Introduction to Travel Fuels Life and Host Drew Hannush (Ep. 2)

Drew (00:00):
I'm Drew ish, the host of Travel Fuels Life, but not this week actually, I am the guest on Travel Fuels Life.

Colleen (00:31):
Hello, my name is Colleen Hanish and welcome to Travel Fuels Life, the podcast.

Drew (00:40):
I feel like there should be some fanfare here, somewhere

Colleen (00:43):
Along that. Well, you need a theme song.

Drew (00:45):
Well, the theme song was on the way in.

Colleen (00:48):
So in order to introduce myself, all I had to do was say my name.

Drew (00:54):
Yes,

Colleen (00:55):
I am Andrew Ish's sister. And we just recently went on a short little trip together to go see my mom in Texas. And on that trip we were discussing this idea that Andrews had for the podcast. And I am an avid podcast lister, so I had all sorts of ideas, but my biggest idea was that somebody introduce him and start asking questions about his ideas because it was a really fascinating talk we had on the plane and I really enjoyed it. So I thought you guys would enjoy it as well.

Drew (01:29):
Very nice.

Colleen (01:29):
So here's Andrew Hanish

Drew (01:31):
With Without having the plane noise in the background.

Colleen (01:34):
Right? Well, we

Drew (01:35):
Could just have it in the studio with an air conditioner.

Colleen (01:37):
Exactly.

Drew (01:38):
It's perfect. Yes. Very good. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, I wrote a book on podcasting before I got all this done just to pick up a little extra information and see if there was anything that I was missing in getting this thing started. And they said, make sure your first podcast is all about you and what your idea is. And after reading that, I thought this was so much a better idea to actually have a conversation and be able to kind of banter back and forth. We do when we go on a trip. It's so funny because you and I, when we were kids, we were

Colleen (02:18):
Like, we did not banter when we were kids. Banter.

Drew (02:21):
Oh, we bantered. It was Stay on your side of the car. What are you doing? You're invading my space first feet

Colleen (02:28):
On my side.

Drew (02:29):
Yeah, it was definitely caged animals, but the break was you would sleep. Right. And I would

Colleen (02:40):
Just thank God for drama

Drew (02:41):
Mean. I would just hum and rock and roll in my head.

Colleen (02:45):
Exactly. You were the good child. I was the one that was needing to be drugged in Dramamine.

Drew (02:54):
Well, you've come a long way.

Colleen (02:55):
Yes, I have. We've done really well on our recent trips.

Drew (02:58):
Yeah, it's actually, it's nice being adults.

Colleen (03:01):
It is. Well, there's the bills.

Drew (03:05):
Well there's the bills. But

Colleen (03:07):
Yeah, so the trip that we took to Texas, we keep going to Texas. I wonder why. I guess that's because mom and Andrew Ellen are there. But the first trip we drove the hallway and we shared music

Drew (03:21):
And that was our first time of actually getting to do that kind of a journey together where we weren't have parents involved in the actual trip controlling the radio. So yeah, it

Colleen (03:37):
Was no Percy

Drew (03:38):
Faith. No Percy Faith, no Ray Coniff. I always like to say I knew all the great hits of the sixties, I just didn't know the words. Right.

Colleen (03:48):
Either that or it was the elevator music version. Yeah,

Drew (03:51):
Yeah, yeah. Pretty much. So it's

Colleen (03:55):
Skelter Skelter by Ray.

Drew (03:57):
Yeah. It doesn't work. No, not too good. Oh, well I think I still have that record somewhere.

Colleen (04:02):
Do you really? Yeah. That's a part of my childhood. I didn't try to save. No, no.

Drew (04:08):
I think I have a few Ray Kiff downloads, sadly. Oh yeah, I

Colleen (04:12):
Think I did go for Patty page. I still have that on my, and some of the forties stuff that dad used to sing.

Drew (04:18):
But see, anyway, but see, I'm a collector, so I, it's, I get one LED Z on an album. I got to get 'em all.

Colleen (04:24):
Oh, okay.

Drew (04:25):
And actually, that's kind of how I travel and it's one of those things that I'm going to have to learn over time is that it's not going to the buffet when you go to Europe that you need to grab a little bit of everything and load your plate down, but instead actually go somewhere and enjoy it and really soak it in for what it is. Because my trip's up to this point have been 16 days, 10 countries.

