A final note of political commentary—Traveling in the post-Bush current Obama era was enlightening. For the majority of the Bush era, traveling abroad as an American was a bit of an embarrassment. While people do not solely judge you by your leader over the last 6 years of the Bush administration there was a certain mocking nature to people’s assessment of our policies and country. While subtle, it was consistently there wherever we went. Now, under the Obama administration, things are strikingly different. When we told people we were Americans, we were greeted with chants of praise. “Go Obama,” was constantly heard time and time again. Kindness, charisma, an ability to communicate, and importantly and ability to admit mistakes goes a long way in building friendship and combating terrorism. Instead of breeding hate, which clearly hasn’t worked very well in the post 911 world, how about breeding friendship. It’s a lot cheaper the guided missiles and will save many more American and foreign lives. Some will say we are naïve, but if you haven’t been traveling the world in the post 911 era, especially outside the sugar coated western world you should, before commenting.
Jeff Salvage after returning from a trip for the One Woman, One Dress, One World photography campaign.
