Why, ever since the word “transportation” and “technology” are invented, are we so enthusiastic to go anywhere, anytime, as fast as possible?
Transportation was meant to be a survival aid. Since you are not likely to live in a place where everything you need grows naturally (including companions), you need to go to places that provide those things. In order to get to those places, you need transportation. Of course man’s own two feet are also a form of transportation, generously provided by nature. In fact we were quite happy with this facility for centuries, using them to fetch our basic needs – food, wood, and a form of clothing. It was sufficient.
And then technology walks in. It happened when we realize the world is so much bigger than our walks can cover. There are more places in this world that we can imagine! And God knows what lies on all those places! We were so excited to find out. Ships were built, to explore the mystery and depths of the sea. Wheels were attached to a platform, to construct some kind of land transportation. We moved from using our own (or some animals’) body to a machine that enables us to explore larger areas. We did it all because we want to seek the opportunities; we want more than just the basic needs, which we already have. We want luxury, the kinds that are hardest to get.
Suddenly it became so important to travel. First there was curiosity. Then there’s research. There was also social motivation that forced us to go places. But now one might wonder, is it not all basically our urge for finer things in life? When we leave the house for school/office/store, aren’t we aware that we did it not for inquiries, but for the education/money/things?
Everyday, nowadays, when you get into a car and drive down busy roads, you’d see hard-driving people anxious to “get there before it’s too late”. Acting almost barbaric on the roads, desperate to speed past everything in front of them. Look around, and you’ll see highway and shortcuts, constructed by the city simply to serve the fast-paced world. Planes and helicopters soaring through the clouds.
Frustrated people on traffics.
Busy railroads and crowded sidewalks.
The symphony of horns & graceful maneuvers whenever public buses start to announce themselves on the streets.
Dear God, the things we must cope just to simply move!
A genius named Douglas Adams put it very well in his book, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”. Simply the best book of the universe (it proudly stated itself so in the first page), it contains a part that explains this issue in a simple, amusing way:
“ ‘Why do you mean, why it’s got to be built?’ he said. ‘It’s a bypass. You’ve got to build bypasses.’
Bypasses are devices that allow some people to dash from point A to point B very fast while other people dash from point B to point A very fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are often given to wonder what’s so great about point A that so many people from point B are so keen to get there, and what’s so great about point B that so many people from point A are so keen to get there. They often wish that people would just once and for all work out where the hell they wanted to be. ”
Enough said.