While many, many people will have you believe that seeing the world is everyone’s right and that those who don’t use that right are plain wasteful, I am here to tell you it is all false. I once heard somewhere that being in possession of a passport meant that the world is your playgorund and you can now play in it. True as that may be is not all the way absolute. Yes a passport gives the freedom and license to see the world but it does not give you means.

Greenbacks, muchos dineros. Money. Seeing the world is an expensive luxury and unless you have the means to do it, you won’t. There are many ways to explore our beautiful planet cheaply but without capital to get from point to point be, own a passport is pretty much useless.

I read an article once that challenged the non-travelled and questioned their excuses for not expanding their horizons, issues of work responsibilities, loan repayments and a family to take care of. These are not trival things, and are worth the consideration that people give them. However, as an avid traveller myself who is perpetually broke and in Constance wait for payday most days it worth single digit bank balance when I think of the things I have seen. I can get by this week on noodles because last week I took breath at the top of the Empire State building, it’s ok that I can’t enjoy a nice dinner out or that my electricity may be running out because in three days time I will wake tranquil waters of Fiji. At times like that it makes sense to me that my 20-something years were spent meeting new people and learning the way of the world from its citizens, while still living paycheck to paycheck.

“I just can’t afford it right now,” a friend once said to me. Perhaps, but the desire to see the world is a magnetic pull that never lets up. Ever since he was a child my father had always wanted to see the Alps, after reading about them in a book, the minute he had the means he found his way up there.

Having a passport will not show you the world, it will give the freedom if you have the means to go the rest of the way. So go forth and airport hop.