The Tragedy of Travel

I love being able to travel. Moving too.

I've been very lucky through my life. I've had the opportunity to experience living in numerous places and I've seen alot of amazing things. There's something about going to a new place that always gives me a thrill. When I'm merely passing through a place, I love being able to soak in the experiences and sights offered. When moving somewhere new, I just enjoy knowing that I'm embarking on something new, that in many ways I'm getting another chance to start over fresh.

However, there are also points about travel and moving that I dislike.

Some of them I downright hate.

Now there are little things that irk me like not being able to go back to places I enjoyed spending time in (the deserts of Jordan for instance) or not being able to continue old habits that I had become used to (such as going to the cafe "Silo" in Canberra on a regular basis). But really these things are minor inconviniences that can usually be substituted.

What cannot be subsituted are the people you meet.

This was hammered home to me very recently. I decided that coming back from India, I would stop over in Singapore to see some old friends and to spend some time with my parents who were travelling through there at the time. While there, I got to see some very special little friends of mine.
I was lucky enough to see little Tina and Magnus! These are two kids I used to babysit and look after when I lived in Singapore. They're starting to grow up now. I could hardly believe how big they had grown since I had last seen them!

Now, it was time for what would be the last goodbye for a very long time. Their family was moving away from Singapore. Who knows when I would see them again? The saddest part was that even when I do see them again, they won't be the way they are now. They'll be grown up, and much of these current cuteness will be gone.

It's a depressing thing to know that I won't get to see them grow up. I still remember when Magnus was a baby, I could hold him in both of my hands. Tina could hardly walk when I first met her. So saying goodbye to these two kids was incredibly difficult. It's the way alot of goodbyes are really....

But that's the way things are.