Plastic Souvenirs

by Cara Thomas (South Africa)

I didn't expect to find South Africa

Travel in today’s time has a different edge than years past. You see it everywhere plain as day. What used to be a unique and surprising curio brought back from a faraway land now presents itself in plastic glory on the shelves of the bulk & cheap stores. Anything and everything brought back from travels tend to have their less valuable and unimpressive counterpart awaiting in your own land. Even certain bits of knowledge transcend the boundaries of water and flight that is travel. Learning something new at the sides of locals, traversing new and exciting places, could have been done just as easily with a quick search on Google or any other social platform. Of course some travel not for the culture but for the aesthetic. Taking beautiful pictures with immaculate scenery at the background of delicately poised internet models. That should have the likes rolling in. others use travel as a way to snub others. “Oh you went to India for vacation. Seems nice. A cheap place. We of course went to France. No experience to expensive you know, if you travel like we do.” Then you travel for the first time. You pack your bags excitedly while trying to remain aloof. In recent years it’s gotten to be so normal to travel oversees that being excited about it is stupid. You set off on your adventure to whatever your destination. Obviously you wonder at all the things that seem so different and unreal. Especially if you’re from a poorer country like I am. My first trip from South Africa was to spend a couple of weeks in Amsterdam and it felt like two completely different realities. Everything is bigger and better and moving away from your homeland seems logical. Your parents are constantly lamenting about how much better its goings to be. You realize that everything about travel is suddenly connected to the word better. The trains are better. The houses are better. The crime is better. What you don’t expect to find is when hearing all this is doubt. Suddenly you are faced with doubt. How could I possibly fit into this bigger and better place? Everyone seems so rich, so knowledgeable, so accustomed to this place. Not you. You feel like an ant compared to the splendor. So you worry about all sorts of things. Your place in the grand scheme of life and how exactly you could fit in. You seem to doubt all aspects of yourself that previously you gave no mind to. How would they react to my clothes, my accent, and my qualifications? So now you buy the souvenir and you learn the new recipe or phrase. You go home. What you learnt from your journey was something that now has an effect on your thought process of you home. You suddenly find the nuances with your homeland endearing. You miss the frustrating and eye-rolling moments you are used to. A fire to love your heritage and love your country has started within you. Now when I see tourists I tend to be forgiving. They are clearly out of place. They dress strangely, have hard to understand accents and we seem to keep misunderstanding each other on an intellectual basis. Being different in any other place than home is difficult. So while you learnt to be doubtful in your capacity when travelling, you also learnt to be humble. There is more on this earth than just the tiny spec you live in. Not only that but everyone’s spec differs. So now every time you look at the plastic figurine you bought, or the photos you took in scenic places, you remember what it means to be a traveler. It means being sure in unsure situations and knowing to be adaptable to unexpected situations. It also means being kinder when faced by tourists and more understanding of their uncertainty. A stupid piece of plastic now has so much more depth than any replica at a bulk and cheap store.