Sure, traveling just to achieve certain bragging rights is superficial and silly, but that doesn't mean travel itself isn't valuable. Similarly, reading books just to say you've read the most or the hardest is silly, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't read.
Traveling allows you to viscerally see how people live and value things differently from you. There is much to be gained from it if you do it for the right reasons.
Actually living in a different place will certainly do that, but “travel” almost never will.
Take one extreme case: a typical college grad doing a euro-trip to 10 countries in 14 days. They will certainly not be able to experience those cultures deeply, but compare that person to someone who never went to Europe, never saw their respect for the past, train travel, food cultures, and the high value they place on vacation.
Even consider those young travelers that mostly stay within the confines of their hostel and their group activities, or in a national bar where things appear familiar and comfortable: they are still better off than if they just stayed home and had not seen any of it.
Certainly, 10 days of travel is not much, but it's a lot more than 0 days. For some, those 10 days may be truly meaningful and eye-opening, for others, a familiar party with different scenery. Traveling is generally uncomfortable and different, and the experience can add something to even the most shallow traveler.
(caveat: It happens, although uncommon, that travel can be a detriment. Particularly, when someone goes to a country that is poorer than theirs, and attributes their lack of development to some genetic or racist defect. While this is possible, I do think it's exceedingly rare. When one sees how other people live up close, it's natural to look for the patterns and similarities rather than come up with differences.)
She had my girlfriend and I stay at her home in a little town Nagold. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nagold
We stayed with their family for a week, experiencing the smaller town life, hiking in the black forest and going to the market for fresh bread every morning.
We then rented a vehicle and traveled around the Autobahn visiting many major cities and either staying at a hostel ($20 a night per person plus an amazing breakfast included!), or with a mutual friend of her's whom she had met in college.
There are only a few Universities in Germany so she knew someone is almost all the major cities we stayed at and it was nice to converse with them in their home, trade stories and experience the night life as a local would.
We did go to a few tourist areas which were neat to experience, however most of the fun did come from 'off the beaten path' where you got to interact with locals and see more of the slower, simple life.
One thing that I found astonishing is the amount you can converse/communicate with someone even if you don't speak their language. Granted most people in Germany can understand English well, but with the few broken phrases I learned before going I was able to do quite well when our translator (my friend from high school) would not be with us sometimes.
I much would rather do this, go to one specific country rather than go to 14 countries in 10 days.
Haven't traveled since as work/school/family is now my priority but doing at least one travel to get out of your comfort zone is a good experience I think everyone should get to experience once (if they want to).
But there are many forms of travel. For me, it is and forever will be only backpacking-ish style. Done for example 6 months in India in very remote places. When you come back from such a visit, you are not really the same person inside that left. Or at least I can't imagine not being changed by all the positive and also negative things experienced. 1 week feels like 3 there, 1 month more like 5 years, and after 3 the idea of my life back was just a distant memory of a dream I once had. You can't tell properly others about those 1000s of small and big adventures, they wouldn't understand most of the appeal. Only those with similar experiences would. Photos or videos, even done with full frame equipment, tell only small part of the story.
And these instagrammers/'influencers' (that's a too pretty name for what it usually is, if they travel around like that they are rather 'influenced') ? Well they are for people with sheepish mentality. I would have to have utterly bland life to be interested in some John Doe's life, where he made this or that selfie and consistently follow them. I guess I am too old and experienced for Instagram bandwagon. With all the travel photo I do, I would anyway end up as one of those 'influencers' (at least that's what people tell me when they see my photos and the amount I create)
Yes, they also have tours to help you 'experience' the life of a local, like going through a favela in Rio. Anedoctal, but from what I've seen it can be really offensive to people on those places, because it works pretty much like a safari.
Here in Iceland(1), shops downtown are regularly being replaced by copies of the same gift shop you’ll find everywhere in the world, and there is active discussion about coming up with “tourist-friendly” English names for landmarks because the Icelandic ones that have been used for hundreds of years aren’t enticing enough.
The tourism industry has figured out how to give people a good show, but it’s ultimately a shallow experience. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing: like everything else, travel needs welcoming, entry-level experiences. The trouble comes when it gets so prevalent that it starts to warp and destroy the local culture in order to sell more spectacle.
(1) Full disclosure: I first came here as a tourist, and would never have moved here without that initial exposure, so I can’t completely comdemn the tourism industry.
Kind of like software development these days, on the web in particular - the "entry-level experience" makes most money, so over time it starts to dominate and push out everything else.
In the beginning it was about exploration and at the end it was about discovering my priorities in life.
The genesis of the trip came about when I started talking to someone at a language school about taking language classes. He started asking me why, then said, "just go there. You'll never get a better chance than when you're young."
He was 100% right.
Sure there are people who seem to travel with the intent impress people, but traveling is a character-building in a way that everyone should experience. Its not the kind of spirit-quest that some people make it out to be, but it will give you interesting stuff to think out for years.
Get a passport, save $5-10k and go slumming in Europe for 6 months. Backpack for clothes. Laptop. Camera. Condoms. If you decide you don't like it in three-four weeks, come back. Otherwise spend time there stretching your money as long as you can until your budget runs out.
"I just want to see the world" I hear, a yearning for an experience that, when pursued, might temporarily stifle midlife crises but ruins marriages just as often. I feel so deeply sad for people who don't realize that everything they need is in front of them.