exciting, friends, and lessons are not only the fruit of travel

When I was just an early teen, I had read a book called “The Wall”. In one sentence, the story would be like that: one man who get lost into world’s end finally end up to be one broad flat wall. Maybe sounds stupid, and it was definitely stupid specially for a boy who just finished elementary school. it was just a delusional dream for me. Even though I couldn't understand anything, except that it was written in Japanese, I had been gradually obsessed with the idea of “world’s end”. I was dreaming with fear how world’s end is like, while played with this idea which always escapes from my hand when I tried to catch. But at that time there were so many “walls” around me, at least I felt so, because of severe entrance competition for high school and so on. World’s end looked like far far away from me, geographically as well as conceptually, since, not surprisingly, I did not have any clue about where it exists or what it is.

Five years later, I got a chance to come to Europe. I came to Lisbon, and I was already determined where to visit first - Cabo da Roca - the westernmost extent of Eurasian landmass. At that time I was 20, so I didn't have a strong obsession for world’s end like in my teens, but still I somehow felt uncomfortable as if I had left something unsolved which I had to solve. I went for the world’s end, bringing the book still lingering in my head. In transportations I spent all the time for reading, actually it was fifth time to read the book, and finally arrived the cape before finishing. That day was really windy, bit cold for end of winter, and cloudy but for the first day I could see the sun in my stay in Lisbon. I stood by the cast, listing the sound water crushes to rocks, and watching various blue colors existing under the surface of the sea and sunlight from clouds trying to embrace something. I sat concave rocky place where shut out wind, and opened the book again.

There was no great encounter with fascinating event, no new friendship, no exciting thrill. But still travel can be travel. I just felt I had done my job. There was no answer. Even no question. Some might say that was meaningless. But in such a world sometimes only in travel we are allowed to pay attention to such an objectively trivial consideration, even if it is serious for oneself. And if we could spend even a little time and money for such a trivial consideration, life could be more high resolution and more delicate. This is my unforgettable memory about travel.