There … I said it!

It’s not some huge achievement … it’s really just a goal. So I’m aiming to hit my 100th country before 40 (6 years from now), which shouldn’t be a difficult goal, but then the most difficult commodity to find in your 30’s is actually time!

All the social pressures are multiplied and the gloves come off in terms of social pressures to conform …

• Gotta get married
• Got to have kids before the woman’s eggs are dried up and we end up with special children
• Got to find money to pay for the ring and wedding
• Have to start planning for retirement … since the advertising from the banks ensure that you feel like crap now and that you’ll be fearful in 30 -40 years that you’ll be broke and living like a hobo

So try and balance those pressures, along with a goal that is mutually exclusive to those things. Don’t you think it’s a bit difficult? So what happens? I’ll tell … somewhere along the line, you either find a super happy compromise or you give up something.

Travelling along at a good pace … you don’t realize how many places there are to visit, except that there are a couple fantastic websites with a true inventory of places to visit. When you get to those websites, you’re really put in your place as a traveller. I’m not here to debate what is travelling or the style of travelling … whether going to countries for a couple days or even a long weekend constitutes a travelling experience or whether I should take a year off for the “Round the world” trip that is becoming so popular with people my age.

I’m going to leave all the qualitative arguments, about what is meant by the word “visit”. Some travellers claim you must spend a night in a place; some argue it is enough to visit a lavatory there; some will say you have to sleep on a park bench or do it for less than $2 USD to make it real … I don’t really care about the qualitative aspects, I’m going to get to more

When I first started travelling, I based my “Top 100 bucket list” on the Hillman Wonders list, then as I got to more and more of that list, I also realized that there tons of places that weren’t on the list and that I wanted to visit. So while doing a search for other well travelled Trinis, I stumbled upon a newspaper article on Charles Veley (who is the world’s most travelled man) … obviously this dude had the fortune of being a millionaire in his 30’s, so he had time to craft and formulate a plan to achieve his goal of being the most travelled person in the world – which is no mean accomplishment!! He even developed a website and created a master catalogue of places … again, the luxury of having money to play with :D

Did you know that there is a phrase to describe uncontrollable wanderlust : Dromomania. It is the addiction to new experiences, the vagabond neurosis. I’m pretty sure that I don’t have that particular mania … since I do like being in my house and I don’t really think I’m an experience junkie … this weekend, I had tons of fun just lying in bed watching movies on TV. Never underestimate the awesomeness of simple pleasures.

Anyway … back to the list … so now having wasted time cataloging and stalking the list to come up with a total of 208 for myself, puts me on the Gold list, I found that Garron Hansen was the #1 Trini with 137 places … so I had to investigate, then in true Trini macco forms … I “googled” him to figure out, he wasn’t even a Trini … well me thinks so … I will add him on facebook and macco then 😀

Anyway, it’s about 24 days before I head out to Trinidad for Carnival 2012 … hopefully there will be more feedback on my Trini World Beating Quest!