Colleen (04:54):
But that's your style.

Drew (04:56):
It is. But I also took a trip here more recently back to Europe where I was a little bit slower about it. I took two days here and two days there and it allowed me to relax maybe a little bit more. Well, maybe not actually. When I went to Carlo very in Czech Republic and I walked tw 25 miles in two days and it's very hilly. And then Prague, I did the same thing. And then two days after that you

Colleen (05:32):
Walked 25 miles.

Drew (05:33):
25

Colleen (05:34):
Miles in two days. Okay.

Drew (05:35):
Yeah, because Google Maps or Google timeline actually will track you if your GPS is on. And I thought,

Colleen (05:42):
Well, but I was thinking 10 miles a day about tops for walking. Oh

Drew (05:45):
Yeah. Yeah. 25. 25 per two days. Gotcha. Yes. Whew. Yeah. And so I didn't have any skin on the bottom of my feet after, and because London, I had a

Colleen (05:56):
Hundred. You were walking barefoot?

Drew (05:58):
No, but okay. I didn't, don't know if they make shoes that are good enough for walking on pavement that much. Right. But I, I soak all of it in, but then I've seen so much stuff. I'm like, next trip I come back, I'll do a week in London, and then that way I can go back to the stuff that I didn't get to go inside. I could only take pictures of it from the outside. Right. Because that's it. I mean, my trips are go get something to eat, then I'm back taking pictures of outside of everything. But I never go in anything because I don't

Colleen (06:34):
Have time. So my travel style is so much different than yours. It's really fun to watch you. Yeah. And I think this whole project that you're taking off on, I'm just curious about how it's challenging you though. And so it's sounds like you're actually starting to think about slowing down so you have more to offer

Drew (06:55):
A little bit. I mean, the thought is, I know I want to travel. And what's interesting is this idea has kind of morphed over time. It started with me coming up on an age milestone and saying, what am I not doing in my life that I should be doing? Because I'm a web designer, I've been a web designer for 15 years, but I, I've gotten the office optimized enough that I'm just sitting at the office and kind of directing traffic and finding busy work to do. And so I thought finally I said, what am I not doing in my life that I'd like to do? And travel is that thing. So now I start taking little short trips and I went to Las Vegas, I was learning how to play baa and I was playing it on my phone and I'm like, this just isn't quite enough for me.

(07:47):
And I talked to a friend who said, oh, I go and play poker in Vegas all the time, and you can go to Atlanta and hop a quick flight. It'll cost you under a hundred bucks to fly there. Wow. You get to Las Vegas, you get yourself, you get one of their rewards programs and you'll get comped rooms and low cost rooms. So I'm paying $45 to stay in Paris Hotel in Las Vegas and going down and getting to practice playing Bacca and all that sort. So for me it was kind of get out and start getting a feel for getting out on the road and seeing what it's like, but mixing work with that so that I'm not letting it get in the way of revenue coming in. And then as it evolved, I started thinking, let me stretch myself out a little bit more and maybe start doing some blogging and that sort of thing because that just seemed like a logical direction to go. And that's when I did my bourbon tour in Kentucky. I knew nothing about bourbon

Colleen (08:53):
And thank you for turning me on to the old Forester site. That was really good.

Drew (08:57):
There you go. See? Yeah. So I went on that trip not knowing anything about bourbon. I knew a little about scotch, but not a lot about scotch either. And so I thought what a great opportunity for me to travel and blog about my learning experience about bourbon from beginning to end. So that's really what I ended up doing. I was kind of just playing around and seeing what I could do in terms of shooting video of myself coming out of this place and going into this place and talking about my experience and making a list of all the distilleries and what my experience was there. And then also showing my growth in knowledge along the way of bourbon. And I realized after I got back from there, between that me doing my James Bond trips, it's all about uncovering things. And so

Colleen (09:56):
Discovery is what I'm hearing you say. Yeah.

Drew (09:58):
It's curiosity that I have. And rather than doing something, reading it in the book or looking it up in Wikipedia,

Colleen (10:08):
You want to go,

Drew (10:09):
I want to experience it because people can tell you about a place, but when you go there, it's like they can tell you, but it's still two dimensional. It's really your ears or pictures. Everything is flat.

Colleen (10:23):
So what do you want share with other people? Then this is your passion and your title says Travel Fuels Life. Yes. And it's funny because when I was thinking about interviewing you, I was thinking, I always thought passion fueled life, but travel is your passion and then you're going to be inspiring other people. And how do you want to inspire them with your stories and with your travels and how you're doing it?

