Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity. Patton
If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you. Gospel of St. Thomas
He that would make his travels delightful must first make himself delightful. Seneca
I cannot help looking with partial eyes on my native land. That partiality was certainly given us by nature, to prevent rambling, the effect of an ambitious thirst after knowledge, which we are not formed to enjoy. All we get by it, is a fruitless desire of mixing the different pleasures and conveniences which are given to the different parts of the world, and cannot meet in any of them. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Is there anything as horrible as starting on a trip? Once you’re off, that’s all right, but the last moments are earthquake and convulsion, and the feeling that you are a snail being pulled off your rock. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Generally speaking, the length and grandness of a hotel’s name are an exact opposite reflection of its quality. Thus the hotel Central will prove to be a clean, pleasant place in a good part of town, and the Hotel Royal Majestic-Fantastic will be a fleabag next to a topless bowling alley. Miss Piggy
Never trust anything you read in a travel article. Travel articles appear in publications that sell large, expensive advertisements to tourism-related industries, and these industries do not wish to see articles with headlines like: URUGUAY: DON’T BOTHER. Dave Barry
I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read in the train. Oscar Wilde
Women have always yearned for faraway places. It was no accident that a woman financed the first package tour of the New World, and you can bet Isabella would have taken the trip herself, only Ferdinand wouldn’t let her go. Roslyn Friedman
Somewhere between Calabria and Corfu the blue really begins… Other countries may offer you discoveries in manners or lore or landscape; Greece offers you something harder–the discovery of yourself. Lawrence Durrell
Maimena [1934] – I wish I was rich enough to endow a prize for the sensible traveller: L 10,000 for the first man to cover Marco Polo’s outward route reading three fresh books a week, and another L 10,000 if he drinks a bottle of wine a day as well… What I mean is, that if I had some more detective stories instead of Thucydides and some bottle of claret instead of tepid whiskey, I should probably settle here for good. Robert Byron
Travel is the most private of pleasures. There is no greater bore than the travel bore. We do not want to hear what he has seen in Hong Kong. Vita Sackville-West
Ah, what is more blessed than to put cares away, when the mind lays by its burden, and tired with labor of far travel we have come to our own home and rest on the couch we have longed for? This it is which alone is worth all these toils. Catullu
When you start on the way to Ithaca
Wish that the way be long
Full of adventure, full of knowledge.
Laistrygonians and the Cyclops
And angry Poseidon, do not fear:
Such on your way, you shall never meet
If your thoughts are lofty if a noble
Emotion touch your mind, your body.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops
And angry Poseidon you shall not meet
If you carry them not in your soul,
If your soul sets them not before you.
Wish that the way be long,
That on many summer mornings,
With great pleasure, great delight,
You enter harbors for the first time seen;
That you stop at Phoenician marts,
And procure the goodly merchandise,
Mother-of-pearl and corals, amber and ebony,
And sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
To wend your way through many Egyptian cities
To learn and yet to learn from the wise.
Keep Ithaka ever in your mind,
Your return thither is your goal.
But do not hasten at all your voyage,
Better that it last for many years;
And full of years at length you anchor at your isle
Rich with al that you gained on the way;
Do not expect Ithaca to give you riches.
Ithaca gave you your fair voyage
Without her you would not have ventured on the way,
but she has no more to give you.
And if you find Ithaca a poor place,
She has not mocked you.
You have become so wise, so full of experience
that you should understand already what
Ithaca means Constantine Cavafy, Trans. George
Valassopoulo
My childhood is a long way off
My old age is a long way off
My country, my exile, a long way off.
Tourist!
Give me your binoculars
Perhaps I might glimpse a hand or a handkerchief
In this world
Waving at me
Take my photographs as I weep
Crouching in my tatters on the steps of the hotel
Write on the back of the picture
“This is a poet from the East.”
Spread your handkerchief on the pavement
And sit beside me under this tender rain
Let me disclose to you a great secret:
“Go dismiss all your guides
Throw to the mud…to the fire
All the notes and impressions you’ve written
Any old peasant in this land
Can tell you with two verse from our sad ‘Ataba songs
All the history of the East
As he rolls his cigarette in front of his tent.” Muhammad Al-Maghut
You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself
any direction you choose. Dr. Seuss
Every man’s religion is good. There is none of it bad. We are all trying to arrive at the same place according to our own conscience and teachings. It don’t matter which road you take. Will Rodgers
Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest do not happen at all. The conscientious historian will correct these defects. Herodotus
Wisdom from Truman and his incomparable Tiffany’s
It’s February – you need Persuasion
How To Behave - Etiquette Central 