Why are so many people obsessed with counting the number of countries they’ve visited? I don’t know the answer but I confess I’m one of them. And despite what many of my friends think (due to how often we go on holiday!), it’s not actually that many in my case – at least not compared to most in the travel blog community. One of the reasons I’ve not visited more countries is that we keep repeating ourselves – with countries at least, if not with actual destinations (although we do repeat specific destinations too). There are many reasons for this, with money and convenience being at the top of the list. Sure, I’d love to go to New Zealand one year, Canada the next, China the next and so on. But, of course, these are expensive destinations, mainly due to the sheer distance needed for travel. France, on the other hand, is just an hour or so away – we live quite near Dover, we’ve won ferry tickets many times and it’s a very cheap and easy place to visit. It’s no surprise that we go back time and again! We also go back to places because we’ve enjoyed them – while I love seeing and exploring new locations, there’s also something very comforting in going back to a place where you’ve been before and where you know you’ll enjoy.
Despite this, I still feel a pull to count countries. A visit to St Peter’s while in Rome? Excellent, that’s Vatican City crossed off. A day trip to Monaco while staying in the South of France? Great, another country ticked. And surely England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland should count as four separate countries?! I’ve even got competitive with my husband. Given that we’ve been together over 25 years, most of our travelling has been done together, but he went to America as a child – I was so relieved when we went to Florida together, as it made us equal! Equal in number at least, as he’d been to Ireland and I hadn’t, but I’d been to Germany and he hadn’t. Needless to say, I felt weirdly reluctant when we decided to visit Germany as a family, and now feel the urge to go to Ireland just for the sake of evening things up! I even do the same with continents – thank goodness for that cruise to Egypt from Cyprus, as it allowed me to visit Africa! And despite trying to get away with an airport stop in Singapore counting as Asia (and Turkey – bit of a grey area, that one!), I was glad to officially cross off Asia when we went to Hong Kong. Still waiting for South America, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a slight urge to visit Antarctica just for the sake of it!
The Twitter travel community is full of posts on counting countries, and several recommended an app called ‘been’. I downloaded it, of course, and set about ticking off the countries that I’d visited. It turns out (according to ‘been’) that I’ve visited nine per cent of the world. Hmmm, doesn’t exactly sound impressive, given that I’m well over nine per cent of the way through my life! I’ve managed 33 per cent of Europe, which sounds better, but still doesn’t really get me too close to visiting all the countries of the world (or even of Europe!). I found that the app was useful in terms of keeping track of where I’ve been, but I wanted something more visual, and something that was more satisfying to change when I visited somewhere new (I’m a list girl, and love crossing things off). So I decided to buy a scratch map – you know, one of those maps where you scratch off the countries you’ve visited.
If I’m honest, I was rather disappointed when it arrived, as I realised there was a fundamental problem with it. Anyone who’s got one will know what I’m about to say – some of the countries are just too bloody small to even see, let alone scratch off! My scratched-off Cyprus is barely visible; there wasn’t even the opportunity to scratch off a separate Andorra, Vatican City or Monaco. It’s not as if the map is small – it’s nearly a metre wide – but it makes it clear just how few countries I’ve visited (and how small they are!) in relation to the world as a whole. One of the reasons I bought it was because we were planning a day trip to Albania from Corfu in the summer, and I was looking forward to the satisfaction of scratching it off. Well, there was nothing satisfying about scratching that off – I needed a pin rather than a coin to be precise enough. And now it’s done, you’d need a magnifying glass to be able to notice that anything’s changed!
The scratch map has, however, changed how I think about counting countries and adding to my number. Now I’m not thinking just about new countries but I’m also thinking about BIG countries. Brazil, Russia, Canada or China? Great idea. Lichtenstein or Slovenia? Nah, they won’t show. Antarctica is looking even more attractive. And when we booked a holiday to (reasonably sized) Mexico next October, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to seeing what colour it is on the map!
Diary of a holiday obsessive 