On Travel
Why you're literally "learning on the fly"
I’m not new to traveling, but I don’t travel as much as I used to. Let’s just say I used to pay to travel for “work”. On the bright side: I got a chance to see if the grass was greener on the other side.
It wasn’t.
Let’s be clear. This is my perspective. I visited other countries and asked myself if I wanted to live there. 99% of the time, it was “no”. I’ve visited more than 25 countries through badminton. Although I can’t say I’ve fully experienced each one, I don’t have to because I know what I like! I hope you do too.
But do I think people should experience travel?
Absolutely.
Traveling is a unique experience because the beginning and the end of the trip are often the most annoying. It’s like being forced to watch ads before and after. You can pay to make the experience less tedious, but there’s no skip button. I just hope the ads aren’t longer than the main program.
Flights operate on your highest expectations. You can’t show up to the airport, check in, board, and leave early. You might save a few minutes in the air, but after deboarding, immigration, baggage claim, and any other surprise events, at best you will arrive as expected. Well, unless you set your expectations really low, like I do (“Oh, YVR airport bags came within 30 minutes? What is this miracle?”).
That’s the plus side. The negative side is like shorting a stock. There’s an infinite amount of things that can go wrong, and unless you purchase additional insurance (like a stop loss), things can just suck, from delays to cancellations. Let’s not go there. Think happy thoughts.
Despite the few “goods” and many “bads” that start and end your trip, everything else happens in the middle. Life is that way too, isn’t it? We must make the most of our time in the middle.
The Experience of Travel: Learning About Other Places
Wherever you go, it will be different from where you live. A humbling lesson I learned from traveling is that the world goes on, with or without you. Perhaps it’s from the 30,000 foot perspective on the plane, or watching people go about their day while sitting in a busy tourist area. Neither really happens by choice.
Understanding that you’re not the center of the universe is a valuable life lesson. It doesn’t mean that you’re not important, but it doesn’t mean other people aren’t important either. Let’s not make this zero sum. It isn’t necessary. We may be in competition at select times, but life itself isn’t a competition because we all suffer the same fate: we all die in the end.
If anything, traveling to different places gives you insight on how other people do things. It doesn’t mean one way is better or worse because every society is a complex system. You cannot extract something, inject it into your own system, and expect it not to have unintended consequences. That only works if your system is overly simplistic, which probably doesn’t exist today.
For example, tipping culture in Japan and Korea is different from Canada and the United States. As a visitor, you have no idea how happy I was to save 15-20% on eating out, but I wouldn’t be so foolish to think that we can take a “no tipping” concept from Asia and insert it directly into North America. I don’t know enough about the restaurant industry to comment, but I would expect it affects wages, which impacts restaurant expenditures, which leads to increased food pricing, which impacts the demand, which affects staffing, and so on. It’s not that simple, is it?
Similarly, if things feel cheaper relative to where you live, think about how the cost of living varies in different places. The less you pay for food, the less you might earn overall if you work there. Purchasing power changes, so it’s difficult to make a comparison because it wouldn’t be fair to consider what you make where you currently live, versus what you would make working and living elsewhere.
That’s often why there are many places that are great to visit, but not to live in. The grass isn’t greener on the other side, because once you go to the other side, that’s all you have.
You can never have the grass on the other side because you can only occupy one side at a time.
The Experience of Travel: Learning About Other People
They say if you want to learn about someone, travel with them.
They also say if you don’t want to hate someone, don’t travel with them.
People say a lot of things, don’t they? I like the words “Your mileage may vary” for this situation.
I’ve encountered this quote from Neil Strauss from various sources:
“Unspoken expectations are premeditated resentments.”
This can apply to the concept of traveling itself—or even badminton! It’s okay, I’ve been a bad partner too (so sorry!). Knowing what to do is one thing, but expecting your partner to read your mind is a whole different level of crazy (oops). It took me far too long to learn this (the hard way too).
Communication is important. We know that, but sometimes we worry about things. Those worries lead us to not saying anything, which often makes the problem worse. The simplest solution is to take action by saying something. It doesn’t have to be antagonistic or confrontational, just ask a question! Make an observation and ask a question for confirmation.
“You seem upset about something, are you okay?”
“You look like you’re tired, should we rest for a bit?”
