do you or have yo traveled around the world?

I've travelled a lot, it can be amazing for an aspie's love of learning and exploring. If you don't want to do the nightlife stuff it's easy to opt out of, if you stay in hostels or just meet social people who want you to join them use your daytime plans to politely knock them back, 'I'm not a great fan of clubs and I did tons of walking today/was up early/have loads planned for tomorrow'. They'll be cool with it. I think the emphasis on clubbing is because NTs are scared of being alone, oddly so if they travel alone. I once sat down at a long table for solo diners in Budapest and every single person there but me was planning on going to the same club that night and chatting about their plans! Don't forget many older, culture-orientated people visit every destination you go to though. Even places like Ibiza which are seen as party hotspots have areas that are promoted to/cater for families, retired folks etc.

The only places my AS affected my travel were Bahrain, St Louis and Mexico. Bahrain because it's a rigid place to work and I am so used to being 'me' and blending traits regardless of which gender supposedly does what that being limited to just a small set of acceptable behaviours was really tiring and felt more like a performance. Mexico was just down to the overwhelming noise and having daily nose-bleeds caused by the incredible smog, I was fine at the time I was there but the day after I moved cities I just had a day where I needed to hide under a blanket and process/recover. St Louis was because I normally handle delays and changes to travel plans just fine but my plans for St Louis were affected by a blizzard and I got there three days after I planned to. I had this feeling of being 'late' the whole time I was there!

So far I've travelled to about 30 countries, everywhere from Ethiopia to Russia to tiny little Scottish islands, and I have loved it nearly all of it. I've seen so many landmark sites, art galleries and museums and tried so many new things anonymously away from home where it's okay to succeed or fail without overthinking it. It's been a great experience for me as an aspie too, after seeing so many ways to do anything social I really do see myself as just belonging to another culture rather than being 'broken' or 'awkward'.

grin And now I have written a wall of text about it but I hope it's helpful.

/r/aspergers Thread