Travelers: The Meaningful Journey
Judging from his book, Régent Jean Cabana, the French
Canadian author of Travelers: The
Meaningful Journey is a scholar, a philosopher and a bon vivant. He calls himself a Traveler. By this he means those who travel on a
long-term basis as a lifestyle. Although
he conducted a formal study of Travelers which included in-depth interviews and
focus groups, this book isn’t dry and academic.
Cabana also writes about his own life and outlook with a changing
perspective that is by turns suave, convivial and wise. He can be a dependable guide, yet he can also
be unpredictable.
Cabana defines Travelers as radically different from
tourists who rely on guidebooks to shape their travel experience rather than
taking chances, and watching for opportunities to contact the local people in
order to learn from them directly about their culture.
Some of his concepts can be difficult to pin down. I finally concluded that “finding your
rhythm” is most akin to the Navajo belief in hozho which is called “walking in beauty” in English. Cabana likes using the word “passage” for
travel. I would associate this word with
“rite of passage” which is an experience that is intended to be
transformative. Transformation is
Cabana’s central goal, and he believes that it’s the goal of other Travelers
that he has encountered.
He also talks about “hitting bottom” which I connect with the
process of overcoming addiction. In the
context of this book, “hitting bottom” means a time of reflection and
self-examination. I read in this book
that some Travelers imagine that they will find people in Third World cultures
who are purely traditionalist and uninfluenced by Western aspirations. It seems to me that they are seeking iconic
representations from the pages of National
Geographic rather than the real individuals who actually live there. When these Travelers “hit bottom”, they
should consider re-examining how they view people in the countries through
which they are journeying.
Cabana himself respects diversity. He says that “tolerance” is one of his
favorite words. “Liminality” is one of my favorite words. It is the state of being an outsider. I think that Travelers are supremely
liminal. They leave their cultures of
origin because they don’t feel at home there, yet they can never permanently
connect with any other culture because they are continually moving on. Some readers who value a sense of belonging
may find this very sad, but I have always appreciated the unique viewpoint of
those who live on the margins of our societies.
This book contains some observations about theology. I would characterize Cabana’s approach as pantheist. He believes that the divine is everywhere and
that we are all one while still being distinct individuals.
If Travelers: The
Meaningful Journey can be said to have a flaw, I think it’s a failure to
give enough credit to those of us who stay at home. As a rather cautious individual with very
limited financial resources, I content myself with armchair travel through
books. A book too can be a journey. Like the Fool of the Tarot, a reader steps
out blithely into the world of a book without knowing whether the consequence
of this experience will be a metaphorical fall from a precipice. I would also
like to point out that if you live in a major city or its environs, you can
encounter people from other cultures and learn from them. You needn’t travel to another continent to
discover cultural diversity and be changed by it. Travel is not the only means of
transformation.
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A Digestif of Chateaubriand
Cabana discusses the phenomenon of "reverse cultural shock" which means that you no longer feel part of your own culture when you return home from extended travel. As an example, he quotes the author François-René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848) as having said that he felt more alone in France than he had been away from France.
The work by Chateaubriand that Cabana is quoting from is René . According to the Wikipedia Article on Chateaubriand's Novella , it is about a fictional young man who settles among the Natchez of Louisiana as Chateaubriand himself did for a while. René can be found in a combined edition with Atala translated into English according to Worldcat. It was originally part of a much longer work called Les Natchez which is available for download in French at The Internet Archive.
Cabana discusses the phenomenon of "reverse cultural shock" which means that you no longer feel part of your own culture when you return home from extended travel. As an example, he quotes the author François-René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848) as having said that he felt more alone in France than he had been away from France.
The work by Chateaubriand that Cabana is quoting from is René . According to the Wikipedia Article on Chateaubriand's Novella , it is about a fictional young man who settles among the Natchez of Louisiana as Chateaubriand himself did for a while. René can be found in a combined edition with Atala translated into English according to Worldcat. It was originally part of a much longer work called Les Natchez which is available for download in French at The Internet Archive.
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