It's true that we rarely give the world the fervent, unconditional presence it expects and deserves. We lend a distracted ear, a monodic perception to the polyphony of its threats or its jubilations. Out of central insufficiency and prudence, we keep our distance from these vast magnetic zones where a secret heraldry that our curiosity steals from us manifests itself, where precisely these polyphonies resonate... For the vagabonds of writing, travel means rediscovering, through uprooting, availability, risk and destitution, access to those privileged places where the humblest things rediscover their plenary and sovereign existence." (Nicolas Bouvier)