When I was a kid it was big news when someone flew around the world in a little aeroplane, but nobody cared when I did it. Then, to rub salt into my wounds, the customs people ripped my aeroplane to pieces, looking for stuff.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
All of a sudden to get all of this attention, and to be away from home and working all the time was hard. I was on planes all the time. I didn't see my friends. I cried a lot. It was quite terrifying.
I flew aeroplanes, parachuted, walked on my own across the Himalayas - you name it; if it was dangerous, I did it.
My parents took me around the world when I was young, so I caught the bug. Every person is different when he travels, and every travellers' story is uniquely his own.
On landing at New York I caught the yellow fever. The kind man who commanded the ship that brought me from France took charge of me and placed me under the care of two Quaker ladies. To their skillful and untiring care I may safely say I owe my life.
As a child, I was airlifted out of the path of the Nazis. Unfortunately, I was parachuted into the path of the Japanese, but then I was airlifted again to India.
I went to a number of foreign countries, and during whenever I went, I would try to go to an orphanage or a home for children. And I was seeing thousands of kids around the world that needed homes.
My wife had taken off on a plane. Two airplanes had crashed into the World Trade Center. I, of course, like any other person, felt potentially devastated, panicky a little bit.
I remember the first time that I flew on an airplane overseas, it was about when I was seven; it was 1969.
On my job I end up jumping out of planes. Last week I got in an 18-wheeler and drove down a runway onto a skid track. The week before that they put me in a car and sunk me to the bottom of a lake to see if I could escape without an oxygen tank.
When I won my way to the international science fair, I didn't want to embarrass myself. It was the first time I was going to be away from home, the first time taking an airplane. I went to the local library, checked out every single etiquette book, and I read those books like I was uncovering some sort of treasure.