Travel

Travel is the movement of people between relatively distant geographical locations, and can involve travel by foot, bicycle, automobile, train, boat, airplane, or other means, with or without luggage, and can be one way or round trip. Travel can also include relatively short stays between successive movements.

Etymology

The origin of the word "travel" is most likely lost to history. The term "travel" may originate from the Old French word travail. According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, the first known use of the word travel was in the 14th century. It also states that the word comes from Middle English travailen, travelen (which means to torment, labor, strive, journey) and earlier from Old French travailler (which means to work strenuously, toil). In English we still occasionally use the words travail and travails, which mean struggle. According to Simon Winchester in his book The Best Travelers' Tales (2004), the words travel and travail both share an even more ancient root: a Roman instrument of torture called the tripalium (in Latin it means "three stakes", as in to impale). This link reflects the extreme difficulty of travel in ancient times. Also note the torturous connotation of the word "travailler." Today, travel may or may not be much easier depending upon the destination you choose (i.e., Mt. Everest, the Amazon rainforest), how you plan to get there (tour bus, cruise ship, or oxcart), and whether or not you decide to "rough it (see extreme tourism and adventure travel). "There's a big difference between simply being a tourist and being a true world traveler," notes travel writer Michael Kasum. This is, however, a contested distinction as academic work on the cultures and sociology of travel has noted.

Smart Gilas

Gilas Pilipinas (originally known as Smart Gilas from 2010 to 2012) is the team consisting mostly of PBA players that serves as the Philippines men's national basketball team for elite level international tournaments since 2010. The team is under the aegis of the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) and sponsored by Smart Communications. Gilas is the Tagalog word that loosely translates as "prowess". The all-amateur men's team is known as the Gilas Cadets (previously known from 2011 to 2014 as Sinag Pilipinas - sinag is the Tagalog word for "ray" (sunlight)), while the women's team is named Perlas Pilipinas (perlas is the Tagalog word for "pearl").

The Gilas Pilipinas program succeeded the Team Pilipinas program (2005-2009) which was an initiative of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) and sponsored by San Miguel Corporation (2005-2007, known as San Miguel-Team Pilipinas) and Coca-Cola Bottlers Philippines, Inc. (2009, known as Powerade-Team Pilipinas).

Gilas 1.0 (Toroman era, 2009–2012)