I have always loved a job where travelling from place to place would be involved however the beautiful experience of visiting a place for the first time can be missed out on if the trip is for business purposes and not leisure but there is a way out. Travception; travel inception.
The first step is to visualize the trip as a holiday. Whip out your suitcase and pack in such a way that it’s sort of like inception, a trip (business) within a trip (leisure) its travception.
Completely put it out of your mind that it’s a work trip. Forget about your presentation and how badly you have to impress the client/customers. Step into an alternate mindset, one where the trip is a mini holiday; it’s inception, a holiday within a work trip.
How Does Travception Work:
1. How to pack: Yes, pack your starched white shirts and business casual outfits put that on one side of your luggage. On the other side luggage, you’ll have the tools you’ll need to be properly under and experience travception e.g jeans and sneakers.
2. Airport Tourist: When you land, you have to get tourist souvenirs like a T-shirt or face cap, this let the citizens of the country you’re in know you’re a tourist and watch them eagerly show off their culture to you; what better way to experience a new environment.
3. On a business trip, you are likely to arrive a day before so take advantage of that. Get as much sleep as you can on the plane because it’s holiday fun-time the minute you land!
4. On arrival: Once you check into your hotel, hop into the shower, gear up in your jeans,tourist face cap and head out to see the city with the help of Google Maps of course. There’s a chance you might be feeling jet-lagged so don’t do too much, try eating at a rooftop restaurant, there is nothing like a good view of the new city to go with your first taste of their local cuisine.
5. On getting back to your hotel, the ideal ‘kick’ that brings you back from travception, is your phone buzzing as it connects to the hotel’s WiFi and work emails start coming in. You come back to reality; your work phone is your ‘totem’ making you aware that you’re back from your ‘holiday dream state’. Snap right back into the real world and prepare yourself to meet your clients/customers the next day. Run through your slides with your colleagues and have a good night sleep.
6. After a successful meet with the clients/customers, work is all done, you go back under, dash into your hotel room, tear your clothes off dramatically like superheroes do when they unleash their costume and scream “I’ve never felt so alive” then go out and enjoy the new city!
7. When in a country for the first time, take selfies with popular landmarks in the country so when you turn on the TV and you see a familiar place you can have that wide smile that says “I’ve been there”. Most importantly pick up a word in the native language; something as simple as a hello or thank you should be just fine.
8. Head back to your hotel after a long but beautifully eventful day and let the departure time on your ticket be the ‘kick’ that jolts you back to reality.
9. On the plane back home, you feel fulfilled because you never expected to have such a great experience within an experience, a trip within a trip.
You’re the architect of your own holiday.
Travception, …it works!
P.S don’t splatter your Instagram page with photos from travception, immediately you are back to reality. Why? This should help reduce envy level if any of your colleagues follow you on social media!
