Baby if you can't change the world
Maybe you should just change yourself
—Tom Petty
Life during a months-long trip is very different from being at home. It can take some getting used to.
How do you readjust yourself?
I did here in Taipei, Taiwan. And it happened in the hostel shower on my first night.
Today was the very first day of what looks like a months-long trip. After weeks of planning and increasingly delirious excitement, I’ve finally reached the first destination of my great Southeast Asia backpacking trip.
All alone in this big, new city, I don’t speak or read the language and it’s dark on a Saturday evening. Although I’ve traveled many times before, I am still struck by a mild shock — it feels like I’m on a tightrope, without a net.
Actually, I have a small net: I’ve already reserved a room for tonight online, at the Taiwan Hostel Happy Family. Nice to have somewhere to go, at least on the first night.
Even a simple municipal task like changing the sign characters on the city hall building can take on a fascinating “foreign” feel when you’re traveling.
(Note: I didn’t take any photos in Taipei, just some video, which I then degraded when trying to save hard disk space. Images on this page are video stills. Sorry for the rough quality.)
Checking into the hostel was my first taste of my new life: I have been in many hostels before but not for a while. In my private room, cramped with bright red walls and a bunk bed, I stood among the jumble of wooden furniture and tried to make sense of everything: the endless city outside, the openness of my plans, and the self-sufficiency I’m going to need to rediscover.
The shower stall incident
Sometimes the smallest things can have the biggest impact. Traveling can tune you into apparently minor events that are in fact infused with importance.
And something happened this evening that brought this whole trip into focus for me. A most prosaic thing that totally realigned my thinking.
I took my first shower of the trip in a stall in the hallway. Four showers, separated by cheap white molded plastic walls stood outside my room, and I got in the last one.
The famous Grand Hotel, which I could see from my much cheaper room at the Chientan Youth Center Hostel.
I had a Ziploc bag with my toothbrush, toothpaste, and soap, and my towel, and when I disrobed I realized there were no shelves or handy surfaces – nowhere to put my stuff while I bathed.
And that was it: the moment the realization struck me that this trip is going to reignite my ingenuity, inspire creativity and resilience, and present me with the tools I’ll need to build my own experiences.
The only break in the smoothness of the walls and door was a small hook; I carefully hung the towel on it. On top of that, I balanced my Ziploc shower bag, which took some trial and error. Then I took my shower, banging my elbows against the walls periodically in the cramped little cubicle and trying not to let the water splash my towel.
Taipei 101 is the tallest building in the world. A little touristy to go to the top, but also something you can’t really miss.
After rinsing off, I got the towel and balanced the Ziploc bag back on the little hook. Trying to shrink down as little as possible, I toweled off while keeping my elbows tucked into my body, and tried like hell not to knock the Ziploc bag off the hook.
The rhythm of travel was instantly reignited in me in that shower stall.
The view from the top of Taipei 101 looks out across the spooky, shroud-misted hills that surround the city.
Backpackers love cheap travel. We love rickety showers and funky hostels and third-class train cars. We love having but a few, carefully chosen possessions to care for.
And I loved having to balance my Zip-loc bag on a hook and pray that it doesn’t fall in the water.
The blur of making your life a series of hostels, trains, stations, markets, sights, and cafés; all of it crystallized tonight for me. My old life of living in an apartment with all my stuff, and days that all seemed basically the same as each other, were over for now.
I’m a traveler; I get by!
Update, March 2016: This trip ended up taking over nine months, and led me to several different countries for as long as I could stay in each one. The pace was relaxed, the sites were enriching, the people I met were the best part. Diabetes behaved sometimes, not other times. I still remember the feeling of this seemingly mundane “shower incident” in Taipei though; when I get anxious about not having traveled recently enough, I often think about this evening and feel better, knowing that when I do hit the road again that I’ll start marching to the rhythm of travel yet again. If you’re a traveler, you’ll know what I mean!
P.S. Taipei 101 is no longer the tallest building in the world. But I saw it when it was!
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