Paddling through seaweed. Making fires. Finding white birch branches. Toasting marshmallows. Building campsites. Swimming in the sea. Getting covered in mud. Fighting wind and waves for kilometres, adjusting course over and over again.
I drifted onto a tiny island of Sweden and somehow became the first person from Shenzhen to ever step onto it.
It was such a random, completely meaningless "first"—free from competition, free from the usual weight we attach to achievement.
Does that still count as achievement?
I don't know.
But I remember feeling unexpectedly happy.
Later, I placed a tiny pin onto a giant map.
That simple act brought the same quiet satisfaction as those days of primitive island camping.
Maybe I wasn't collecting places.
Maybe I was discovering something.