You could be forgiven, as you approach your 8th consecutive hour on a patch of grass next to a Slovenian motorway, for despairing. Merciless sun scorching your skull, like an electric kettle erroneously left on the gas hob. That morning’s hangover still stalking balefully through your veins. Carbon monoxide fumes poisoning your lungs; egregious Maccies takeaway poisoning your stomach; an encroaching pessimism poisoning your soul. Sense of humour: expired. Bank account: ransacked. 13th desolation cigarette: lit. Dissertation: unwritten. Day: wasted.
To any fellow Bummiteers out there, en route to Belgrade, this might sound familiar. I also cannot recommend it enough to you all. Even leaving aside the work that the Bummit society does for charity – which is significant – it’s one of the most worthwhile things you can do with your time at university.
For those unaware of the concept of Bummit, it’s very simple. You and your teammates are given a fundraising target, a destination, and a date by which to be there. Then you hitchhike. Depending on your success rate, you might get all the way to Eastern Europe on the back of nothing more than the magnanimity of strangers.
I make no attempt to disguise just how badly my mates and I scored on any of the above metrics. We didn’t raise any money, electing instead to tag along unofficially, making meek donations to other, more diligent comrades’ fundraisers. Our generosity towards Flixbus’ profit margin, on the other hand, would’ve put Mother Teresa to shame. We hitched more free rides from train conductors than car drivers, and I’m only slightly exaggerating. It was only after we begged the girls to take pity on us and join our teams that we looked even remotely approachable. It was, almost without interruption, a hangry, disorganised, drunken, expensive, fatigued shambles, from Sheffield to Belgrade. Like a really shit Canterbury Tale.
I also have rarely laughed harder in my life. There is a camaraderie that only dire straits can induce, a buoyancy of spirit that always bounces back against adversity. Because of the kind of character Bummit attracts, it’s famous for finding firm friends that might’ve otherwise passed you by. It is an adventure, but a real adventure, in which there are genuinely moments where you couldn’t assure yourself you knew how to resolve the situation. You’re forced to constantly reassess your options. You’re with your friends, surrounded by strangers. You’re a raft desperate for a shore.
We live in very insulated, isolated, agitated times. Much of the world, and the human experience, is migrating online. Health and safety regulations breathe constantly down the neck of endeavour. Interest rates spiral. What grades do I need to average a first this year? What’s Trump done this time? Has AI taken my job? Check the Pound against the Euro. Check your BMI. Check how many units are in this beer. Check your paycheque. Checkmate.
There’s something about a hitchhike to far-flung European cities that can’t be touched by the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world. Cast down amidst the litter of a Croatian slip road, you’re freer than you’ve ever been. Relegated to pauper, you’re elevated to kings. Where the winds of fortune blow, you’ll go. No one can stop you going into that cool-looking bar at 1pm on a Tuesday. Buy that Aperol Spritz, and buy it in Dinari; it’s not real money. Don’t buy it at all; matey in a Volkswagen campervan is giving us a lift to Budapest and he’s offered you a tinny. Orban has lost the elections. You’re wealthy beyond your wildest dreams; rolling in the riches of irresponsibility.
It’s not an experience that suits everybody. There are adventures to be had out there for people that don’t want to shave a decade off their lifespan in the space of a fortnight, and for people that don’t derive joie de vivre from the randomness of the universe. G.K. Chesterton writes that “an adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered”, which is a privileged twat philosophy, but this is an opinion piece, and my opinion is that some of us benefit from a touch of inconvenience in our lives*.
*dissertations not included.
