Alain de Botton – Marilyn R. Gardner

“If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest – in all its ardour and paradoxes – than our travels. They express, however inarticulately, an understanding of what life might be about outside of the constraints of work and of the struggle for survival” – Alain de Botton

In his best-selling book “The Art of Travel” Alain de Botton begins with a chapter on “Anticipation”. He tells of being in cold, dreary, England in the winter and receiving a brochure advertising an alluring picture of a beach; a resort with sunshine and cloudless sky. Palm trees beckon from the picture and he is caught up in the enticement. He promptly decides to go. From there with a true writer’s skill he crafts an image of everything it takes to get him from where he is to the inside of the brochure.

What is the image between brochures, skillfully created by marketers and actual arrival? It usually includes extra time at work in order to make sure we can take vacation, difficulty getting reservations, crowds at the airport, difficulty securing a cab on arrival, figuring out a budget and more. It’s the total opposite of the brochure. But it’s an important piece of the in between; all that happens between deciding to go on a trip and actually getting there.

His point? Anticipation never includes the mundane that is a part of wherever we travel. If it was, where would be the allure?

When we travel, we don’t anticipate “same”, we anticipate “different”, “exotic”, “unusual”. In his case his anticipation of the island of Barbados did not include waiting for his luggage in a crowded airport; seeing a large, ugly factory building on the way to the hotel; streets crowded with people who were nowhere to be seen in the advertisement. All he anticipated was the actual picture on the brochure, not everything that comes along with it. He goes on to tell of people who like the anticipation stage so much that they never actually go on the trip.

I remember preparing to go to Cairo a couple of years ago; my husband had gone on ahead and I was still in gloomy snow and the stress of single parenting. Along with that I was trying to make sure every detail was arranged before leaving. The anticipation of Cairo and thought of waking up in the warmth and sunshine kept me hanging on until the morning I was to leave. It was then that I burst into tears and promptly did what you are never supposed to do in a marriage: I wrote an email saying that I didn’t even want to go anymore; that it had been too much work; that it wasn’t even going to be fun after all it had taken me to prepare; and on and on and on I went, not willing to connect my brain to my keyboard.

As I got out of the taxi and stepped onto the courtyard of the beautiful Marriott Hotel in Zamalek, Cairo, all of that faded – it no longer mattered. What mattered is all that transpired was behind me and my ten days of Annie and Cairo were in front of me. I was in my brochure.

For me the anticipation stage is that critical piece of this thing we call travel. Nightly we look at those we love and say “In just 2 weeks, we’ll be at the beach!” “In just 12 days, we’ll be in Cairo!” “In just…..” and on it goes. The anticipation of the trip is what gets us through the gruel to the other side.

What do you think? Would travel be as meaningful without the anticipation process?

Book Review: The Art of Travel by Alain de Botton (secondphaseofmylife.wordpress.com)

This afternoon I will find myself, yet again, at an airport. As I browse in the airport bookstore, looking for that specific plane ride book that is neither too serious nor too trite and has just the right number of pages, I will think, as I have thought hundreds of times before, that I am a fortunate woman.

Being able to travel is one of life’s greatest gifts It simultaneously keeps one humbled and fully alive. And for me the gift and magic begin at the airport. Despite body scans (and sometimes stripping down to way less than I am comfortable wearing) to get through security the airport is a place where I don’t have to try. It’s where I can be fully comfortable “between worlds”. I sit and people watch without seeming intrusive, I grab that cinnamon roll that I would never be seen eating on a regular basis, best of all I dream of the future and recall past memories of places and people who are no longer a daily part of my life but hold significant value in my mind and existence.

Alain de Botton, a Swiss writer was hired by Heathrow Airport to spend a week at the airport and write about what he saw and experienced. The result: “A Week at the Airport” a thin book complete with humor and insight. I can think of many friends of mine as well as myself who have spent significant hours of our lives in airports – waiting for planes, trying to figure out a missed connection, stuck for hours from a cancelled flight, running to catch a plane, sprawled out on the floor of Heathrow trying to get some sleep and making friends with the many immigrants willing to work long hours for low pay to try to make it in their adopted country – and it begs the question: Why not us? Why did WE not think of asking for this assignment and writing this book?

But I am content that his is a job well-done and agree with the author’s words that “airports are the cultural centers of the modern world”. “They express all the things that make the modern world so strange and horrifying and beautiful and exciting. They’re all about interconnection. They’re about technology. They’re about our loss of contact with nature; they’re about consumerism and our dreams of travel. All of this comes to life at the airport.”

For those of us who live “between worlds” and who are most at home in the airport – this is perhaps “our” book!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112144272