Collegiate Travel Advice

College
students have a rap for telling it like it is. 

There’s rarely any sugar-coating or beating around the bush.  When something sucks, they tell you it
sucks in the most truthful, succinct way possible: “This sucks!”

It was therefore, with a sense of nostalgia that I came across an amusing article of travel tips compiled solely by college
students
.

Journalist Janet Eastman spent five months accompanying 700 students on a Semester-at-Sea program.  At its
conclusion, she asked the students to email her the best travel advice they learned on their journey.  The results
were refreshingly candid. 

In today’s age of worry-warts, paranoia, bird flu, kidnappings, and other travel horrors, it is so very nice
to hear from a generation who can throw caution to the wind, as the saying goes. 

The basic theme that seemed to emerge fell along the lines of, “Eat everything and diarrhea be
damned.”  This carpe diem approach included such recommendations as, “talk to strangers,”
“be prepared to squat,” “forget your puritanical inhibitions,” and “be
selfish.”

Such collegiate council, however, was also balanced with some very wise and seasoned advice.  This
shouldn’t come as a surprise.  College students are far more apt to embrace every aspect of their travels
and see things through a different pair of eyes than the typical tourist.  “Don’t deny a fellow human
being his or her humanity” was the most touching lesson absorbed by some college student on his travels and
passed on as his most learned advice.