Traveling with someone for the first time can either make a friendship or create a dent in a friendship. Traveling develops our true nature. It can put us under severe stress or pure bliss at times, all within a couple of hours. So, if you don’t want to risk a life-long friendship for just a week of traveling together, then I would suggest: Don’t do it.
It might be hard to know which friends would make bad or good companions, especially, if you’ve never traveled with them before. However, there are some secret ways to know. One way to determine this is to examine their personality traits. If a friend falls into any of the following categories, then you should avoid exploring the world with them at all costs. At least, you save your friendship!
1. The No-Cash Person
Traveling is not at all cheap. But, it’s even irritating when your cheapskate of a travel buddy refuses to pay even half for the rental car or at a restaurant. So, the first thing you can keep in mind is that you and your friend should be in a similar financial state. This doesn’t mean they have to be loaded with money and have to pay each time. In fact, this could cause an entirely different scenario. If your friend is wasting money on unnecessary goods during the whole trip, then you’ll feel obligated to do the same. You should come back home feeling relaxed and rejuvenated and not totally out of cash. So, make sure your travel buddy and you are both stable and responsible with money.
2. The Over-Dramatic
They’re the ones who tend to create a scene when someone skips ahead of them in line or someone delays for a minute. They’re the ones who scream and threaten to leave the bar if the bartender is rude to them. These are the kind of people you don’t want to be stuck with halfway around the world. To be honest, they’re probably not the type of people you should be friends with at all, but that’s your decision.
3. The Introvert
The worse thing than traveling with an over-dramatic person is traveling with someone who misses home and feels bad about it. You can’t change an introvert. And, as much as they are sorry about it, it won’t amend the fact that your trip is not more fun. You’ll find yourself constantly consoling and telling them, “It’s OK.” It’s OK that they don’t want to explore the city. It’s OK that they don’t want to go clubbing. It’s OK that they are too afraid to bungee jump. But at the end, you can’t force a person to do anything in which they don’t feel comfortable. But, at the end of the day, it’s not OK that your entire trip spoils!
4. The Drunken
Vacation is the time and place to let loose, but that doesn’t mean getting drunk all the time. You don’t want to be with someone who gets drunk at 9 in the morning and can’t even walk back to the room on their own. It’s true that we all have our nights and it’s important to look out for your friends but getting drunk at every single situation is not good. However, the last thing you want to think about while abroad is your friend’s embarrassing behavior.
5. The Madly in Love
Just because someone’s in a relationship doesn’t mean they won’t be fun to travel along, but to be true, most of them aren’t. If you know someone who is always with their partner, stealing them away for a week probably won’t decrease the obsession. Instead, you’ll end up listening to her long, “I miss you so much” conversations during your travel which is no less than irritating.
Remember that traveling is meant to be fun; it’s meant to be an experience of fun and memorable for the correct reasons. So, choose your travel buddies well.
Do share your tips on choosing the right traveling friend. Happy Reading!