresh green or brown and the majesty with which the mountains stand, it peak shattering the icy clouds and winking at the vast blue skies is nothing short of breathtaking.

 

Tourism affords all of these for little. The closest we get to nature, the wider our understanding of what life has to offer. The closest we get to history, the better our views and fondness of the distant and immediate past. With these we make informed decisions about the future. A future that presents what it has to offer because of what it has been given.

 

So, when next you travel, look out for the subtleties which make you want to come back. They are your money and times worth.  

WE WILL TRAVEL AGAIN

The fufu at Amonokrom close to the washing bay is nothing like I have ever experienced. Soft and smoothly round. Its lays gorgeously in an “ayiwa” or “asanka”- some call it earthen ware. The anglisization of it does not effect any change in my murmuring stomach.

 I have to eat. This looks like something I can without much effort finish in minutes.  A grin running from one ear to the other inhabits my face. I’m not a glutton but the thought of food -good food gives me a sudden rush of warm blood in my face. If I were white, I would have looked pink because of food. So, food makes me jittery. I present my “asanka” for garnishing, from the hugh aluminium sauce pan came the best home away from made light soup inundated with assorted meat and fish. Meat? NO!. Fish? Plenty.

I scooped half a spoon full of freshly grounded mixture of onions, garlic and ginger onto the fufu.

Lunch is served. I carried my load with grace to the low placed kitchen table and stool under a tree whose fruits I don’t know because there was none. I cared less. i had not driven all the way to pick fruits.

With my fore finger running through the soup, a piece of piece slid into the soup painting a picture of an island far away from civilization where its inhabitants could run around not bothering who was watching. The taste in my mouth and temperature in my mouth was electrifying. Underneath this electrification was an everlastingly refreshing taste of ginger, onion and garlic all at once. An assurance of having my monies and time’s worth. Morsel after morsel, with my head slightly bowed and a back contorted into an arch, I swallowed, chewed, sucked and licked off every bit of fish and every stagnant pool of soup.

Sitting quietly under the tree sipping from a medium sized calabash of fresh palm wine, life couldn’t have been any better for me.

 Covid -19  has affected us great deal but what it cannot do is stop us from enjoying the little pleasures of our short lives. Covid-19 will continue to wreck havoc , devastating the very core of our existence but one thing is certain…

＃WEWILLTRAVELAGAIN

 

THE TRANSFORMATIONAL POWER OF TRAVEL

Traveling genuinely pushes you out of your comfort zone and sets you in an environment challenging enough yet brings some innate sense of pride and joy in you. The freedom of movement that comes along with traveling fuels your desire to explore and discover new things.

 

In the recent development regarding the Covid-19 pandemic around the world, it has halted the movement of people. According to travel advisers, adventure traveling is one way to lead the industry recovery. The Travel and tourism industry has played a vital role in allowing individuals to travel and explore the world. The pandemic was an unexpected hit or turn off an event that leads to reducing business and services rendered by the industry.

 

None the less, the growth in adventure travel was in place way before the pandemic. That growth was formed because of people wanting to leave their homes to do something fun aside from being confined in their homes (i.e taking mini trips to safaris, going to remote places and sleeping in little tents, hunting their food/kills, hiking, etc)

 

To conclude, the transformational power of travel balls down to the why and the merit people derived from traveling. Through traveling, people challenged themselves, experienced something unfamiliar and left with new skills or knowledge, got in touch with themselves and appreciated life, and most importantly built and strengthened their relationships with friends and family.