I love it when friends say they want to join me on my travels. Most of them know I enjoy exploring places I’ve never seen, and those who give a little thought to what I post about my journeys understand one more thing: I like to wing it.
In that regard, I share the same approach to travel as Anthony Bourdain, the late chef who fashioned himself as Renaissance man. Perhaps he was, although his arrogance, his elitism made that a difficult label to attach to him.
Bourdain didn’t necessarily go in search of the perfect experience — the perfect dinner, the perfect drink, the perfect adventure. Perfection isn’t out there, is it?
“I’m a big believer that you’re never going to find perfect city travel experience or the perfect meal without a constant willingness to experience a bad one,” he once said.
From his “Parts Unknown” journeys, Bourdain learned to welcome the happy accidents, those experiences he didn’t discover in Rick Steves travel books or on Facebook, Reddit or some other travel site.
“Happy accidents” are what make travel so rewarding. For a happy accident allows you to discover a barbecue joint in Frankfurt, Germany, that would thrive in most cities in the United States; it helps you find salmon soup in Helsinki, Finland, inside a market in the heart of the city.
What about sushi at a chain-like restaurant and soul food in Tokyo? The Mediterranean restaurant in Auckland, New Zealand, proved a surprise that I bumped into accidentally, though it probably was on someone’s list of places to dine.
Yet I’ve had swings and misses aplenty. I have no doubt that Bourdain did too. In my case, who would I have thought springbok, an elk-like animal common in South Africa, would taste like iron? How about a barbecue chicken pizza in Da Nang, Vietnam, that was poorly seasoned chicken atop dough with little and even less barbecue sauce.
Few people travel the world for food alone. Some want adventure; some want the joy of soaking up history and culture; some want to get away from the chaos in their homeland and find peace of mind abroad.
I wish all of them would chase Bourdain’s happy accident.
“Letting the happy accident happen is what a lot of vacation itineraries miss,” Bourdain once said. “I’m always trying to push people to allow those things to happen rather than stick to some rigid itinerary.”
It’s impossible for chronic planners — and several people I’ve traveled with are — to think like Bourdain, because they prefer to avoid risks while traveling abroad, as if they expect their experiences to mirror what they’ve read about on Reddit.
I don’t mind an itinerary; it isn’t a bad thing. But I don’t want to plan my days abroad down to the millisecond. I don’t need to eat breakfast at 7:05 a.m. each day when I’m weighing what place I want to try breakfast this morning. Is scheduling lunch for 1:15 p.m. mean I might have to cut short my visit to Centre Pompidou or Musée d’Orsay?
Or skip The Louvre altogether?
I don’t want to miss any of these global experiences, nor do I want to keep my friends from joining me on my travels abroad. But I need them to embrace Bourdain’s “happy accidents” first.
If they can’t, I’ll be leaving home without ’em.
