The other day I was surfing through the channels when a clip on the discovery channel happened to catch my attention. There was this program that was aired on the channel, and they were specially focusing on the ancient modes of travel and the aspects of travel in the ancient days. I found the program to be very interesting as most of the programs in the discovery channel are. It kind of kindled my imagination and I thought of putting down my thoughts and perceptions on the topic, not to the paper but to the internet. Now I am not a great writer, and leave alone great, I am not even a writer. So don’t accept any great insights on the blog. I am just blabbing my thoughts, views, and the incidents related to the topic.
Bullock carts and horse carts are two of the oldest modes of travelling. Traveling was more or less a kind of need in the earlier days. The modes of transportation were a big trouble in the earlier times. On top of that people had to actually travel miles at a stretch to procure the commodities that they need. Just imagine traveling for twenty days just to get some cotton for the clothes. Freaky isn’t it. You bet this is something unthinkable , at least in the current scheme of things? Now tell me, all of you must have heard your grandparents retell how plans were made for days together in order to make a visit to a relative’s place. Even the preparations to go to a relatives place used to be somewhat festive. Preparations used to go on for months altogether, right from the dates, the food that has to be carried as a sign of goodwill for the relatives, the gifts have to be decided so on and so forth.
So traveling was actually quite a serious business in the times of our grandparents and great grand parents. This conception is actually very novel to us, the current breed of people. And today, visits to relations are rarely seen as travel at all. We are with the conception that, traveling necessarily means visits to tourist spots or other adventurous activities like, trekking, surfing, bungee jumping so on and so forth. In fact visits to the familial relations are found to be very boring by the current crop of young generation. And in the hustle and bustle of the present world people are actually left with very less time to make cordial visits to the relations. Any spare time is spent with family and friends or in some exotic locale.
Earlier however, this conception was not even born. Traveling necessarily meant visits to family and relations. And there was proper planning for the same. But the worst part in traveling in the earlier days was that it was really time taking and pain staking. Even if we don’t go to the ancient ages, and take the case of around 1century back, travel used to take days altogether. If a person wanted to travel from one country to another there was no other alternative other than the sea. In case of intra country travel it was most of the time roadways or water ways. And even in roadways most of the time it was most of the time carts and very rarely cars and buses. All the nooks and corners of all the places in the world were not accessible to the rail network in those days. Hence it was a case of great fortune if your hometown and your destination are connected by the railways. In short, travel was more of an ordeal than fun. At least the journey to the destination and the journey back were tortures in real terms. People used to take days to wash of the fatigue and tiredness that their travel left them with. But then people were not complaining. For them that was fun that we today find to be absolute pain in the butt. We never know what our grandchildren would be thinking of our conception regarding travel. Changes are bound to occur. We can only pray that we don’t turn out to be as outmoded as our fore fathers turned out to be.
Bullock carts and horse carts are two of the oldest modes of travelling. Traveling was more or less a kind of need in the earlier days. The modes of transportation were a big trouble in the earlier times. On top of that people had to actually travel miles at a stretch to procure the commodities that they need. Just imagine traveling for twenty days just to get some cotton for the clothes. Freaky isn’t it. You bet this is something unthinkable , at least in the current scheme of things? Now tell me, all of you must have heard your grandparents retell how plans were made for days together in order to make a visit to a relative’s place. Even the preparations to go to a relatives place used to be somewhat festive. Preparations used to go on for months altogether, right from the dates, the food that has to be carried as a sign of goodwill for the relatives, the gifts have to be decided so on and so forth.
So traveling was actually quite a serious business in the times of our grandparents and great grand parents. This conception is actually very novel to us, the current breed of people. And today, visits to relations are rarely seen as travel at all. We are with the conception that, traveling necessarily means visits to tourist spots or other adventurous activities like, trekking, surfing, bungee jumping so on and so forth. In fact visits to the familial relations are found to be very boring by the current crop of young generation. And in the hustle and bustle of the present world people are actually left with very less time to make cordial visits to the relations. Any spare time is spent with family and friends or in some exotic locale.
Earlier however, this conception was not even born. Traveling necessarily meant visits to family and relations. And there was proper planning for the same. But the worst part in traveling in the earlier days was that it was really time taking and pain staking. Even if we don’t go to the ancient ages, and take the case of around 1century back, travel used to take days altogether. If a person wanted to travel from one country to another there was no other alternative other than the sea. In case of intra country travel it was most of the time roadways or water ways. And even in roadways most of the time it was most of the time carts and very rarely cars and buses. All the nooks and corners of all the places in the world were not accessible to the rail network in those days. Hence it was a case of great fortune if your hometown and your destination are connected by the railways. In short, travel was more of an ordeal than fun. At least the journey to the destination and the journey back were tortures in real terms. People used to take days to wash of the fatigue and tiredness that their travel left them with. But then people were not complaining. For them that was fun that we today find to be absolute pain in the butt. We never know what our grandchildren would be thinking of our conception regarding travel. Changes are bound to occur. We can only pray that we don’t turn out to be as outmoded as our fore fathers turned out to be.
1 comment:
great work done by the wtiter and also hats off to the blog writer to have actually locate the article......very refreshing read.
Post a Comment