Why I Travel

There’s more than one reason why I wander.

Zenaido Torres

People often ask me why I travel so much.

The short answer is that I enjoy discovering new places. But a long time ago I realized that wasn't the real reason. The truth is, I travel for many reasons.

And I can't explain any of them without going back to some of my earliest memories.

The first journey I remember was when I was eight years old. My mother took me to the bus station in Minatitlán, Veracruz, where I boarded a bus alone to Tehuantepec, Oaxaca, to spend the summer with my father and grandmother.

It was a six-hour trip.

I still remember the surprised looks from adults who couldn't believe a child was traveling on his own. It's the same look I still get today whenever someone finds out I'm somewhere on the other side of the world.

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I, on the other hand, wasn't afraid. I spent the entire ride glued to the window, watching the landscape go by with a curiosity I still recognize in myself today.

That journey became part of every school vacation. Over time it stopped feeling like an adventure and became familiar. I learned how to switch buses to shorten the trip, how to find my way around, and more than once I even hitchhiked.

Years later, as a teenager, I developed another habit. Almost every afternoon I would sit on a retaining wall near my house and spend hours watching trucks, cars, buses, and trailers drive by.

I wondered where they had come from. Where they were going. What those places looked like.

At the time, I didn't realize it, but what I truly wanted was to travel.

Maybe I wanted to escape the world I knew. Or maybe I was simply searching for another one where my life could become more than I had imagined.

Then came another great journey: moving to Mexico City to attend university.

More than a change of city, it was a completely different life.

I wanted to explore every corner, wander through unfamiliar streets, and see as much of the city as I could. Whenever I had the chance, I started taking short road trips. But it wasn't until I was twenty-nine that I boarded an airplane for the first time.

It was a business trip from Mexico City to Monterrey.

The excitement was exactly the same as the one I'd felt years earlier when that eight-year-old boy climbed onto a bus by himself.

Five years later came my first international trip, to Los Angeles.

And I never really stopped.

I've continued exploring my own country while discovering many others. Today I've visited nearly fifty countries, and every one of them has left me with something different. That's why I truly believe it's never too late to start traveling.

Over the years, the way I travel has changed as well.

Today I don't travel to escape the world. I travel to immerse myself in it. I no longer travel to check destinations off a list. I travel to collect experiences.

I suppose that, deep down, I've always been a wanderer. I find it hard to stay in one place for too long without wondering what lies beyond the next landscape, the next city, or the next country.

Whatever inspires me to pack a suitcase, all my journeys have one thing in common: they invite me to leave routine behind and embrace the unknown.

I leave behind the comfort of knowing exactly what's going to happen. I walk unfamiliar streets, try new flavors, talk to people I'll probably never meet again, and discover that their lives can be so different... and yet so much like my own.

I travel because it inspires me. Every place makes me wonder what it would be like to live there, how someone like me could become part of that world without leaving his roots behind. I suppose that's why so many of those places eventually find their way into my novels.

Over time I've also realized that journeys aren't measured in miles or days.

Some take us to the farthest corners of the world. Others are much closer: the neighboring town, the museum I've been meaning to visit, the sculpture I've walked past for years without really seeing, or even a book or a film capable of transporting me somewhere else.

Sometimes you don't have to go very far to travel.

Sometimes all it takes is looking at the world differently.

Walking to work as if you were seeing the city for the first time. Allowing yourself to be surprised by the ordinary.

Travel reminds me that the world is far bigger than the small piece of it I know, and that there's always something more to discover, both out there and within myself.

It also brings me back to my roots with a deeper sense of gratitude. And almost every time I return home, I come back inspired... with new ideas, new stories, and new plans to pack my suitcase all over again.