]I had just landed in Edinburgh airport, and I felt an all too familiar tickle in my throat of an encroaching infection. There was little I could do as I came down with a harsh cold the next day. I spent the majority of the following days with this lovely view of the ceiling crossbeams:

Quality construction

 

I was stuck in a foreign country, had a room filled with a dozen other strangers, and had no comfort food in sight. I cobbled together pasta and tomato sauce for my meals from the nearby convenience stores, grabbed some cough medication from the nearest pharmacy, and streamed movies on my phone to pass the time.

To make matters worse, I didn’t quite recover in time for my flight to Lithuania. So, a few days later, I had to drag myself out of bed and slog to the airport in the dead of the night. I combined a side table with an airport bench as a makeshift bed for the night. It was even less comfortable than it sounds.

Why even tell this story?

For pity, clearly.

But truly, I believe we’ve put traveling on an unreachable pedestal. It’s like the rainbow-tinted Facebook news feed that filters out all of the bad news. When we only see the success and joy in others’ lives, we start to wonder why our lives are so drab, and if we’re not achieving real happiness.

The same goes for traveling. We see friends post glamorous photos of fanciful foods, imposing landmarks, and general merriment from their travels. How many times have you seen someone post a picture like this:

 

But for each of those days, there are days where we’re eating this:

Mmmm…. tasty?

 

Rarely do travel updates show sickness, fatigue, or homesickness that’s so prevalent. And why would they? That’s hardly the parts of the trip we like to remind ourselves about. So with each passing day, it’s easy to think of vacations as too lofty, expensive, or untenable for a prolonged time. We start to dismiss long-term travel as “implausible” or “something I could never do or afford”. But the reality of long-term traveling is this:

It’s not a vacation; it’s living.

The typical mundane things need to be done. Every few days, I take a few articles of clothing to hand wash in the sink. If you’re on a vacation, you pony up the 10 dollars since you’re only gone a few weeks. But we’re not on vacation; we’re living. And you would never pay 10 dollars a week to do laundry when you’re living at home.

Grocery shopping is hardly ever a dull affair. Being unable to read the local language can make shopping feel more like playing a game of Craps. I’ve bought ground turkey instead of ground beef through a translation error. On a lighter tone, I’ve accidentally ordered half a liter of wine since I couldn’t read the menu.

It turned out to be a good night.

 

So, just like at home, you can’t eat out every day, nor do you want to. You begin to pine for healthy and familiar foods to relieve yourself from a constant foreign palette.

Buying bus tickets, getting directions, or simply crossing the street can present their own challenges. But none of these things are bad. They’re just a change. This change is what brings excitement in what would otherwise be repetitive mundanity.

The same daily responsibilities that are present in traditional life don’t magically vanish when you travel, but instead manifest themselves in lovely new ways. And when you see these daily chores and activities in that light, it’s easier to realize that it’s just a different way to live life. You learn to think of this journey not as a brief passing trip, but as part of a dynamic life.

When we are faced with all of these new responsibilities and hardships while traveling, traveling becomes more relatable. It has highs and lows, as with traditional life. And when we see that side of traveling, it’s not as mythical or far from your grasp as it would seem.