Leonardo was still feeling pretty shaky when Peter knocked on his door again, but he was certainly feeling much better than he had felt in the last four or five days.
‘Hey
buddy, I’m glad to see you’re still alive.’
‘Yeah…hey,
I wanted to thank you for helping me out and bringing me some bread and water.
That was really nice of you, you know?’
‘Don’t
worry about it buddy, travellers stick together you know what I mean?’
‘Yeah…
but thanks anyway.’
‘So,
do you think that you’re well enough to hang out with us a bit tonight?’
‘Huh…I
don’t think I’m well enough to be walking around yet.’
‘Don’t
worry, we’ll just hang out at the terrace a bit, and you can come back to your
room at any time if you’re feeling sick or tired. Does that sound good to you?’
‘Okay,
you convinced me. I think it will be nice to breath some fresh air anyways to
be honest.’
‘You
know, you shouldn’t feel bad or embarrassed for being sick at all. Pretty much
everyone goes through that at some point. Western stomachs are simply not used
to the food and especially the water of these parts of the world.’
‘Tell
me about it.’
‘I
still haven’t gotten sick here fortunately. Yet when I was travelling in India,
a few years ago, I ended up in bed for something like a week and a half. So I
know exactly how you must be feeling. That’s why I decided to see if you were
okay and get you some water and food. As a traveller, I know how important the
support of fellow travellers can be’, said Peter, as they strode briskly up the
stairs that led to the terrace.
When
they finally finished climbing the stairs, Leonardo was pleasantly surprised by
what he saw. For a 5-euros-a-night hostel, they had a surprisingly nice terrace
where the guests could hang out and allow themselves to be engulfed by the warm
Moroccan night. He recriminated himself for not discovering such a pleasant
place before, especially considering that it had been standing only two floors
above his head. To his defence, however, out of the two weeks and a half he had
been staying at the hostel so far, almost a full week had been spent between
the bathroom and his bed, leaving him time for nothing else than bodily
functions and feverish dreams.
‘Not
bad huh?’ Asked Peter, almost as if he had read his mind.
The
terrace was actually the rooftop of the hostel, and provided a great view
towards the night of Tangiers. It was immediately evident to Leonardo that, for
some reason, Tangiers looked a lot more beautiful at night then during the day.
On the other hand, how could that not be the case? The night sky in Tangiers
was unlike any western city’s. Artificial illumination was, for the most part,
dim and sparse, allowing the silver stars to take centre stage. Near the
rooftop’s edge, there were five chairs disposed in a circular way. Three of
those chairs were taken, and the other two were free, waiting for Peter and
Leonardo to join the circle.
‘Come
Leonardo, I wanna introduce you to some fellow travellers’, said Peter as they
approached the people sitting on the chairs. ‘Hi guys I wanna introduce you to
the newest member of our evening parlour discussion. This is Leonardo. He’s
been feeling a bit sick lately but he agreed to join us tonight for a bit.’
‘You
should be very careful with what you drink and eat around here. Unfortunately,
I learned that lesson the hard way just like you did. I’m Sven by the way,’
said one of the three young travellers sitting on the chairs.
‘Hi
Leonardo, I’m sorry you haven’t been feeling very well, but as Sven just said
that’s pretty much something we all go through sooner or later. A traveller’s
rite of passage if you will. I’m John by the way and this is my wife Keira.’
Leonardo was a bit surprised to hear him say that the girl was his wife, since
they seemed to be in their mid-twenties. These days it seems that most people
won’t even consider getting married before they hit thirty.
‘It
still sounds weird when you say that…’ the girl said confirming Leonardo’s
thoughts, ‘we just got married you see? This is sort of our honey moon, well
this IS our honey moon actually. Except that instead of spending our money in
some fancy resort in East-Asia or the Caribbean we decided to spend a month
travelling in Spain and Morocco.’
‘That sounds like a great idea’, said
Leonardo as he vaulted forward to pick up one of the beach chairs and have a
seat. ‘I’m doing sort of the same thing, except in my case I didn’t get
married, I graduated from University.’
‘That’s great, congratulations. So
where are you from Leonardo?’
‘I’m half Brazilian and half
Portuguese, but I studied in England. In Leeds.’
‘Cool. I actually thought you were
American by your accent. I have some distant family living in Leeds, although
I’m originally from Liverpool. I studied in Manchester which is also quite
close to Leeds so I went there a few times.’
‘Nice. So you guys live in
Manchester?’
‘No, we both went to Uni in
Manchester so that’s where we met, but I grew up in London so when we graduated
I managed to take her back with me,’ said John with a proud look on his face.
It made sense since Keira was quite a pretty girl and seemed to be very nice as
well. Not so many girls like that anymore.
On the other hand, John was also a good-looking guy. He had light brown
hair and white teeth and was well built.
‘So why did you come to Morocco
Leonardo?’ Asked Sven who was sitting right in front of him.
‘That’s kind of a tough question. As
I said, I graduated recently and decided to travel a bit before doing whatever
it is that you have to do when you graduate. I don’t know exactly why I came to
Morocco specifically but I think that I was attracted by its mystique. There’s
something about the desert that really, piques my interest.’
‘I think I know exactly what you
mean. For us European kids the desert tends to symbolize freedom and adventure.
That’s pretty much what we can’t find in Europe anymore. Things have gotten too
civilized over there.’
