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Personal Narrative : Why I Travel

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Why I Travel I believe that travel is something that everyone, no matter what, should do at least once in their lifetime. This is because once people leave their comfort zone and present situation, they begin to truly learn about themselves and the world. Once they finish travelling, that same person may find themselves to be totally different than the one who left. In my short 14 day trip to Senegal, I feel as if I learned a lifetime’s worth of knowledge about not only Senegalese culture but also about myself. The trip as a whole was fun and interesting but this also means that there is a danger the true meaning could be lost in the smiles and happy memories. I feel travel is so much more than just having a good time and making happy …show more content…

In the U.S., it is so incredibly difficult to well and truly stick out to the same degree that a toubab like myself sticks out in Senegal. Everything about me was different to so many Senegalese people from my race to my language to my dress, etc. This means that everywhere, we went, except touristy areas, our bus full of toubabs stood out. I can recall countless times when people would wave at our bus or knock on our windows to try as sell us some commodity solely because we were toubabs. This experience was so odd to me because I have never felt this way, I am used to just being a member of society and not the main attention of sorts. In Senegal, this feeling was exacerbated in the markets, the schools and the homes of people, we visited. In the markets, specifically on Goree Island, vendors targeted toubabs and tried to coerce them into visiting and then buying something from their shop. Even more annoying was that in order to get a fair price, I had to fight tooth and nail because the initial price well over the true value. Then even in bargaining, you could never get a fair price because the vendors operated on the assumption that since we were toubabs, we had more money and thus were okay with paying more. Then when we would visit schools, the students would flock to our bus when we would first arrive. They would then knock on the windows and wave. Then when we would get off the bus and walk around, there were always groups of kids who would follow us

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