I know the best reasons for hanging a world map in your living room. So much so that I created a company.
It would be easy for me to tell you the 5 reasons, but I would rather let a friend of mine, Valérie, who, one day, moved me with the story of her mother who opened up to the world. when her daughter (my friend) decided to take a trip to the end of the world, to Bali.
It is through this story that you will learn the 5 best reasons.
I let her tell you about her wonderful story.
Once upon a time, a world map
First, thank you Dominique for allowing me to tell this story to your beautiful Easy Planet Travel community.
It all started in 2014 when I attended my first yoga class. It was love at first sight and I had the impression of finding a comfort zone that I had lost. So, 6 months later, I decided to enroll in a training course to teach yoga. I remember that I had a very strong desire to take this course , It’s like I had to transmit the benefits that this practice brought me, and this, at all levels.
At the end of the training in the fall 2014, the teacher informed us that in March 2015, she will be offering a yoga retreat in Bali. After that, for at least a month , I received a lot of strange signs. Once at the Archambault store a backpack fell at my feet as well as a notebook with the image of a young Southeast Asian woman.
The question was, can I afford to go? No ! But, the desire was too strong. So I borrowed some money from my dad and opened up a line of credit at the bank. I have to go !
When I told my mom I was going to Bali, she said : Where is this? I told her that it is 30 hours from here by plane. My mother widens her eyes and says: Wow, that’s far away!
You should know that my mother has very little schooling and that geography was far from being her favorite subject. In her days, traveling was for the rich, So her thought was ” what’s the point of learning about the world”?
One thing though , the long 30 hours by plane must have made her curious because she asked my father for a world map for her birthday, December 8, She wanted to know where Bali was.
Of course my mother had seen a world map before, but when she received the one she requested for her birthday, it was different. it’s as if suddenly the world was calling her.
So when I showed her the very small island of Bali among the hundreds of other islands in Indonesia, she started to trace with her finger, the route between Quebec and the tiny island of Bali, on which I will find myself for a month. I saw her fascination. She was developing her curiosity.
That’s when she started looking at all the places around the island of Bali, and then those around all the other places. She was amazed to discover where New Zealand, Hawaii, Afghanistan were ( she had heard so much about these places since 2001). She was opening up to the world.
And then, My mother, who had never even dreamed of traveling, suddenly had a spark in her eyes and started to dream of one day visiting Peru and Egypt. With her world map she was now able to discover where the big cities of the world were located, like Madrid in Spain, Beijing in China, Sydney in Australia. She then became interested in the American states and made the connections between the cities she saw on the map and the films and songs she watched and listened to. When she watched the news and heard about something happening at such a place, she was going to see on her map where it was. Without realizing it, my mother was learning geography, history and culture. Her world was expanding. I found it very touching to see her discover the world through her map.
Then, the big day of my departure arrived. My flight will make 2 layovers. Montreal-Vancouver, Vancouver-Taipei and Taipei-Bali. My mom enjoyed following my itinerary. She even pined the destinations on her map. I liked to think that she was traveling with me.
When I got back, my mother was very happy to show me her thumbtacks on her map. With each photo I sent her of Bali, she typed the name of the place on Google Map to see where I was exactly. She asked me a ton of questions like how people live there and wanted to learn about their religion, rituals, climate, flora and fauna. The more she asked me questions about my trip, the more we connected. We shared a lot of special mother-daughter moments. I felt so blessed to be able to share these moments with my mother, my heart was overflowing with joy. This is where a dream was born in her: she said to me “one day my daughter, you and I will go to Bali”.
The pandemic has slowed down our plans, but one day, one day very soon I hope, you and I mom, we will be going to Bali together.
The End.
Isn’t that a great story that my friend shared with us? Have you noticed the 5 reasons to hang a map of the world in your living room? I’m sure you have them all, but let’s go over them again, shall we?
1- Develop your curiosity
2- Open up to the world
3- Dream
4- Learn about the history, geography and culture of the world.
5- Create memorable moments with your loved ones.
I invite you, like my friend’s mother, to learn to know the world by offering you one of my personal world maps that I draw by hand.
Wishing to give you the desire to broaden your horizons and to dream.
