September 11, 2018 Travel

The Liberty Gazette

September 11, 2018

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: Apart from war-related flying, weather research, search and rescue, mercy flights, and such, when we consider travel by air it brings us thoughts of adventure waiting on the horizon. But travel does more than jet us away from home. When we go to faraway places we learn about other cultures. If we are open to it, we also learn about ourselves, outside our comfort zone.

We re-evaluate values; experiences versus things. For example:

- Climbing to the top of Sniper Tower in Mostar, Bosnia and witnessing the messages of peace and remembrance in street art;

- Finding the Pittman Apartment building in Saigon—the one in the iconic photo of a helicopter lifting some of the last few people out of the country as the enemy rolled down the streets in tanks;

- Our souls soaking in beautiful Cambodia and her lovely people who have suffered immensely, yet their art is healing a wounded nation.

We’ve seen firsthand how God uses art to heal in Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe. It’s powerful. We’ve met survivors and descendants of those who suffered. We’ve heard their stories and they have moved us. Experience versus things? There is no souvenir of that worth.

Mike: There’s so much more to the universe than the little space we take up. Most people who travel report a significantly deeper sense of connection to the rest of the humanity. But to get this benefit, we must be immersed in the culture we visit. Cruises, resorts, and shopping don’t show us the real world. To be in the neighborhoods and visit people in their homes, to discover their customs, traditions, daily life, is to gain appreciation for our differences and similarities.

I flew a trip to the Dominican Republic for the wedding of the French Prince Louis Alphonse, Duke of Anjou to the daughter of a friend of my boss. My co-pilot and I did not attend the wedding but remained in the country for a week, put up at an exclusive resort. Resort life did not give much of a window into the lives of the people in the D.R. All around the outside of the compound were ramshackle homes, most only half built. These people worked behind the scenes at the resort but were not allowed to interact with guests. We were discouraged from leaving the compound except in one of the resort vehicles to and from the airport.

I contrast this with Alex, our enterprising tuk-tuk driver in Siem Reap, Cambodia. He took us to his village and his home. We tasted local herbs and learned about how a neighbor extracts sap from a tree, rising early to boil it carefully for hours in a wide ten-gallon cast iron bowl hung crudely over a fire to make sweet syrup, which he sells in the afternoon. Cambodian children warmed our hearts as they walked dirt roads with their arms around each other—buddies, like kids everywhere.

We are enriched as we travel beyond our borders to truly live in God's creation.

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