An Ordinary, Common, Usual, Normal, Regular, Average, Typical, Customary, Plain “Why Travel” Seminar

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Well, why travel? This is indeed a very vast and interesting topic. Last Monday, in English class, we had an intense debate about “why travel”. Overall, it was a deep, philosophical, and entertaining talk about the purpose, strategies, difficulties, and more of traveling.

A few days ago, our teacher, Dr. Terrett, gave us all quotes about traveling to let us make notes of ideas about traveling. I, to be honest, did not consider it as a problem. I only prepared some key points about the themes of a few quotes on the first page. This caused me to be surprised later on.

On Monday, Dr. Terrett chose two students to lead the seminar. Me and Anna were chosen, but Anna didn’t come that day, so I worked with Leo instead. When I was selected, at that point, my brain was awed along with me. I had expected anything except for leading. About a second later, I chose to follow my destiny.

After sitting with Leo, I’ve experienced the importance of having a well-prepared teammate. I was very impressed by his passion for English. His paper was filled with notes and highlights, and since I had done nearly nothing, I decided to put my ideas on his paper. Minutes later, Dr. Terrett came and made us do a PPT page of travel questions. I came up with several good questions, which was the most I could do when unprepared.

Then the seminar started. I decided to be a questioner who points at people and lets them answer questions. Throughout the whole discussion, all I did was agree on peoples’ points and read questions while Leo made notes on the whiteboard (he quit later). I felt I did not contribute to the conference and had nothing to say. 

As for the content of the discussion, I don’t remember much since I wasn’t a part of it. I do know that Joshua, Matthew, Daniel, Crystal, Elaine, and a few others made some interesting points about The Alchemist, different quotes, and other texts while debating topics such as “Why travel?”, “When to start/stop traveling?”, and “Is traveling as a team better or is traveling alone better?”. The conversation was deep but everyone (well, most people) had benefited from it.

From a perspective of the future, I regret not preparing thoroughly. If I had more preparation, I could’ve been involved in the discussion instead of pointing at people to answer questions and saying “mm-hm”. Although I thought of interesting questions, I could’ve done better, with more effort, than N/A. If I had another chance in the future, I’d organize enough information for me to engage in the discussion.

Comments (3)

  1. A clearly written reflection. I like how you connect your unexpected leadership role and your destiny. Now you have revealed your lack of preparation, I must say I am reconsidering that N/A 🙄

  2. Impressive selection of vocabulary! I truly admire your honesty, along with your willingness to strictly criticize yourself, as you unhesitantly mentioned that you didn’t prepare adequately for the seminar. Great allusion from “The Alchemist.” “About a second later, I chose to follow my destiny.” I personally suggest that adding the conclusions for the topics the attendees covered within the seminar could really improve the quality of your reflective blog. Be aware of your tenses, as after you said “After sitting with Leo, I’ve experienced……” you switched from present tense to past tense, which typically shouldn’t happen within the same paragraph.

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