I am planning another travel to Japan. I feel like I'm having more fun planning the trip. I suppose there is an element of risque to it. This is my third backpack trip. So.. things haven't really gone south for me so far. Because when you're backpacking you're never sure that the internet is 100% faithful to reality and you just kinda roll with the punches. For example, catching a ferry from Tagbilaran to Cebu-- I know that that facility is there and it's supposed to work, well what if doesn't-- the ferry is on a holiday or there are no trips or whatever. There will be legs on the trip which you cannot book in advance. You'll just have to show up there an hope to hell it works.

That said, when I say backpack, I'm not saying like white people live off the land and daddy's credit card for three month's kind of deal-- Backpacking for me means I have ten days to see and experience as much as I can of this alien place without breaking the bank. There are strict constraints to time and money here so I better make it work.

On the other hand though, planning helps me travel twice. I travel the first time when I am doing research on places to go and things to do. I make all the mistakes I can make- missing the bus, miscalculating the time in transfers (too short, too long), etc. You get to understand how some places are built and you experience it from afar.  Then you go on the actual trip where see if your meticulous planning will work. And it does, it will, it has to, or else I'll be fucked.

I'm making it sound like this travel thing is a strict step 1-2-3 kind of a thing. Yes and no. I make sure that I am not hassling myself. I am on vacation after all. I make it to a point that there is enough slack for randomness, which oh my god, these travels can be super random. You get to meet people who are on the same journey as you. I travelled with my daughter so we had good days and bad days. I can't even begin. We were walking in Tokyo, three people in go-karts dressed as Mario characters drove by. My daughter was like "Daddy, they are playing Mario Kart in the streets of Japan!" No it is never predictable. And it only works if you give the slack to BE unpredictable. This is why those travel agency tours will never be this fun. There is no room for something to go horribly wrong or right. That Tagbilaran to Cebu? The ferry was there, sure, the commute from my hostel to the ferry I figured out that you can take a habal habal to the port the night before I left.

This trip I will do it with my brother and my ex. Like when I say ex. I feel like she'll probably the person I marry. It's a whole can of worms on its own. I've talked about her enough in the past. I want to make another trip, solo. I want to do Egypt. That's next year. 

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I've been playing a lot of Stardew Valley, like, an unhealthy amount of Stardew Valley. I know now that I gave up too early on my other play throughs, because honestly it was hard as hell. I mean not hard, Dark Souls hard, but were you are starting from is really difficult. As you go on, and you gain profficiencies, everyday life become easier. The sense of immediacy becomes greater and greater. Day by day becomes more and more important because there is so much to accomplish. 

This is were I'm getting at. In Stardew Valley the small actions stack up. The minute-by-minute stack to the hour-by-hour to the day-by-day to week and so forth. You can sense the scale of which you are playing at. 

Okay, let me be philosophical here and say, isn't that something you don't see in real life-- that immediacy. That knowing that these acitons have effects a year, a decade into the future. We cannot see that. At least, I cannot see that. (which may explain my anxiety). In contrast to real life, Stardew Valley has long enough cause to make the effect meaningful. And its a farming sim, that is what it supposed to do-- to make you realize that what you plant today you harvest tomorrow, or eight days from now depending on what seed you planted.

I can't tell you if the effect of this game to me is a net positive or negative. On the one hand, I feel more optimistic, in the realization that I am planting seeds and just watering them for a pay off in the future. It will be trudge, but all trudges has a reward. On the other hand though, what if doesn't? Hahah. Here me out. What if there is doesn't work out? What if this game isn't really reflective of real life? I am seriously fucked up-- as a person. BUT. It is helping me understand scales of life. Like the previous thing I wrote about story arcs. This games helps me peg what minute-to-minute, hour-by-hour, day-by-day means, and that's enough. 

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Posted by big.mati on July 5, 2018 at 05:00 AM | COMMENT TEXT!
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