Drew (10:57):
Well, in reality, I have a back background in radio, and the interesting thing about my background in radio is that I was always the person in charge. I was the one who was always leading the charge in terms of dialogue and what I wanted the audience to know. What I find when I travel is that what I get the most pleasure out of is talking to people when I'm here or there and learning from them. And so to me, it's almost my way of bringing my travel experience to other people who haven't had a chance to enjoy the pleasure of being able to go somewhere and have those conversations and hear people's experiences and break down those barriers of, I don't know how many people I run into who say I don't know that I could do, I couldn't just go solo travel, which is what I normally do. I mean,

Colleen (12:00):
I hear a lot of people say that. I mean, I went to Mexico by myself and everybody's like, you can't do that. And I went to London after the bombings and everybody said, oh, you're not still going to go, are you? And so I hear a lot of hesitation in people. So part of what you're looking at is inspiring people to become more independent in their travel.

Drew (12:22):
I want people to not, I want people to understand that fear is a real thing, but that you need to look at where that fear is coming from. Are you afraid of this travel because somebody told you to be afraid of it and because there is a, and or you're putting up your own barriers, or is there really a concrete danger to you going to a particular place and doing something and trying to differentiate between the two so that you can make a decision of, I would love to go to someplace like Iran or Turkey.

Colleen (12:59):
Right.

Drew (12:59):
But if you read the State Department website, it's going to tell you not to do that. Exactly.

(13:04):
And I had somebody tell me right before I went on my trip to Europe the first time this was the Belgium bombing happened, and they said, boy, this can't be a good time for you to be going. And I was going to Bruge Belgium. So I was not far from where all of that had taken place. And I said, I can't let that stop me. Right, exactly. Honestly, I would've never moved to Philadelphia when I was younger. If I read the crime reports, I mean, it's American cities, you know, probably have as much opportunity to have something bad happen to you in American City as you're going to have going anywhere else.

Colleen (13:46):
So you can give people the ins and outs of going, but if travel is your passion, what do you hope to pass on from your passion to them? There are people who passion is not travel

Drew (14:00):
Well, and this is part of the reason for the name Travel Fuels Life. And I, coming from a marketing background, my first, well, I was lucky because I started to put together the name of the business and I was looking strategically at how to do it with that marketing brain. But then I just kind of stepped back from it and I said, what feels right to me? And so I started just putting a bunch of words down on a piece of paper in different combinations, and I looked at Travel Fuels Life, and I said, that's speaks to me. And one of the reasons why I'm so sold on it is because it is a statement. It's not necessarily a brand. I throw all the marketing out. If the words travel fuels life resonate with you, then I'm providing content that's going to resonate with you.

Colleen (15:02):
Well, it's your statement.

Drew (15:04):
It's my statement. But it rings true for a lot of people, I think. But you're right, there's people who,

Colleen (15:10):
So you're going to have listeners that are going to just pop in and listen to you. I mean, I pop in and listen to all kinds of podcasts and some of them grab me and some of them don't.

Drew (15:19):
And there's going to be people who don't want to listen to it at all because they don't really like travel.

Colleen (15:23):
But you're going to get a few people in there who don't necessarily have never considered really traveling the way you travel. And then you're hoping to reach them with your passion.

Drew (15:35):
I am. And I don't want to dictate how they travel. And what I want to do is I want to introduce guests from a variety of backgrounds who travel in a variety of ways, whether they travel with their family or they travel solo, or they like to travel to foreign countries, or they just like to travel locally.

Colleen (15:56):
Exactly.

Drew (15:56):
There's so many different, or people who, because I hear this a lot too, how could I travel more and maybe even make it an occupation and bring in people who have made that leap and been able to do that sort of thing. To me that it's just opening up a world of possibilities to people who, again, travel fuels life, the name resonates with, they see it, they go,

Colleen (16:26):
So one of the things that you are really good at is, and it's a philosophical thing with you, I think, but one of the things you're really good at is really just breaking down barriers. And I don't think you see them. Most people see them. So I think that that's going to be a real benefit to people.

