On being a tourist

Usually this time of year, we're on our way or packing up for our annual cross country road trip to visit family. Suitcases, bags of food, book bags, a bag of movies for the car DVD player, food,  a bag of art supplies, more snack food ... all get loaded into the car, and then the kids and the dog are wedged in.  It's laborious, but we've done it for so many years, that we’ve become pretty efficient at the process.  And we never go hungry.

But no road trips this year. The kids keep asking if we’re going to see their grandparents.  I have to keep reminding them, “Not this summer.” I am the killjoy.

Instead we’re planning a trip to Japan. I’ve been spending hours searching for a hotel that will sleep 8 in our price range. I checked out all the library travel guides to Japan (3 of them) and ended up buying the Lonely Planet guide and highlighting the places I’d like to see. I’ve been studying Tokyo subway and train maps trying to plan an itinerary. I bought one set of tickets that had us flying into Tokyo and out of Hiroshima, cancelled them, and then rebooked to stay in the Tokyo area after realizing how expensive and tiresome that trip would be with six kids who know little about Japan and won’t remember which temple is which two days after we return home. I’ve called hostels and ryokans.  We’ve watched a PBS special on Japan, tried to learn some phrases and the symbol for “men” and “women” so we’ll use the right toilets. We’ve shopped for comfortable shoes. 

This process is taking at least twice as long as it takes to pack AND drive through the Midwest, and probably much longer, because I can’t commit. 

The other night I went to bed feeling sick. My head was throbbing from computer glow burnout and from wondering why I’m going to spend all this money on site-seeing. I don’t really care for being a tourist.  I’d rather take the money and fly home to the people I love and who love me and my children.  Cousins, grandparents, siblings, places.   My parents are probably reading this and saying, yes, yes, do!

(Turns out I really was sick.  I was congested and feverish for two days, then woke up in a sweat all better.)

But I’m not going to fly home, even though I thought I smelled a hayfield the other day and had an intense moment of homesickness.

This homesickness was brought on partially from reading Emily of Deep Valley. Emily’s relationship with her grandfather reminded me of all the hours I used to spend at my grandparents’ house on the way to or from track practice or work.  They’d feed me and ask about what was going on.  I want my kids to get to experience that one on one time with their grandparents.  I want to sit and be fed and questioned by my family. I’d be happy to be like Emily and stay in my little cottage, and while away the hours in the garden and visiting with the neighbors, taking on little acts of service here or there.

I was homesick for an image of life that doesn’t exist anymore. Not that my relationship with my family doesn’t exist anymore.  But I have a loyalty to the way of life I have chosen, both for the sake of my children and for my marriage.  As I am reading about visiting Japan and reading “The River Ki,” I’m reminded over and over about the sacrifices Japanese girls make when they marry.  They leave behind their birth families for years at a time, often forever, to take on a new identity in their husbands’ families.

I am not Japanese though, so I don’t have to give up those relationships.  I want to nourish these relationships that will always be a part of our lives, not just the friendships that are a part of our lives for the next year or two. I want my children to know and love their aunts, uncles, cousins, and especially their grandparents. I want them to have memories of their grandparents’ personalities and quirks and wisdom. 

But I also think the kids will gain something from this trip.  I want them to know that the world is a big place, but not limitless. It’s possible to be aware of both the colorful differences and the striking similarities between foreigners and ourselves.

Even with expensive hotels, the trip home would cost twice as much.  Tickets from Guam to the states are close to two thousand dollars right now. 

This isn’t about the money, though.  I’m also trying to honor my husband, who doesn’t want us to leave for 4-6 weeks.  The trip home is arduous, and our time here is relatively short.  We agreed that we should take advantage of living in the Eastern Hemisphere to see a little more of it.  I also agreed with him, that if we don’t go home this summer, we will go home next summer, whether with orders or as a vacation, especially since his parents will celebrate 50 years of marriage, and his sisters are trying to cook something special up.

Personally, I don’t really like being a tourist, and I’ve never really been motivated by wanderlust.  It’s not that I don’t like travelling: I like airplanes and other forms of public transportation because I don’t use it often.  I don’t have any phobias about eating, sleeping, and voiding in strange places.  I like seeing the places I read about, but I don’t have a bucket list of places I want to see.  

Traveling as a tourist, rather than as a pilgrim or to see family, is exciting, but then it’s over. I have to label my photographs right after I get them, so that I don’t forget what I saw.  The memories fade quickly, and as a tourist, you don’t really get to know a place.  And three-fourths of the time, I’m disappointed that a new place is not more exotic.   Even when I was younger, I didn’t buy into the idea that you have to go somewhere to experience something. That’s what books are for.

Most of my kids don’t like learning from books, though. They will learn more about the history, art, and culture of Japan from visiting it.  They will witness the cleanliness and efficiency of an enormous Eastern city, see a little of the incredibly varied and awe-inspiring landscape of Japan, (even if we’ll only see a fraction of central Honshu) and maybe remember a few of the phrases we’re practicing. I hope they will notice the pride that the Japanese have for their own culture and then, in returning, take pride in the culture that they have inherited. It’s probably a false ideal, but I’m hoping that by traveling with the kids, they’ll appreciate the diversity in the world God has created, but even more, I want them to be aware of the blessings they have, especially that of having a family who loves them and always welcomes them home.