Why travel friendships never last Paul Hansford From: news.com.au April 13, 2011 10:27AM 4 commentsIncrease Text Size Decrease Text Size Print Email Share Add to Digg Add to del.icio.us Add to Facebook Add to Kwoff Add to Myspace Add to Newsvine What are these?
No matter how fun they are, friends made while travelling just don't last. Picture: Flickr user Uncleweed I'VE decided I'm going to get a little business card made up to hand out to potential friends I meet on the road.
It will simply read: "I know we're going to get on really well. We'll hang out all the time, experience life-changing moments together, see wonderful sights and get drunk on many occasions. But we're never going to call/email/Skype/Facebook when I get back home. If you're cool with that, great. If not, then it's best we stop this right now."
The card is designed to save me a lot of time and effort, but it's not because I think travel friendships are fake or not worth developing. It's just that I know they rarely continue after your trip and there's no point in leading someone on with promises of emails, video calls or ten year reunions. I've had enough friends fall off the face of the earth and my expectation of travel relationships has changed drastically over the years.
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Let's take the "friend" I made on the road last week as an example.
I hooked up with Geoff, a photographer, for a trip from Berlin to Utrecht in Holland, stopping off halfway overnight in the quaint medieval town of Osnabruck.
Flying down the Autobahn the conversation quickly flowed like we were lifelong pals, chatting about work, music, family and friends for hours. During our evening meal over several beers, secrets were spilled like we were a couple of Wikileaks journos with a pile of CIA documents. We got on like a house on fire and I genuinely felt a little sad when he flew home and I took up the last leg of the trip alone.
But we both knew we wouldn't keep in touch.
No emails were exchanged, no "let's catch up in a couple of weeks" were uttered.
We'd had our travel bromance but we also knew its boundaries. We'll drop each other a line again at some point, but we weren't kidding ourselves that we'd just found our new best mate.
The harsh reality is that travel friendships hardly ever last.
I'm not saying it isn't possible, but for every lifelong friend made on the road there's hundreds of examples of people losing touch when they return to the reality of normal life and the daily grind of the 9-to-5.
But why does this happen? Why do people who make a genuine connection on the road fail to follow it up when they're back at home?
Firstly, it has a lot to do with the "holiday you" not being the "real you".
The "holiday you" is far more open to new relationships, other people and sharing experiences with them in a way you just don't feel when you are at home.
Also, the intensity of a travel relationship can never be matched by email or social networking when you get home.
The reason you became friends in the first place - a connection grown from being with someone 24/7 and getting to know them intimately - is no longer there to bind you together. Without that contact to develop a burgeoning friendship, the relationship tends to unravel within a few weeks.
Ironically, I think the reason travel relationships work so well is because deep down we know that we're not going to keep them when the trip ends. We share our thoughts, hopes and secrets to relative strangers because we know they're not going to last.
This doesn't mean travel friendships are any less meaningful than stronger bonds forged over many years. They are just different and if recognised as such can be as fulfilling as any long-term friend you will ever make.
I like to look at travel friendships in the same way as I do the destinations I visit. They're great while you're there but you can't take them with you.
Every once in a while you get out the few photos you have, reminisce about the great times you had and hope that one day you might see them again.
At least that's what I keep telling myself.
Geoff, if you read this, call me. I miss you. Sniff...