Drew (16:44):
Yeah. I, and to me, it's exposure. Exposure not necessarily to opinions or prejudice, exposure to the actual thing. For instance, before I was saying, if you go look up something on Google, because somebody said this to me the other day, they said, well, I mean, why go there? You can just look all this stuff up or watch it on TV there. To me, that's two dimensional, three dimensional is when you go and you actually see everything in 3D around you. And now this gives you, and you smell and you experience. And then the fourth dimension is when you actually start talking to somebody and when you start interacting and you learn things from people. And to me that is the piece that you get from travel that you don't get from reading it in the book or even listening to a podcast.

Colleen (17:43):
My first travels beyond dad dragging us around to president's homes. My first travels were in college talking to people who had come from other countries and just learning about water buffalo. I talked to a woman who was raised with water buffalo as pets in Vietnam and just asking about religions and how they practice and what they do. And it is, it's fascinating. And so going to another country and sitting and talking to people is just, yeah,

Drew (18:18):
It's

Colleen (18:18):
Sitting on a train across from people you don't know and just striking up conversations.

Drew (18:24):
And what's funny is that I've talked to people who say they're introverts that are travelers and they open up when they're on the road. And I think it's a sort of a defense in a way too, because if you're solo traveling, you haven't been able to talk to people for a while and you, after a while, sometimes I'll start looking around for people to talk to. But it's fantastic. I mean, I went to Shaman France in the shadow of Mount Blanc, and I got there late. I walked into a restaurant in this little town, and the guy that, well, the bartender was from New Zealand, and we started having all sorts of conversations about New Zealand. Then the guy that came in and sat next to me was an American Exchange student, but he was actually studying in Ireland. And he said, oh, I just flew down here because it's so cheap to fly from place to place in Europe. And he opened a whole new world to me. Oh yeah. I mean, I thought when you go over to Europe, either you're going to take a train or you're going to rent a car. I never thought, I don't have to sit on a train or a bus for hours and hours and hours when I could pay 40 bucks to fly from east to London. And so in talking to travelers, you get a whole new view on the world that you didn't even know existed.

(19:49):
And again, in terms of doing a podcast, that this gives me the opportunity to find those kind of guests that can maybe get those creative juices flowing in somebody's mind and get them to go, wow, that person went some place. I've always wanted to go, yeah, maybe I could go there. Maybe it wouldn't be that hard.

Colleen (20:10):
I like that idea that we talked about interviewing somebody just about traveling in your own city too. I love that idea. Just practicing those same techniques in your own city.

Drew (20:23):
Well, I sort of think that for the person who's nervous about traveling, that's a perfect way to start, start close to home, then start inching out a little further. Go visit a city or a whatever it may be nearby you, but within a hundred miles or whatever, and then take that first plane flight to somewhere that's not too scary,

Colleen (20:46):
And learn to do with one travel bag you would do if you were going to Europe. Right. That kind of thing. Right. Yeah. So those are all things that people can practice.

Drew (20:55):
Yeah, absolutely.

Colleen (20:56):
Yeah. I just had this great thought. Who wouldn't it be cool if you could somehow interview dad about his travels? And I mean,

Drew (21:09):
Yeah,

Colleen (21:11):
Our dad was someone who could get in a car and drive and stop at certain locations and see certain things that he planned on seeing. He'd have an itinerary, he'd have it all set up. And I kind of see Andrew traveling that way some too. But he's different. And so my first question is, what do you think you would get out of that if you did ask him about his travel? And then my second question is, who would be, if you could interview anybody about their travel, who would it be? So both of those things.

Drew (21:53):
Wow.

Colleen (21:54):
I know. I thought that was a good question. Well,

Drew (21:57):
It's interesting to hit the second one first. I hadn't thought too much about it, but what's interesting about this is that I've been lining up guests in my head and I thought, actually, one of my favorite musicians actually just released an album today. And I had had an interesting experience with him in terms of chatting back and forth on social media. Now you think in the old days of lead singer of a band, there's no way you're ever going to talk to the guy, right? Because there's always a velvet rope between you. But in social media, that all breaks down and there's much more of an opportunity to be able to chat

Colleen (22:41):
With people. Well, that's why I was wondering who that would be. Yeah. So who's the singer?