‘I couldn’t have said it any better
man’, agreed Leonardo. ‘What about you Peter, what brigs you to this sandy
corner of the world?’
‘He hasn’t told you yet? Peter is
like the king of travellers mate,’ said John before Peter could answer.
‘I wouldn’t go that far…’
‘He’s just being modest man, he’s
been everywhere you can think of. Sandy places, snowy places, mountainous
places, big cities, small villages, rainforests, it doesn’t matter, he’s seen
them all. What’s your count so far Peter?’
‘151’
‘151 what?’
‘151 is the number of countries he’s
been to so far.’
‘Holy shit! Are you serious?’
‘I like travelling…’
‘You don’t say. How could you have
visited that many countries?’
‘Well, unlike you kids I’ve seen
quite a few winters in my life… After spending thirty years of my life
travelling it’s not a big wonder that I’ve been to that many countries.’
‘You spend the whole year
travelling?’
‘Not exactly. You see, back home in
Australia I work in a school as a primary teacher. I’ve been doing that for
more than thirty years now. A few years into the job I realized that I needed
to leave and see the world so I went to talk with my boss, the school’s headmaster.
I told him that I loved my job, which I did, but that I had the burning desire
to spend some time travelling around the world.
At first he wasn’t too happy with the
prospect of me leaving my job for several months but after I told him that I
would have to quit if he didn’t allow me to take a sabbatical year off he
finally agreed.
A year later I went back to Australia
and resumed my job, but I had been changed forever by my first year of
travelling. I had blown away almost all of my savings in adventures across
South-America, Europe and East-Asia. The experience was worth every penny. I
discovered not only a whole world that I had never seen before but I also
realized that I couldn’t possibly wait twenty years to embark on my next
journey.
So at the end of the year I went to
see my boss again and I told him pretty much the same thing I had told him two
years before that. Once again, he was mad at first, but eventually he decided
to let me leave for a year again if I promised to return. In my second year travelling
I travelled across a number of African countries and I knew that I had taken
the right decision. I wasn’t a mere teacher anymore. I was doing what I felt I
had been born to do, travel. So I went back to Australia again and this same
cycle has going on for approximately 30 years now. They call me
traveller-teacher back home and my boss is more than used to it by now. That’s
my secret, one year working and one year travelling. That’s how I managed to
visit 151 countries so far.’
‘I told you mate, you’re looking at
the king of travellers,’ said John with a grin on his face.
‘You were being modest after all,’
Leonardo agreed.
‘I can tell you one thing. After
travelling as much as I have, I find it easy to recognize other people like me.
People who were born to travel, people who can’t do without it. I knew as soon
as I saw you that you were one of us. And yet, although I’m sure I’m right in
that regard, I can’t help feeling that you’re also looking for something. You
said you wanted to come here because the desert piques your attention, but I
think there’s something more to it. I think that you travel to find something,
not just because you want to. Am I not right? What are you looking for
Leonardo? I hope you don’t mind me asking.’
Leonardo gave the question some
thought and then decide to answer.
‘When I graduated, I felt as if a
world of possibilities had suddenly opened up to me. I guess that I felt a bit
like you felt when you decide to travel for the first time. Yet unlike you, I
wasn’t enlightened by a particular resolution that could give meaning to my
life. There was no epiphany capable of driving me towards a specific direction.
In my case, it was more like the promise of freedom as an abstract state.
Freedom gave me joy and that lasted
days, even a few weeks. Eventually, however, a dark force found its way into my
heart as I realized that I held only the promise of freedom, but not freedom
itself.
I was now free, or so I thought, to
do anything I wanted with my life. Yet I started to suspect that infinite
freedom might imply absence of meaning. If I had all the options in the world,
I was forced to find a way that actually meant something. In other words my
optimism constricted me to actually make my life meaningful, special,
excellent. If I didn’t, having all those choices would mean nothing.
Yet the truth is that free as I might
seem to be, I can’t find a way to give meaning to my life. I now realize that
I’m only a very small part of the universe and that I can do very, so very
little, to impact the world around me.
Increasingly desperate, I tried to
seek a way to make my life worth living. I tried to add meaning to my life. And
yet I still sit here now, talking to you, and I realize that I might never find
an answer to my questions. My ambition is burying me alive and I know that,
sooner or later, I have to go back home and accept the truth that I’m trying to
ignore. No matter how much I try to convince myself that I’m special, the world
doesn’t care about me or need me more than anyone else. I’m not special and
sooner or later I will have to return home and take up a job in order to pay my
bills. I’ll have a boss that tells me what to do and what not to do and I will
be one more nameless piece in the great machine we call society.
This is the last stage in my journey
of self-discovery, and I’m afraid that when I finally find myself surrounded by
the dunes of the desert, I will look at the distant stars up in the sky and be
forced to admit that I failed to find the meaning to go along with my freedom.
I’m looking for purpose Peter, but to no avail… Now if you’ll excuse me, I
think I’ll go to bed, I’m still feeling a bit week I’m afraid. Thanks a lot for
everything Peter, I had a great time. I’m sorry if I killed the mood around
here with my depressing speech.’
‘No worries my troubled young friend,
a hard truth is always better than a soft lie. Tomorrow at the same place, at
the same hour?’
‘I’m in. I’ll see you tomorrow king
of travellers.’
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