Accepting Imperfection

After being fined on the metro in Budapest for having the wrong ticket, and handing over practically all of my cash intended for the weekend, I felt as if my entire trip had been ruined just three hours after arriving in Hungary. Traveling to a foreign country comes with culture shock. And it’s easy to be overwhelmed with this shock after dealing with a not so ideal situation. At the time, handing over my money on the metro made me feel as if I should have never attempted to leave Amsterdam in the first place. However, the situation ending up teaching me a very important lesson about traveling. You can hope and plan for perfection as much as you want to, and you may even be lucky enough to have a trip with no complications. But you have to understand that when you travel to even the most beautiful of places, you still are traveling in a world full of mishaps and unanticipated difficulties. People miss flights. People get off on the wrong bus stops. And sometimes people get fined on the metro. That’s just how life goes sometimes. Accepting imperfections in your travel plans will lift a huge burden off your shoulders that is often brought about by skyhigh expectations. In the grand scheme of things, it would be asking far too much of yourself to make zero mistakes while you’re trying to navigate a foreign country. Accept the losses you may face and appreciate all of the things that do go right. Traveling is an incredible privilege that should never be overshadowed by little bumps in the road. While I still wish I had that money, Budapest was an incredible place, and I positively reflect on my time there even with the complications I faced.