We all know that person who comes back from a trip abroad and cannot stop talking about it. Everything reminds them of their new favorite place — the place they really belong in.
After a while, spiels about their time abroad become tiresome and the you-had-to-be-there inside jokes about that thing that happened on the boat with the Australians begin to feel ostentatious.
You start to hate them, their pointed way of bringing up how much better the food was in “Barthelona” and how it was just so easy to walk everywhere in Europe as they show up 20 minutes late to dinner because they thought they’d just continue that tradition.
Of course, you don’t actually hate them; you want to be them, not in a braggadocious way, but in the sense that you want what they had. Who doesn’t feel a twinge of jealousy when somebody is plying them with stories recounting the best parts of a trip that no one else got to experience?
Travel does change you
Until recently, I was consistently the second person in that scenario, forcibly happy for all of my friends going to new places and experiencing the things that I only hoped I’d see one day. (Yes, I was actually happy for them, but I wanted their memories, sue me.)
When that day came, I understood the rambling and ravenous compulsion to talk about it every chance I got. I also realized that travel really does change you, and I’m not alone in making this assertion.
According to The Washington Post, studies have shown that people are more creative, open minded, trusting and agreeable after traveling.
Neuropsychologist Paul Nussbaum told The Post that this comes down to an improvement in brain health and that “when you engage in something that’s novel and complex, your brain thrives.”
Getting out of our routines and facing the challenges of travel, he said, allows us to see real benefits in our brain health.
A report by Forbes echoed this sentiment. According to Dr. Michael Merzenich, the “father of brain plasticity,” travelers who engage their brains in language learning and new experiences develop cognitive decay at lower rates.
Rather than give advice on how to deal with those people who go overboard in regaling their friends, family and the baristas at their local cafe with endless stories, I’d like to take another approach.
How to talk about your vacation in different situations
How do you, a recent vacationer, maximize your storytelling capacity?
Here are some scenarios in which you can bring up your trip for, if nothing else, some reminiscence and to assert your new worldliness over your peers.
Eating at a restaurant
This one is easy to imagine. You’re sitting on the restaurant patio, waiting for your food to be brought out, and you can’t help but notice that there isn’t a view facing a promenade or road bustling with people. You just can’t people watch at a little cafe table with a hot drink like you did in France. It just isn’t the same. Not only will pointing this out help you make your peers feel less worldly, but you’re also bringing the classic French pessimism to the dinner table. Technically, you’re providing them an immersive experience of sorts, encouraging them to seek the experiences you had.
When the food comes, there’s another equally annoying opportunity. Take a bite, savor it and remark, “This reminds me of the little Tuscan restaurant in Florence, but their gnocchi was so much richer.” Then, recall how the restaurant owner came out and thanked you personally for visiting his humble eatery and trail off thinking about the good ole days. Bring it back around with an, “Anyways, look at me talking your ear off about my trip...” This encourages your peers to excuse your ramblings and potentially ask more questions.
Of course, these can all be tailored to your destination, but I find that it’s usually more irritating when the anecdotes reference Europe.
Sitting in traffic
This scenario will likely happen to you multiple times post-trip, which means you’ll have plenty of openings, chances are with different people.
My go-to segue has been to bring up public transit and walkable cities. For example, while sitting in traffic in Los Angeles, I felt compelled to observe that the city would be better if it were walkable — nay, the entire country would benefit from walkable infrastructure, because “in France, I was able to walk from Nice to Villefranche-sur-Mer safely on the side of the road.”
There’s the simple, yet effective, “In France it would have been faster to walk.”
Or, another alternative could be, “Taking a train would be much faster. I took a train from...” You get the idea.
Posting to social media
With this option, you don’t have to be in a conversation at all, which is great for when you’re alone and still want to impose your memories on others.
What you’re going to do is this: Go through the hundreds of photos in your camera roll and select some to post to your Instagram feed or stories, post them with a cheeky comment about something you love about the location, and wait for comments and messages to roll in asking if you’re still abroad. This gives you an opening to talk about it with multiple people.
Going to the beach
While it’s a more limited scenario, this one still works wonders. When you’re sitting at the beach, comment on just how much bluer the water was on your trip. The natural segue here provides ample opportunities to share photos you took while you were abroad.
Then, of course, you can throw in the occasional, “The photos don’t do it justice, it looked so much more blue in person.”
Surely these are a mere few of the situations that you can leverage to boast about your last vacation, and I believe that you can find a way to connect an anecdote to almost anything.