The long tail of travel

I was riding the airport escalator, lost in thought, the aspirational airport ads gliding by.  Island resorts that I’ll never visit; books I’ll never read; restaurants I’ll never frequent; shows I’ll never attend.  It’s like an airline magazine brought to life.

Then an HSBC poster caught my eye – one of the many “ways of seeing” ads that they post on jetways worldwide.  This one made me smile, though.

It captured the contradictions of expat psychology so well.  It’s a Jason Bourne / Jeremiah Johnson archetype, of being more comfortable with environments than with people.  Of being lone hunters rather than communal gatherers.

It reminded me of an October 2011 graphic in Wired Magazine, reproduced below.   They surveyed everyone’s passports in the office an counted up the countries visited.  The results produced an long-tail distribution, with some countries being visited by almost everyone and others by only a few.

As with the HSBC poster, I can recognize myself within this picture, placed about a third of the way from the left.  That places me in the top 7% or so among the most travelled Wired staffers. 

I’m torn as to whether this tells me that I travel too much or that others should travel more.

And there’s an aspirational aspect to the statistics.  I’m instinctively looking right to find my next destination: prescriptively I should be visiting Brazil, Egypt, Norway, and perhaps delaying Albania and Sudan.

And no sign of when the time is right to start exploring the ‘Stan countries – I may leave that to my son, reporting in from Turkmenistan and Afghanistan.

Happy "Day to Read"

A quiet day on the blog while I take advantage of today's designation as a "Day to Read", being promoted by a number of sites. And, just in case you find yourself without something to read, I'll add a link for the day to Amanda's latest post about "what to do if you're traveling too much".

"Where luxury once meant chandeliers, champagne, and staff on tap, it now means privacy, independence, and chocolate-covered strawberries."

There is a category of magazines that deals with aspirational lifestyles: once described as being "dedicated to clothes you'll never wear, people you'll never meet, cars you'll never drive, and parties you'll never be invited to." In general, I don't give them a second thought.

I do, however, have a weakness for the Aspirational Travel Mag.

Conde Nast, Travel and Leisure, the Sunday Times Travel (the quote above is theirs) are my favorite bits of fluff to curl up with on a long flight. Further down my list come CNN Traveler, National Geographic Travel, and Frommers (although I swear by their guidebooks). And no, sorry, I've never warmed to Rick Steves like so many Americans (even though he's a fellow Seattle-ite).

The fun of these aspirational magazines is that they are filled with completely accessible aspriations. It's not hard to imagine standing where they've taken a picture, staying in a recommended hotel, or enjoying one of their idyllic meals. I usually come back with several torn-out pages in my shoulder bag that I use to help me remember towns to visit, or to find some out-of-the way spot that would make a great getaway. While most have online versions, I much prefer the big glossy pages, filled with pictures of clear blue seas and deep green forest.

As the Times says, "Be informed. Be inspired. Be there."