Because they wanted to, while birds and animals travelled the length and breadth of this planet from its start — they, at least, love what they’ve been gifted — ancient humans also journeyed vast distances, crossing mountains and seas, sometimes seeking opportunities, sometimes just. Wandering has been an eternal feature of all beings.
Because they wanted to know Earth, the fabric of its being, its different grasses and trees, the taste of water in diverse streams, the feel of breezes from myriad directions, how the light falls at different tilts and how darkness unveils a new world, full of stars, the answer is,. Why, one may ask, cushioned as we are today in the blithe armchairs of modern life?
Each journey revealed something about a landscape — one before people’s eyes and one deep inside them. Wandering characterises ancient epics. From the Mahabharata to the Odyssey , protagonists were driven by love, hate, profit and curiosity to scour new corners. Some discovered monkeys were not that different from men — some found men cruel enough to make gifts killing machines. Eventually, the human mind turned its curious gaze towards space and made startling discoveries. There was a larger universe beyond our homes, towns and planet. We were only one part — and not even the centre — of it. Yet, we were the only known place hosting life. Our restless souls seek more, spaceships and telescopes helping us travel farther, asking if there’s another planet with the right balance of water and air? Is there life somewhere as intelligent as our own? Or perhaps more lovable, hard as it is to imagine a more cruel species than humanity? What power created these glittering galaxies, sprawls of stars and plumes of planets? And why were we — you and me — put exactly where we are? Wandering produces an awareness which makes us understand our current environment and value it more. It is no small coincidence the Anthropocene — the era of human destruction marking Earth — comes with the spread of ‘smart’ devices which make us dumber, clicking more and wondering less. There is a solution — as Times Evoke’s global experts emphasise, keeping alive our innate curiosity about the world, from the pattern of winds to the shadows of clouds, can help us preserve what’s left of it. Oscar Wilde remarked, ‘We’re all standing in the gutter — but some of us are looking at the stars. Let’s join them, dear reader, to wander and wonder again. Catch the latest World News and Live updates. Download the TOI app.