(badminton) “You look tense, what’s your focus for this rally so I can help cover you?”
If you’re the one that has the unspoken expectations, please speak up.
Read the room: people can’t read rooms
(yes, not funny—I didn’t want to leave this unspoken).
When we travel with people, we see all sides of them. This affects our expectations of them and when things go wrong, it challenges our sense of self. It’s an ego problem because we have to decide if:
Our expectations were wrong (i.e. your fault)
They failed to meet our expectations (i.e. their fault)
Let’s propose a formula:
(Amplitude of Expectation) ^ (Duration Left Unaddressed) = Amount of Resentment
The exponent allows for compounding, so something small not addressed for a long duration can feel the same as a large, unmet expectation. For example, catering to someone on a shoestring budget the entire trip, versus finding out your hotel wasn’t booked. Sound familiar? I hope not.
On the contrary, removing expectations (i.e. setting them to zero) leads to no resentment. I’ve enjoyed my badminton a lot more when I remove the expectation to win. It doesn’t mean that I don’t want to win; rather, it means that I don’t have expectations of how I should perform. This allows me to engage more in the moment, working my way as I go along, enjoying things as they come, and letting things go as I please.
With traveling, I want to know what the purpose of the trip is. If I’m just there to experience things, then so be it. If there’s somewhere I want to go, I do that as soon as possible. It’s about setting priorities, instead of trying to optimize things perfectly. Like the saying goes:
“You can do anything, but you can’t do everything.”
That’s why I recommend traveling, because you learn about different places and different people. Most of all, we learn a bit more about ourselves.
The Experience of Travel: Learning About Ourselves
“Wherever you go, there you are.”
Sometimes we want to travel to get away from ourselves, but in the end, you’ll find that you can never ditch yourself. Might as well learn to get along!
To be fair, changing your environment can help change behavior. Your environment shapes you in ways you might not notice. With travel, it becomes more evident, or at least to those traveling with you. Hopefully, their expectations are spoken, so put your ego aside and take things like a champ. You don’t have to agree, but it’s good to get feedback. How else will you learn?
Even before the trip, we often learn about ourselves. How much do we plan? How much do we spend? How much do we eat? How much do we procrastinate? We learn how we adapt to new environments, for better or worse.
This is a bit like playing tournaments. You face different environmental constraints, and how you play is a function of your adaptability. Most of us perform much better in familiar conditions, but true expertise requires the ability to handle greater variability. For example, I learned that the 2026 Pan Am Juniors was played in an open-air gymnasium. I can only imagine how hard it was to play when all their training was spent in non-wind environments.
The main thing to look out for is our egos. Traveling should take us down a notch, because we’re functioning in a new environment. If nobody knows who you are, how does that make you feel? Do you accept that and try to fit in with the culture, or do you feel the need to express yourself? Do you need to stand out, trying to show the world that you’re better or more important than other people? (Translation: Are you an “influencer”?—just kidding, just kidding!)
It sounds bad when I say it explicitly, but we already talked about unspoken expectations. We’re only clearing the air and I’m asking an important question. Sharing isn’t necessary. This is for you to reflect on.
As an example, I want to leave a place better than before if possible. If not, I want it to be as if I was never there. If it’s not my home, I’m a guest and I want to be respectful so that if I want to go again, I can.
However, I want it to be evident that I’m a guest. For example, I’ll continue speaking English instead of butchering the main language of the country. This is not an optimal strategy, but I don’t want to say a few phrases and then not understand anymore. I’ll use “sorry“ over すみません | sumimasen (because it feels weird to say something that starts with “sue me“) . Your mileage may vary!
Through all my travels, a valuable thing I’ve learned is that people are a function of their environments, and if you don’t travel, the world you live in is all you see. You start to believe that your environment is everyone else’s, which is unlikely to be true.
I’ve also learned that I’m lucky to live in Canada. As interesting as other places are to visit, I’m happy here. It’s like training in a foreign country. You’ll get a training effect from a new environment, but once you’re home, your environment will reshape you back.
Lastly and most importantly, I’ve learned to let others do their thing while I do mine. Most things aren’t a competition. We’re all just trying to make the most of what we have with the time we have.
Respect others, but don’t disrespect yourself.
You’re important, but other people are important too.
Bon voyage.