I have been blessed to be able to travel. I’ll never forget my first plane ride, at 17, when my family vacationed in Bermuda. The experience took my breath away. I was so worked up about my first trip to Europe when I was 23 that I managed to make myself sick. I can still remember taking the Underground in London and the Metro in Paris, the first street I walked on in Rome, and how I felt seeing the Goya and El Greco paintings in The Prado in Madrid.
Our trip to Romania in the mid-seventies gave me a first-hand look at Communism. No one seemed to care about serving us. Not waiters, not employees in the hotels, not anyone. Romanians had no incentive to work hard. It didn’t lead to promotions and improved lifestyles. When we went to Morocco, camels blocked the road from the airport to downtown Casablanca. The winding, montainous roads in Crete were dangerously unpaved, and the most beautiful drive in the world was on California’s Pacific Coast Highway from San Diego clear up to Seattle, Washington.
I’ve traveled for pleasure and for business. Even though I prefer the former, the latter introduced me to Chicago, LA, San Francisco, Atlanta and more. I traveled so frequently to some places that I began to feel like I was visiting an old friend.
Most people all over the world never get the chance to see the world. They worry about their next meal and keeping their kids safe, not where they’re going on their next holiday. Their “scenery” is often ruble, mud or garbage. The only language they know is called survival.
