Lens

This is perhaps the proper second time I'm solo traveling (unless you count the short time periods in between friends and family in Colorado for example). I was pretty sentimental going into this post but then this pub/bar music is on and I'm a pint in, two pretty aggressively middle class activities (like most of my trips, which is why I prefer to write in private in respect and disagree with Rovik's broadcasting). Don't get me wrong I think there is essentially nothing wrong with travel unless you are arrogant/ignorant enough to believe it is 'affordable' for everyone if you 'plan right' or that it is an option freely available or desirable.
Trying a new line breaking white text things which I think will be fun.
I was thinking about this when Chris talked about Americans who love their hometown to a point of disliking others. Although it's hard to deny that travel will change people, I think the psychological/character effects 'traveler' types attribute to going overseas tends to be overestimated because the group is self-selecting in the first place, much like how 'effective' elite schools are if only elite people get in (so these people were bound to succeed in the first place to some extent). Similarly, one would have to study the specific subset of people who maybe were 'dragged' by family or significant others to travel, having first detested the idea, and then subsequently going through some significant change in perspective to really vindicate the idea that it opens your mind. In fact I think a lot of it really comes a lot earlier.
I will probably have a few of these in each post from now on if I remember.
I'm thinking about the eccentric Uber driver now which ties in to the point a little. Took a little detour reading up on The Last Samurai, a show he was basically obsessed with, in a weird way. I saw weird because...

^ I completed the above sentence but actually had an incomplete sentence before I took a long side-track to read Chris's blog, read about the LGBTQ+/LHY sagas in Singapore, and finally decide that actually, I was pretty comfortable reading/blogging and don't want to spend any more money tonight.

Now I'm back in the room where I think I'm being judged by 2 'almost-sleeping' people hearing me type furiously. C'est la vie d'auberge, non? Merde, j'ai oublié faire l'exercise Duolingo. Never mind I think. I actually feel quite stifled trying to keep my typing noise down... so maybe I'll finish, or even start a new post tomorrow... yea. The latter.