Why are we always ticking boxes?

I love to travel. Having traveled around South East Asia and India, travel to me was always looking at sites. I always looked for famous places, cities, historical monuments, museums, beautiful cliffs or breathtaking beaches. It’s necessary to have something to see and tick a box. “Sightseeing” as it’s called in travel brochures. Once a box is ticked, it’s done. I would never ever go there again. More so because time and money is both precious and limited, and there are so many more boxes to tick!

Hordes of Indians and Chinese do this box ticking around the world. May be it’s in the Asian psyche. The endeavor to get maximum bang for the buck, whatever the bang is, real or imagined.

When I met Europeans who traveled to the same vacation spot every year, I was aghast! Mauritius may be beautiful, but 7 times! Such an incredible waste of time and money! You won’t be able to tick a lot of boxes in your lifetime, I would grin. Then I met Americans. Same incredible waste but at a lesser cost I suppose on New Jersey or Florida shores.

The other type of vacations Europeans and Americans have is ‘doing’ rather than ‘seeing’. How about a camping vacation in the mountains, a skiing trip to Japan or a fishing trip to Alaska? I get tired even thinking of these vacations but somewhere inside I feel an urge to go try it. Too expensive, I console myself although I am not too enthusiastic of a backyard barbecue as well. Too tiring for a lazy bum is putting it more correctly.

Yet another vacation I saw people take (usually non-Asian) was having a stay-cation. Just book a star hotel in your own city, enjoy the pool and food and relax by taking a few days off. But wait a minute, at what cost? (Indian mind wakes up). I could cook my own food at home and relax, for free. And then why take a leave at stay at home (such a waste), I need to save that for my box ticking in December :p

At first I thought, money was the cause and effect of all this. Rich people after ticking all their boxes just want a place to relax and hence end up going to the same places again and again. I will do that someday, so I thought. But the more boxes I tick, there are millions more I see. It struck me then that this is never going to end. When will I be able to take a month off, rent a place in Goa (for example, like the scores of foreign tourists there) and just relax on the warm beaches with fantastic seafood and dazzling festivities? Will my box ticking guilt ever allow me to do that?

Enough of idealism. These firangs don’t know what they are missing. I need to plan my Christmas box ticking.