An American in Dresden

“The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality,

and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.” ~ Samuel Johnson

I like to travel, probably most of all because I like to be out of my usual, hectic routine.  While traveling I can leave a messy room, a stuffed schedule, and most of the books that I'm supposed to be "reading."  Alas, I now have the technology to scan books or download pdfs onto my laptop and edit them (ie. highlight, underline, scribble notes in the margins--if you're not using PDF-Xchange yet, let me put in a plug for them; it's free and so much more agile than Adobe!).  Anyway, I will never be without my "must-read" list by virtue of its physical bulk again.  Ah, well.  Perhaps this crush of reading can now be accomplished on trains--my favorite method of travel--or in foreign cafes, which improve upon their American counterparts by virtue of lower pastry prices and by offering me Sahne with my hot chocolate.  Mmm...so cultured.

Does travel really make you a better person?  Some people say yes, because it broadens your horizons, lets you see how other people live in other places.  Personally, I have found that "Germans" are more real for me now that I have seen them go about their daily lives in person, than when I first read about them in my high school German textbook (the one from the 1980s with pictures of Jungen named Hans and Uwe playing Fussball in short-shorts).  Some say no, because it is too easy to find only yourself when traveling (cf. Eat, Pray, Love and the second Sex & the City movie).  I believe this was often the case for both my fellow American students and our aloof South Korean roommates the summer I spent at the Goethe Institut in college.  Others don't like the question, because answering it, especially in the affirmative, may make it sound as though travel is the only way to improve yourself; or that the supposed benefits of travel (an open mind, new experiences) can only be acquired by physically going there, wherever there is.  This discriminates against those of lesser means, but not those of lesser minds.


A few weeks ago, I came across the line (above) by famous British author Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) while looking for some travel quotations with which to spice up my posts.  I chose it because it sounded familiar...probably because I wrote something similar on my Fulbright application.  On retrospection, I also find it interesting because one of the historical intellectual conflicts I will address in my dissertation is the nature of evidence--namely, what kind of evidence about nutrition and digestion did early-twentieth-century Saxons find convincing?  What did you have to tell them to get them to change their behaviors one way or another?  Many proponents of alternative medicine and food fads spoke from the authority of personal experience.  While many food gurus today still hold up their own weight-loss or recovery from illness, other experts (namely the medical establishment) insist on the gold standard of evidence-based medicine, the double-blind randomized and controlled trial.  (Or even better, a meta-analysis of double-blind randomized and controlled trials!)  Johnson is advocating for the importance of "autopsy" (eye-witness) for moderation of personal intellectual growth; I don't know what he thought about convincing others with one's own experience.  Travel literature and testimonials have long been popular genres, I guess because at the very least they are entertaining.

I study a topic in a time period for which many published sources by a wide range of experts are available and can be obtained from an academic library.  But there are still some institutional records, rare books, and handwritten documents that require me to go to Germany.  More importantly, I believe, my dissertation research needs to be done in Saxony, and not via Inter-Library Loan from the comfort of home, because I am writing the history of people who lived (and ate) in a particular place (and time).  So I need to ground my scholarly understanding of food history in the realities of Dresden, and Leipzig, and Chemnitz, ideally through personal experience.  Not only will I be living with Germans, but I hope to travel some around Saxony and to learn to cook some local dishes.  Could this project be done from home?  Sure.  The result would be different, but it could be done.  I'm lucky I received funding to taste Saxony for myself, while you are subjected to my travel-blog!

And now I am about to embark on this adventure.  My flight leaves at 9pm, I have a 3 hour layover at Heathrow in the morning, and I arrive in Copenhagen at 3:40pm local time.  My next post (hopefully) will be from Denmark, in the city of Hans Christian Anderson.

p.s.--I've included a photo of me with all my gear, so you can judge for yourself whether I was successful in my attempt to "pack lightly."  That's one rolling suitcase (carry-on size), one stuffed backpack with laptop, and one LLB tote bag for over-flow.  We'll see if I'm still smiling in 18 hours...