Encounters in My Travels: Thoughts Along the Way

167 Pages·2006·0.82 MB·English

by  Dixie Lee Harris

ENCOUNTERS IN MY TRAVELS
THOUGHTS ALONG THE WAY
VIBS
Volume 174
Robert Ginsberg
Founding Editor
Peter A. Redpath
Executive Editor
Associate Editors
G. John M. Abbarno Steven V. Hicks
Mary-Rose Barral Richard T. Hull
Gerhold K. Becker Mark Letteri
Raymond Angelo Belliotti Vincent L. Luizzi
Kenneth A. Bryson Adrianne McEvoy
C. Stephen Byrum Alan Milchman
H. G. Callaway George David Miller
Robert A. Delfino Alan Rosenberg
Rem B. Edwards Arleen L. F. Salles
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon John R. Shook
Francesc Forn i Argimon Eddy Souffrant
William Gay Tuija Takala
Dane R. Gordon Anne Waters
J. Everet Green John R. Welch
Heta Aleksandra Gylling Thomas F. Woods
Matti Häyry
a volume in
Lived Values: Valued Lives
LVVL
Richard T. Hull, Editor
ENCOUNTERS IN MY TRAVELS
THOUGHTS ALONG THE WAY
Dixie Lee Harris
Amsterdam - New York, NY 2006
Cover Design: Studio Pollmann
The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of “ISO
9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents -
Requirements for permanence”.
ISBN: 90-420-1788-0
©Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2006
Printed in the Netherlands
CONTENTS
Foreword vii
Introduction 1
ONE Police Encounters 3
TWO Alaska, 1957–1960 31
THREE Roads Traveled 43
FOUR War! 67
FIVE In the Muslim World 75
SIX Natural Wonders 87
SEVEN Built Wonders 97
EIGHT Other Encounters 117
NINE Epilogue 127
For Further Reading 131
About the Author 133
Index 135
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FOREWORD
I first met Dixie Lee Harris as a student in a course in critical thinking I was
teaching at the Center for Inquiry Transnational in Amherst, New York. It was
an interesting class comprised of students from college undergraduates to oc-
togenarians, with even a classics professor and a Nobel Prize nominee tossed
in. Dixie Lee impressed me by her contrast with the more garrulous members
of the class: She was quiet, attentive, and watchful, but did not speak up much.
I saw her at several other Center events, most recently a year ago in To-
ronto, Canada. There I made so bold as to speak with her, and she gradually
opened up about herself. I had just successfully proposed this series, Lived
Values, Valued Lives (LVVL), to the Value Inquiry Books Series editors and
was looking for titles. Dixie Lee mentioned that she had a manuscript about her
travels around the world, and I said I thought it might fit into my new series.
I found Dixie Lee Harris’s adventures to be fascinating in a variety of
ways. She demonstrates that extensive travel is possible without incurring great
expense is instructive. Her experiences have been much closer to the lives of
the common folk of the countries she has visited than the typical tourist fare.
Her encounters are eye opening even to one who has traveled a fair amount.
The Lived Values, Valued Lives Series is comprised of biographies,
loosely defined, that express and explore how values appear in, and shape,
human lives. We intend to provoke readers to engage in reflective exploration
of values expressed in the decisions, actions, and thoughts of philosophically
reflective individuals. From one another’s narratives we can learn much and
come to consider possibilities that might otherwise never occur to us.
Dixie Lee Harris does not have formal training as a philosopher. Her
comments about values such as honesty, integrity, or happiness do not appear
in a theoretical framework. Yet, in her own way, she characterizes the di-
lemma we all have with ideals: holding to them as a matter of principle versus
compromising them as a matter of practicality. She discussed how compro-
mising our values can hurt us, but that hurt is sometimes valuable.
LVVL is a series intended for young readers of all ages looking for in-
spiration not only for course papers but also for their lives. The value of
thoughtful reflection, not conversion, is the aim.
Richard Thompson Hull
Tallahassee, Florida
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INTRODUCTION
As a young adult, I had a naive notion that chemistry would help solve some
planetary problems, resulting in a better life for people. I became a chemist.
Instead of being part of a solution, I became increasingly disturbed that my
job as industrial chemist was contributing to the problem.
Then I thought I could do my part to help find some solutions by becom-
ing a teacher in the local high school, but I was passed over for that job, I
thought possibly because I was “overqualified.” What I considered a curse at
that time turned out to be one of the greatest blessings of my life.
So I decided to be a writer and wrote a book.
With the third rejection slip in hand, I began thinking again, “What
now?” Having failed three times at what I thought I really wanted to do, what
did I really really want to do?
Europe had always piqued my curiosity and I had great interest in the
Holy Lands of Israel, Jordan, and Palestine. I checked my finances and fig-
ured I could travel for three or four months.
At first, my horizon was no farther than Europe and the Holy Land. I
went down to New York City and found the S.S. United States was leaving in
two days’ time. I boldly bought the cheapest ticket and two days later sailed
into what turned out to be my great adventure. To my delighted surprise, my
three or four months’ budget stretched to nearly a year.
I seized as many opportunities as possible to view the great “wonders”
of the world. As I hiked and gazed at these wonders, I contemplated the phi-
losophical and practical issues that had urged me on my pilgrimage.
When I started traveling in 1955, I was in anguish over what I viewed as
severe and wide-ranging socioeconomic and political problems in the United
States. I had a grandiose notion of returning from my travels with ideas about
how to correct our faults as a nation. If I ever found a country that appeared to
have avoided or eliminated these problems in its society, I even considered
renouncing my American citizenship for that Shangri-la.
In addition, I yearned to retrace the roots of our political order. That
meant starting with Great Britain. That initial visit suited my purposes well. I
learned so much. The real revelation for me there was that while we in the
United States are so conscious of our problems, Britain has problems as bad
as ours, but the Britons did not appear to realize that they had problems at all.
As for the French, the ones I talked to did recognize that they had problems,
but had nothing I could see as a solution for ours. In the Netherlands, I viewed
their dike system as a great achievement in social engineering. I admired the
collective will required to accomplish the feat more than the technological
achievement.. Everywhere I went, just an ordinary private person, I was al-