My eyes widened. This was it, the reason for traveling Chicago, what I was looking for. I wanted to know so that I could follow suit.

“… was to find out about Mark Twain .”

What? Twain? Was he kidding? Twain hated Chicago .

Apparently, the trio had read about the Mississippi River and Twain in their English classes back in Korea and wanted to learn more about them. I dropped my head and moved on.

My hopes had fallen but were not completely dashed. Just because I didn't want to travel the ole Mississipp' did not mean I would simply give up. I wanted to stick with the city, so I would try again.

I spotted a bubbly group of women from southeast England packing their bags and picking through the bagel table. I figured I could ask them a few questions about where they were going.

They weren't sure yet. They had just arrived from San Francisco the night before and would be leaving for New York in a few days. This was the last leg of a five-month around-the-world trip.

They couldn't offer me much. They didn't know anything about Chicago except for that it was cold and they needed, as they put it, warmer jumpers and overcoats. I directed them to H&M on Michigan Avenue .

I was about to move on when one of the women, Coralie Wright, 22, stopped me. She said she understood my story – at least the part about the cost of travel – and how Cheap Tickets wasn't so cheap, and how that tends to keep us from traveling.

“Traveling costs so much, but it's worth every penny,” she said. “You could buy a wide-screen TV with that money, but why do it when you could go there?”

I felt a semi-connection but needed more. At this point, sadly, the idea of banjos and steamboats didn't sound that bad. I was getting desperate. I looked to the couches to see if the Koreans had left. They had. I turned back and watched the English women slip out the door.

Disappointed, unconnected and alone, I looked for my coat and decided to go home. Walking back over to the couch to pick up my jacket, I noticed to my surprise a little man slouched down on the armrest quietly eating cereal of some kind and watching CNN.

Allen Lu, 22, was a foreign exchange student from Taiwan who was studying in Toronto . What was he doing in Chicago ?

“I had to see Alicia Keys.”

The night before, R&B singer/songwriter Alicia Keys rocked out at the United Center to a sold-out audience. This concert was a must for Lu. As a self-described music junkie who owns over 100 CDs, he admitted music drives him to travel.

That was different. That was unconventional. Unlike the Koreans, he hiked off the tourist path. Unlike the English, he knew the city.

Lu planned to chill at jazz clubs, specifically the Green Mill, and dine at steakhouses for his remaining two days. He had done the tall buildings and museums already and now wanted to get, as he called it, a sense of Chicago .

That was it. We connected. I wanted to get a sense of Chicago. I wanted to escape away from my keyboard and meet new people. I wanted new places to explore in the city, places the unconventional traveler would seek out. He had given it to me.

I asked him if he ever felt disconnected and alone, yearning to meet others.

He smiled and opened up a tiny notepad.