Midway on a 25km trek. Seven hours of scrambling up and down rocky mountain faces as the rain came down non-stop. And after all that the main attraction was shrouded in clouds. I nursed aches and pains for two days later. Safe to say an experience I'll never forget!

Adventure Girl

Last night over a bottle of wine a few fellow backpackers and I shared stories in the common area of our hostel. Two, in particular, struck me.

The young New Yorker told me of a forty-something traveler who had seen much of the world on the back of a motorcycle. Whenever he ran out of money he would work for three or four years as a physics teacher in an international school; he’d done so in Papau New Gineau, Switzerland and New Zealand.

The young New Yorker, though impressed, confessed he didn’t really like the man. When I pushed for reasons he replied, simply, “he wasn’t a very nice guy.” Firstly, he was derogatory to the “shitty kids” he taught (one can’t help but feel for the kids who get this dude as their teacher). Secondly, he was a bit sleazy. Thirdly, there was an arrogance about him that was evident when he bragged about his exploits – conscious of how impressive his tales of travels were.

And lastly, in more general terms, he seemed selfish. He didn’t care about anyone. He didn’t have anyone. The only person he thought about satisfying was himself.

This led the blue-eyed Swiss girl to tell us of a gutsy, nineteen-year-old woman she had met in her previous hostel. The teenager had spent three months living with a cannibal tribe in the wilderness of Papau New Guinea.

At some point she asked some local seamen to drop her off on an island. She drew in the sand four suns and moons, in an attempt to ask that they pick her up in four days. After four days, with food and water supplies dwindling, the boat didn’t show up. On day six there was a storm, and still no boat.

She twisted together palm fronds in order to catch rainwater. Previously someone had shown her how to climb coconut trees – now was a good a time as any to try those skills out. Up she’d go, and clunk, she’d fall before she could reach the top. Again and again she would try.

Eventually a boat passed by, and she yelled and jumped up and down, waving. Lucky for her she was rescued.

When she returned to civilisation she found the experience so overwhelming she checked herself into a 10 day silent meditation camp in order to calm down. Now she was here in Argentina, and with rented boots, walking through snow for the first time. She was delighted by the experience.

I was weirdly moved by the story of this young woman, but also somewhat disapproving. “That was incredibly irresponsible!” was my initial reaction to the tale of the island troubles.

Sure, half of me was deeply impressed by the girl’s chutzpah, and willingness to throw herself into the deep end. She was experiencing an authenticity most backpackers can only dream of – and will only ever dream of. These days all paths are too well carved to be anything but safe, santised, that dreaded word “touristy”. Yet here she was, in the midst of a honest to god adventure.

But the other half of me found her behaviour to be reckless, naive and almost arrogant. “It’s so typical for a middle-class, young Westerner to think the world is their playground, and they can just go in, invincible, do as they please and come out unharmed.” The teenager reminded me a lot of Christopher McCandless from Into The Wild. He too rejected society, and entered the wilderness with little knowledge – and therefore, in my opinion, little respect – with devastating results.

“Ah, but she’s Mexican!” the Swiss girl countered, “not from the West!”

OK. But clearly she’s a pretty well off Mexican if she has no responsibilities to her family, or community, and can instead jet set around the world, doing as she pleases. (The Swiss went on to say her father was dead, and her mother was a painter.)

Earlier in March I met a guy at my Spanish school – a young, nineteen year old American from Tennessee. One evening at a group dinner he said he was jealous of homeless people because “they only have to think of themselves.” Although crudely said, I think what he was trying to articulate was that there is something seductive about that solitary, nomadic life. For some, living in a society with all the complications, expectations and responsibilities that entails, is just too much to handle. And some would argue, distracts one from the true essence of being alive.

But I wouldn’t agree with those people. I think the essence of life is born out of our relationships with one another. Being a part of something. Feeling like you’re important to others, and that you’re making a useful contribution. Real, lasting happiness, the kind of contentment that has longevity, comes from when you do something for someone else, not for yourself. And whether that’s for people you know in real life – your friends, family and co-workers – or in a more abstract way the people we are connected to through markets, nations, communities, scenes and so on.

So when it came down to it, I wasn’t that impressed by this young woman. I am impressed by stories of real connection. And real connection requires time, hard work and love. Had the teenager decided to stay in PNG, living and working as part of the tribe, learning the language, making friends, falling in love, contributing to the life of the community, over the course of a decade … that would have truly impressed me.

But of course, she is nineteen; still footloose, and wide-eyed (and it seems wonderfully crazy). Let’s just hope that she doesn’t become the man in the first story – or die in the process.