Travel

Dr. Samuel Johnson, in his book The New Hebrides, (and I thought about this many times when I was there) said, “The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.” Mark Twain said, “India is the ultimate travel destination.” (And, I thought about that every time I was there.)

To prove that this is the land of opportunity, you may use this illustration any time you wish. I was born in poverty, on a tobacco farm in east North Carolina. All we knew was hard work, sweat, and the need for everything except God's mercy and parental encouragement. From this background, graduating from a country school with 13 in my graduating class, working my way through 8 years of university education, then as a commissioned medical officer going into the military, returning 100% disabled, totally blind, I had dreamed of seeing the pyramids along the Nile, the opera house in Sydney, St. Paul's in London. God, in His infinite grace and wisdom, saw fit to allow me to prosper early in my return on the Stock Market and led me to travel the world while I still had a small amount of vision in one eye.

You see, God is a traveler. He has seen the end of the parade as well as the beginning of the parade. He wanted to prepare me as He has prepared me for everything else, by sending me around the world several times so that I could better understand the miracles of the breadth and depth in the designing of this planet and the people who He allows to live here on every continent.

Books are man's greatest friend. With a veracious appetite for reading and a quick mind, I had traveled the world in books. In writing and speaking, I have said many times, “I was never in any place which surprised me.” My passport has been stamped in 157 countries but I have been in most countries several times. I believe 23 times through Europe. Both to the Arctic and the Antarctic. In God's preparation, in youth as in old age, I have been a “tight wad” and probably traveled the world as cheaply as anyone possibly could. God knew of my frugality. He knew I would not waste a dime. Most tourists, in tourist places, such as Paris, would be extravagant in fancy restaurants. I would pick up food in a small kiosk and bewildered passersby when they saw an old blind man, sitting on a bench, eating cheap food. I always stayed in inexpensive hotels, unless it was a planned itinerary group trip. Most travelers would not live like I lived when traveling and would not live like I live when staying at home.

Never in my life, have I had room service and never in my life, have I ordered anything to be delivered to my house (not even a pizza or Chinese food). When the time comes that I cannot open a can of something and prepare it myself for my consumption, I will pray again, as I pray everyday, “Lord take me on home.” It has been a curiosity to every reporter who has ever interviewed me, that in traveling, I would take nothing but second hand clothes (this multi-millionaire wears nothing but second hand clothes), which I would trade for artifacts, art objects, carpets, and jewelry, so that on my return, the only clothes I owned were those I was wearing. My suitcases were full of “junk”. I even returned with the magazines which were on the many airlines.

You would be surprised to know how well they have sold on eBay and all the other things which I have brought back from all over the world: a whale vertebrae from the Arctic, silk carpets from Pakistan and Afghanistan, silk shirts from Kashmir, paintings from China, silk embroideries from China, masks and animal skins from all over the world. I have had the pleasure not only of bargaining for these thousands of items, but having them around me all these years in my town and beach houses to bring back the wonderful memories of travel and now I am having the pleasure of selling all of these items online. The money is being used to support God's work in many places because He and He alone has made it all possible. How people cheat themselves when they do not put their lives in His never-failing, ever-lasing arms. You see, He saw from a great distance a young, barefoot child, who had a wonderful mind, who could give a marvelous testimony throughout the world of His grace and mercy.

In the New Hebrides, which I have already mentioned, I met two men from Seattle, Washington who had escaped the “rat race” of the banking world in the northwest, who had purchased a sloop, sailed to the South Pacific and were using their retirement funds, going from island to island taking care of the needs of many people, both physical and spiritual. Can you even imagine how excited they were to meet me; for me to give my testimony before their groups and to have my contributions to their cause, financial and physical? One said, “I thought I knew about life until I met the Maker of life through my devotion to the people of these islands. It takes very little for us to live here, and with the fortunes drawing interest we left behind, we are able to supply our needs and the needs of so many needy people.” Albert Einstein said, “The greatest force in the world, is the force of compound interest.”

Now it has not all been pleasant, mostly due to other tourists. An international poll this week told us, that the French are the world's worst tourists and that the Japanese are the best. I found, in my traveling, that American tourists are obnoxious, spoiled, and insipid. But, they are the same up and down the street where I live. Americans are the same everywhere, brash and arrogant. I never got accustomed to being in a wonderful hotel such as the Peninsula in Hong Kong, eating with a guide of taste and discipline and over-weight, always pant-suited women coming in, not having hygienically prepared themselves for being with acceptable people, infringing on their outing.

I sat at a hotel in Bombay, India, and saw three women (two fat lesbians with the mother of one, who was evidently paying the bills) come into a restaurant and each time, have all the wait staff trembling from their callus attitudes. If one wants all the services, nuances, hospitality expectations of America in a foreign country, they should simply stay at home. When you are in Outer Mongolia, the people who work in places of service, are not accustomed to American extravagance and selfishness. America's greatest export in a foreign country, Wall Street, Main Street, your street, is the golden rule of attitude. (Matthew 7:12)