Welcoming Travellers is a Holiday Itself

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Many of us are stuck in the daily grind. Living in our houses, paying for our mortgages, going to a workplace every day. We long for more holiday time.
Bring the holiday to you!

By welcoming a traveller, you can feel as if you have been to their land yourself. As they say, a change is as good as a rest, and conversation with a traveller can be a breath of fresh air.

An organization called couchsurfing.com gives you access to all kinds of travellers coming to your town in the near future. I’m not always in the mood to receive someone, but when a Swedish girl posted a note about her sister arriving at the airport, I thought, why not?

And what an excellent visit we had. Having been treated wonderfully quite often when I was a traveller myself I remember how great it is to have a kind person greet you at the airport, to give you a shower and a bed.

The joy of creating joy is the first benefit. I realized, too, that the kid and I could take a Tuesday off and drive her to the mountain town where her sister was, instead of putting her on an impersonal bus. Why not?

And all the next benefits came from Maja. I sat back and gratefully received cheese from Sweden, and candies, and chocolate.

And the stories! Who wouldn’t want to spend a day with a cheerful, smart, interesting blonde farm girl full of ideas and experiences? It reminded me of the cheerful, smart, interesting blonde farm girl that I used to be. About the hope and energy and swimming-with-ideas-ness I used to have myself.

We had a lot in common, but some things not. I think she’ll do better than I have. I hope she will. I hope I’ll get to keep track of her in the future. Naturally, as it often does with world travellers, our hospitality to her resulted in a return invitation – we should come to stay with her next time we are in Northern Sweden. Well… if you read my previous articles, you know someone once said that to me about Singapore when I wasn’t expecting to go to Singapore, and it turned out magically, so who knows? Maybe we will end up in Northern Sweden. On ne sais jamais (you never know).

On our return trip from the mountains, we saw a man by the side of the road on the Indian reserve, where I used to work teaching adults. I know that hitch-hikers from the reserve are usually full of good stories, so we gave him the empty space in the back seat for the ride to town.

He had heard his one-year-old son had been discharged from the hospital and was on his way into town to visit him and his mother. It gave me time to think about relationships and acceptance and the way things are for people – again, excellent brain food to give me a break from the daily grind.
When my son went off to preschool, one day he brought home some stories of “rangers.” They had been talking about some strange and scary concept called “rangers,” which baffled him.

They had been preaching about “stranger danger,” of course. Though I have always taught my son about situational awareness, and not trusting people who seem like they might have a bad vibe, I never taught him about the stupid modern blanket concept of “strangers.”
Because of the popular media-driven modern fear of all unknown people, many have closed themselves off completely to the world.
I challenge you to rethink that.
Think of this: a stranger is simply a friend you haven’t met yet. Welcome a new person into your life, your car, your house today. If only for an hour.
They will bring a breath of fresh air for your mind that you’ll never find in the gym, on the ski slopes, or in any other money-driven pursuit.
Only by the opening of your mind and heart and by a little generosity yourself can you receive this life-saving, sanity-saving gift of
fresh air.

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