Getting away gives us a fresh perspective on the world – and ourselves

If we don’t know or expose ourselves to other cultures, it’s very hard to understand – let alone appreciate – our own, writes Harry Readhead

Through new eyes: Porto’s old quarter on the Douro river in Portugal (Getty/iStock)

When I was small and rosy-cheeked and by all accounts an unbearable little show-off, my dad always told me and my brother to speak a little of the local language whenever we were abroad. It was a basic gesture of respect, he suggested: a way of acknowledging that we were guests in someone else’s country, and that although we could get by without having to speak a word of any language except our own promiscuous tongue – or perhaps, because of this – we shouldn’t. And of course, speaking a little bit of the local language smooths the whole travelling business. We are a practical family.

This naturally comes to mind whenever I go abroad; and today, it just so happens that, barring all disasters, I will be travelling to Portugal. I was able to study a morsel of Portuguese during my squandered years at university, but I will still be crossing my fingers every time I’ve ordered food in the local language.

Charles Darwin wrote somewhere that human beings have a compulsive need for language: babies do not teach themselves to cook, or juggle, or pull off outrageous feats of football artistry à la Ella Toone. But they do babble, all by themselves, and that babble becomes language.

Language, spoken or signed, is how we communicate. Without communication, we can’t get along, or work together; language, then, is the soul of culture. And so I bridle a bit at the notion that it’s “pointless” to learn French or Spanish or Chalcatongo Mixtec because “everyone speaks English”. To understand another person’s language is to get a bit closer to understanding their world.

Of course, you don’t have to learn another language to find some nourishment from going away for a bit. There is the novelty of the whole enterprise, of course, and the chance to rest, and that peculiar sensation of emotional distance from the stresses of home that physical distance brings. But getting away is also like looking through a pair of new eyes, being gifted a different perspective on life and living. And it doesn’t have to be outside of the UK, either. We are a wonderfully diverse country.

And we can bring the world to us as well. The Olympics, which we hosted 10 years ago this summer. We have the Commonwealth Games, incisive takes on which have been offered this week by Sean O’Grady and Mohamed Adow. I am convinced that if we do not know or expose ourselves to other cultures, it is very hard to understand – let alone appreciate – our own. I am sure I am not the only one who, lucky enough to have gone away in the first place, returns home full of affection for the dismal sky, the strong cup of tea, the eccentric magazine, the self-effacing humour. George Orwell said that, for all its faults, there was a fundamental “gentleness” to our country. As we witness the sparring of the Tory leadership hopefuls, and wonder what the future holds for our wind-battered North Atlantic archipelago, this feels like something to bear in mind.

Yours,

Harry Readhead

Voices commissioning editor, freelance