Travel

 WORDS

Transfixed

Suitors

When Ulysses set out from lthaca it was the beginning , maybe , of the travel book . What is that ? Well it’s about  one thing . If you can’t travel the next best thing is to read about it . 

The story of Ulysses is a great one and l remember l was transfixed by this story as a kid . I liked this story more than anything as a kid and especially liked the end when he settles accounts with the suitors of Penelope . 

The thing about human beings and also many animals is that travel is the food of the soul. Why ? Because every day we are in robotic mode , we move through life seeing the same things doing the same things but suddenly we do something that means we see things with new eyes and it’s called travel . Suddenly the world becomes beautiful and interesting .

What kind of travel is there . First of all they say travel was created by  British aristocrats .Going on what they called the grand tour taking in Switzerland , France and ltaly in the 1700s but of course travel goes back to the Middle Ages and we only have to look at Chaucer’s pilgrims who gathered at the Tabard inn London to journey to Canterbury and as  l said before the epic voyage of Ulysses . There is the classic figure of the tramp who for all life wandered around mostly walking everywhere . That character has more or less vanished but by walking they saw more than most . They seemed to have had a kind of wanderlust because they just kept on their journey from one place to another . Maybe normal life bored them or maybe running away from something 

Then as regards ordinary people there is the holiday where we suddenly take in new sights and new feelings about life always an adventure . Lastly there is the journey of the immigrant who leaves home to find a better life . They had little idea of what life awaited them but travelled on into an unknown land many going to America . Some made their fortune there   Others died in misery but it was always that these immigrants were going forward to change their lives .

Questions

1. What do you think an immigrant felt leaving his home ?

2.What's the difference between travel and a journey ?

3 . What's The best holiday or travel you ever did ?

4. Why did people become tramps ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoQEddtFN3Q