Away From Me

I’ve spent about half of the last two and a half years overseas. My travels have taken me through Asia and across the United States; I’ve already seen more of the world than I ever thought I would. That’s primarily because, as a child, I never had any real desire to travel at all. I wasn’t one of those people who couldn’t wait to finish school so they could take off and explore the far corners of civilisation – I savoured the comforts of home too much for that. A couple of years ago I decided an overseas holiday would be good for me and it really was. Since then I’ve traveled on-and-off for a couple of months at a time.

I’m a different person when I’m overseas. I don’t know what it is but for some reason, when I’m away, I feel much happier. It’s almost like I instantly become a better, more optimistic version of myself as soon as I touch down on foreign soil. I’m more confident, capable, and, in general, really enjoy life. That confidence doesn’t extend to dealing with girls but I guess I can’t have everything.

Last year I spent some time in South-East Asia with a few friends. For a few days we rented motorbikes and rode around a small town in the south of Thailand. The first day we had the bikes we took it pretty easy – I’d never ridden before – and we did a few laps of the main streets of town while we were getting the hang of our hogs (they were only about 100cc). After a few laps, a fellow tourist on the side of the road waved me down. My friends were riding ahead and once they realised I’d stopped it took them a few minutes to turn around and come back to me. The girl who'd got my attention was in her late twenties or early thirties, European and, if I may say so, pretty attractive. We were a couple of kilometers from the centre of town and sort of in the middle of a desolate area and she explained that she was looking for a monument she’d read about in her guidebook. We’d passed it a little way back and I told her it was about a half hour’s walk down the road. She wasn’t enthused about the prospect of walking all that way in the mid-afternoon heat and asked if I would mind giving her a ride. I didn’t mind at all except that, after only about twenty minutes of riding the bike I didn’t fancy my chances of being able to maintain my balance with a passenger on the back. When my friends eventually caught up to me and I explained what had transpired they just laughed at me. I’m forever whining that I can’t pick up a girl and when one literally asks me to pick her up I decline.

Then there was the time I was wandering around a mall in New York and out of the blue a girl comes up to me and nervously says, “my friend overheard you talking and thinks your accent is really cute, where are you from?” Somehow I manage to walk away from that situation having politely explained that I was only in town for a day and in a couple of weeks would be heading back to Australia. What was I thinking? In fairness to me, I was working that day and was in a bit of a hurry but I didn’t think to get a phone number or an e-mail address or anything. Opportunities like that never present themselves to me and when they do I don’t recognise them. The universe is probably thinking, “what do we have to do for this guy, send him a singing telegram?” Maybe that would help; at least it’d get my attention.

My monumental ignorance notwithstanding, I really enjoy my time overseas. It takes a lot to get me down when I’m away. When I get home, for a few days at least, I maintain that positive state of mind but it doesn’t take long for me to lose the momentum and sink back into an apathetic stupor.

It’s tempting to take off again but, right now, it just doesn’t feel right. It would almost be like I would be running away from my problems, which are all pretty much inside my head anyway. There must be a reason why my mood alters so drastically depending on my geographical location. I will head overseas again sometime this year but I first want to work out why I’m so unhappy while I’m here. I’ve got no reason to be – my family and friends are supportive and I have life very easy. Maybe my discontent and disconnectedness is my way of telling myself that, right now, I should be somewhere else.