Wanderlust
School was always an escape for me as a child. It was a place where I thrived and felt good about myself. I worked hard on my studies and received good grades. When other parts of my childhood were not so pleasant, school was a bright site. Teachers were my friends. When our school was one of the first in the community to offer foreign languages, I had no idea the world that was about to open up to me. I began studying the Spanish language in the sixth grade and immediately fell in love with the test of translating, writing, and speaking in another language. The challenge was exhilarating, and learning to communicate in an alternate vernacular was like completing a puzzle. By the time I entered high school, I was placed in advanced level Spanish classes immediately. Spanish was more than a class to cross off the list. It became a means of further escape, as I dreamed of going to a foreign country where Spanish was spoken. The wonder of wanderlust was born.
Wanderlust gave birth to adventures beyond anything I dreamed possible. My journeys in international travel began decades ago when I was a mere sophomore in high school and I spent the summer in Spain. I received a scholarship with The Experiment in International Living, and set off for my very first plane trip from Chicago to Hartford, Connecticut and then traveled by bus to Middlebury, Vermont for a week of cultural immersion with a group of thirty other high school students and adoring adult guides. We bonded over our studies and Elton John’s Daniel (Daniel is travelling tonight on a plane…I can see the red tail lights heading for Spain…The say Spain is pretty though I’ve never been…la, la, la…). Once we all arrived in Spain we were split up as we each lived with a family to experience life as a Spaniard, learn the local culture, and accelerate our grasp of the Spanish language. Within the first couple days, my local father was hospitalized, and I had to be re-assigned to a new family. One of the wonders of wanderlust is learning adaptability – quickly! My new family lived in the same building as our group’s adult chaperone, which was a real blessing for a fifteen year-old girl who was not nearly as brave as she pretended to be. After a few weeks of living with our families, we said good-bye and toured the country together as a group. It was during this time that I became fascinated with the world and the cultures of people groups outside of my own. I became fluent in Spanish during the trip, and went on to college to major in International Business. I can't say enough about the value of travel to expand the mind and the heart.
Way back then, I never dreamed that I would one day lead groups to travel the lands of the Bible, but God prepared me long ago for such a time as this! There's nothing that compares to the shared experiences when traveling with a group like the one to Israel in 2013 and Journeys of Paul in Greece, Italy, and Turkey in 2016. The wonders of wanderlust have me so enthusiastic about our upcoming Journey to Israel later this year. I've seen how enriching a spiritual trip can be. I know why scholars call a trip to the Holy Land the Fifth Gospel, and since we know for certain that Paul wrote thirteen books of the New Testament, I would say that the Journeys of Paul trip is comparable to a fourteenth book of the Bible!
Traveling gives you a real-life education. While cruising the Mediterranean Sea, I woke up one morning to catch the sunrise (I actually did that every morning). I didn’t intend to wake my roommate every morning, but the morning we cruised by the Stromboli volcano I think I woke her with my gasps. The sheer beauty and wonder of this volcano sent me into a picture-taking frenzy and Google search to learn what this awesome piece of God’s creation we were privileged to witness with the sunrise. I had never heard of Stromboli other than what I had seen on a menu in an Italian restaurant.
Some of the other benefits of travel include: Increased creative thinking, improved social skills, a better sense of self, fun, and memories for a lifetime. What are you waiting for? Pick a place and pack your bags now!
