I had never been to Guilin China. Heck, I had never even heard of Guilin China
before signing up for the 9 day whirl-wind tour of China that April of
2000. I had given myself this tour as a
40th birthday present for myself.
After all, who doesn’t deserve something special for achieving such a
landmark period in life? Little did I
know, however, that my life would be forever changed during that tour. My sense of adventure had taken me to a place
that I never imagined possible.
I grew up primarily in central Ohio but we moved around a
lot. I went to three grade schools in
Columbus and even started junior high there.
We then moved to south Florida where I finished up with middle school
and started high school. Midway through
my junior year, we packed up and moved again, this time to Fayetteville, West
Virginia.
I guess that’s how the travel bug started. Going to new places was no big deal to me
after all of that. It was just a part of
my life. Later on I realized that experiencing
new places was more than “no big deal”—it was incredible and I actually loved
it. I loved the excitement of going
somewhere…anywhere I hadn’t been before.
It was fascinating to get to experience someone else’s way of life, if
only for a few days or even hours. My
motto became, “if I haven’t been there then let’s go.”
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