- By Rashidat Olamidayo Ajakaye
The Nigerian Nomad, Idoko admits that the African country, Nigeria has a huge beauty to pass across to the world; she further advises that domestic tourism is the fundamental step for Nigerian citizens to sell proudly before thriving successfully in international tourism. Civilisation generally denotes advancement; it is a complex human society that definitely characterises cultural and technological development. Cultural and technological maturation arise from the rooting existence of identities- knowledge, traditions, social norms, values, language, customs and other sundries. The culture of a society becomes rich while it is being sophisticated by cultural integration.
Cultural integration simply denotes the sense of achievement that features people or groups welcoming a strange culture without losing the former culture (Kessler & Arnold, 2025). Here, a strange lifestyle becomes a new lifestyle that can be adopted into the firstly acquired culture. As a result, civilisation is birthed from the pleasurable and tolerating approaches that individuals and groups employ to treat complexities. Journey entails moving or going away from one place and ending in another, with some kind of meaningful experience in between (Williams, 2024).
Travelling does not limit its description to far distance; it is simply stepping beyond one’s familiar environment. Therefore, there is a rising need to approach travelling with mental openness and deliberate action, expand civilisation from the shared cultures of travelling and apply civilisation as a pathway to harmonious co-existence and social sanity.
First, travelling has its essential benefits that require not only visible action but also mental openness. It is beyond a logistical shift from one location to another. It is the mind-set of a sojourner that makes him or her cultural literate; he or she becomes psychologically receptive to absorb new ideas with a neutral perception and not assumptive judgement. If not, false stories about places would be enough to withdraw action for learning, growing or even working in an unfamiliar space.
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One of the best ways to overcome false information about the world is to travel (Look, 2018). Travelling with a willing intention eventually erases negative thoughts that might be relatively arising previously from secondary reports. Yet, it is best to avenue to re-create an avenue to reduce stress, enhance creativity, enhance perspective, increase awareness and first personal growth. The purpose of travelling is not depending on the distance covered. There is a need to test the mental and physical strength of travelling through the near environments that are easier to reach before attempting tasking destinations for the untried or professional breakthrough. When the earliest travelling experiences have shown a traveller sensibly recognising the complex beauty of human difference; transformation becomes a feasible aspect that can be connected to movement. Travelling is not just to experience but rather to report grateful tales that would inspire others to be culturally literate.
Similarly, one of the preferable ways to expand civilisation is through shared cultures form travelling. For every location aside from a familiar one, there is always one, two or priceless values which one understands, retains and eventually borrow to supplement the existing ideology. Travelling is beyond mere theory; it is experimental when cross-cultural interactions germinate into innovations, intercultural and international co-operation for mutual benefits.
For shared cultures to reach civilisation, it should be understood that civilisation is the progressive state of human society. It is the advanced level of culture and standards (Nehru, 2024). Therefore, when a traveller observes technological, infrastructural, gubernatorial, agricultural, medicinal, transportational, social aspects of a new environment, he or she recognises the element that surrounds it being equivalent, enhanced or underperforming to the locale. Definitely, it is necessary for individuals and groups to either utilise every opportunity to contribute to the second habitat without disregarding protocols or return to the first habitat to fix these aspects with the calculated sense of updated pieces of information and strategies. This would maintain heritage conservation and socio-cultural development.
Essentially, the application of civilisation should be geared towards harmonious co-existence and social sanity. Civilisation is never closed for it is a system of growth and development that never ends its humane thirst and enduring relevance. The participants of the civilisation system are humans for messages are carried by individuals and eventually consumed with varying interpretations. Human advancement does not ever die, it only needs to take new forms; human beings are naturally programmed to keep changing. This draws a glaring relationship between humanity and civilisation.
Random change makes human beings neither to understand themselves nor other beings, creates chaos in their lives and that of others (Damani, 2018). Therefore, the continuous modification of culture germinates civilisation.
In recent times, the morphing of civilisation eventually becomes entirely new with the simultaneous force of lingering traumas and hopeful ideals (Newitz, 2021). There is a flaming need to water down the mismanagement of civilisation. Else, it would make men and women turn against each other. Definitely, when the receiving individual sees no single need to enjoy receiving a travelling visitor who reaches an unfamiliar environment for a social asset which the former possesses, the later would naturally in turn report less of the receiving society at the slight encounter of an underdeveloped aspect of the revered setting. Would this notion ever be turned the other way? This question relies on the brief that no single worldview is absolute. When positive lessons are reported, communities become reshaped; co-operation replaces competition and dialogue recovers the harms of hostility. Hence, civilisation becomes a continuous system for peace in the interconnected world.
In the order of the discussed aspects related to change of environment- progressive experimental travelling begins with the mind, appreciation of distinct values as a daily ethic strengthens civilisation and civilisation is a continuous system that should be in favour of the world through collective responsibility. When we understand that civilisation grows through connection rather than separation, we begin to see travellers as gentle carriers of unity. Each conversation they share, each tradition they respect, and each moment of learning they embrace, quietly shapes their outlook and the outlook of those around them. These experiences soften hearts, open minds, and encourage a world where people treat one another with more understanding. In this way, travel becomes more than a journey from place to place—it becomes a living experience that helps us grow kinder, strengthens the bonds between communities, and reminds us of the simple humanity we all share.
•Ajakaye writes from Lagos State University, Ojo.
