ELCA NEWS SERVICE

August 21, 2007  

Real Travel with Real People: Lutheran Rick Steves on Meaningful Travel
07-146-BMC

     CHICAGO (ELCA)--Veteran guide Rick Steves believes good
travel is meaningful travel. In his 30 years as an author,
television host and tour leader, Steves has learned that it's all
about meeting people with other views and values.
     "It's the people that carbonate the experience. If I can't
get my travelers in touch with real people, the experience is
going to fall flat," Steves said in a recent edition of "Grace
Matters," the radio ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church
in America (ELCA).
     Steves brings his faith perspective with him as he travels
and leads other travelers. He is a member of an ELCA congregation
in Lynnwood, Wash.
     With his enthusiastic and unpretentious style, Steves has
taught millions of Americans how to make the most of their
vacations abroad through his 30 guidebooks and his popular public
television series "Rick Steves' Europe."
     Steves knows that good travel means more than being fed and
pampered, although those are important factors.
     "I sell a lot of guidebooks because I list a lot of
restaurants and hotels, but my passion is to inspire people and
equip people to travel in a way that broadens their perspective
and celebrates the world," Steves said. "Of course, the practical
hook is the tips and the tricks and the budget ideas."
     As a young man returning to Europe summer after summer,
Steves realized that his fellow American travelers --
honeymooners, retirees and families on once-in-a-lifetime trips
-- were making the same mistakes he had made on previous trips.
     "I thought if I could just package the lessons I've learned
from my experience, other people could learn from my mistakes
rather than their own and travel better, and I would have a good
excuse to go to Europe every year and update my material," he
said.
     Europe is the focus of his work, because in Steves'
estimation Europe is the wading pool for American travelers.
"They go to Europe first, they gain their confidence, and then
they can go further afield in the developing world."
     For Steves, further afield means places such as Papua New
Guinea, El Salvador and India. Steves rates India the most
culturally stimulating country he's visited. His most memorable
trip was to Central America on a tour that uncovered the faith of
people living in economic hardship. "The faith of people in
Central America blows away a lot of Americans and Europeans who
visit," he said.
     "When you travel (in developing countries), you realize that
the poorest people on the planet operate from a mindset of
abundance while the richest people operate from a mindset of
scarcity. That's a very challenging thing," Steves said.
     When Steves walked on a garbage dump in San Salvador, the
capital of El Salvador, he saw adults scrambling to meet the dump
trucks to pick out half-used batteries they could sell at the
markets. In that moment, said Steves, "I realized, these are
parents, they've got kids (to feed)."
     Through face-to-face encounters with a few of the billions
of people who live on $2 per day or less, Steves has found that
his priorities back home have changed. "It's inexcusable that
there's a tsunami worth of casualties among children every week
for simple water- and hunger-related illnesses that could very
easily be addressed if we had those priorities," he said.
     Steves believes that once you've met with people who find
"God-given truths to be self-evident" that are different from
those of the average U.S. citizen, it changes the way you see the
world. "There is just nothing as valuable to understand our world
out there as to physically leave your home and go far away and
look at your home from a distance."
- - -
     Audio clips from "Expanding Your World," the May 13, 2007,
interview with Rick Steves on "Grace Matters" are online at
http://www.gracematters.org/listen.html#May on the ELCA Web site.
     A 12-minute video interview on "Faithful Travel" is online
at http://www.ELCA.org/mosaic/faithfultravel/  on the ELCA Web
site.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or [log in to unmask]
http://www.elca.org/news
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