Drew (22:45):
The singer is JR Richard. He was a lead singer of Dish Walla. Ooh,

Colleen (22:51):
Yes. Yes. You turned me on to Dish Wallah,

Drew (22:53):
And he's a fantastic singer. And I don't know, the only reason why I'm was only hesitant in terms of reaching out to him, I'm going to reach out to him regardless, but was because I don't know that he actually tours anymore. But to me, asking him the question of what's the difference between having a top 10 hit on the charts with a band traveling, where everything's done for you, to you now being on the road yourself and really trying to make your, and what that transition is.

Colleen (23:29):
See, I think that that's making this podcast unique is that you're looking in that direction. Yeah.

Drew (23:38):
So

Colleen (23:39):
Is there anybody else on that list of the perfect interview?

Drew (23:46):
There's, just so you know what, I think the people that I really want to talk to, because they will be more inspirational to the audience as a whole, are regular people who just got out there and started doing it. They either took a risk and said, let me do it because this is what I love to do. Or people who have methodically figured out how to transition into a life of travel. I think that would be bigger for me. In terms of Dad, we got to do some traveling together.

Colleen (24:23):
You guys went to Germany or was that a home?

Drew (24:26):
He went with me to Philadelphia when I Okay. Moved up there before we moved. Before I moved, he went on a scouting trip with me. The great things that I learned from Dad in terms of travel is my tuning fork for danger is a lot more acute. I would say at, if I'm sometimes naive when I travel, I could probably be overly naive in some places I shouldn't be. And in him being a Detroit policeman and having that background and really having a sense of what you should be looking for when you're on a large city,

Colleen (25:13):
Well, he was traveling with his child too, so that makes it different.

Drew (25:18):
Protective.

(25:18):
I picked up a lot of pointers from him, and I did get a much better sense. And what's funny is that I doesn't mean that I won't go to a place that I might be somewhat questionable. It just means that I know how to be prepared and I'm a little bit more focused on those of my surroundings. Yeah. It's funny because I just went to, on the bourbon tour, I went to Cincinnati and I talked to somebody after I came back from Cincinnati because I just walked all over the place because I love architecture, and they have this great, between art deco, Detroit's fantastic for art deco, and then if you're in Cincinnati, it's this Richardson Romanesque style that's just this very ornate style of architecture that I love. And so I was walking around looking for these places, and after I came back, somebody said, so you went to Cincinnati and you were just walking around anywhere?

(26:19):
And I said, yeah, I don't know if it's because I lived in Philadelphia and I lived in Detroit, or lived near Detroit, and I've been around Detroit that since Cincinnati almost felt like just a town to me, not like a city. So I felt comfortable enough there. But if there were places that as I walked around, sometimes I'd walk down the street and go, okay, I'm probably going to walk just so far down the street, but not all the way down. Not that there's immediate danger, but just I'm comfortable here and I'm not comfortable over there, and so I'm going to do what I do. And so I think that's great because having that overseas and the first time you start walking around towns overseas that you don't know that tuning fork is sometimes out. You're a little out of focus in terms of what danger looks like, right? Because everything looks so different that maybe you don't get as much of a sense, but you can do some research ahead of time when you're going on a trip here or there and sort of see where the good stuff is and things that you should go see.

Colleen (27:31):
I think that's always a good idea to ahead of time, ask somebody who knows. I'm listening to that podcast. Alan was talking about the Beken. Yeah. And they're talking about underground Prague. Did you hear that? I haven't. That's the one he told us to listen to. Yeah. It was so interesting.

Drew (27:48):
Oh, yeah. I listened to the one on Pilsen because I, that was such an interesting experience going to an American festival. Well,

Colleen (27:54):
I need you to go with me because this underground sounds incredibly spooky. Oh, does it? And yeah, I'm okay about jumping into going into a city where I don't speak the language for the most part, but yeah, going underground, that's creepy. And I

Drew (28:11):
Could see that. But see, that's one of

Colleen (28:13):
Those, and then the escalators are going to kill me.

Drew (28:15):
Yeah. Well, you got to get long. You used to those, but she doesn't like that. They're long and

Colleen (28:21):
Deep forever to go deep, deep down into the ground.

Drew (28:24):
I just spent the whole time staring at people going, it is so cool to be in a country where everybody's polite and just moves over to the right side, handrails moves at the road so that people can walk up on the left side.

Colleen (28:35):
And we came and get people to turn signals on.

Drew (28:38):
I laugh because when I took my last driving tour of Europe, I drove in Germany, and in Germany, people are so polite in terms of their driving so well-mannered as drivers. And then I went to Italy where I was actually almost petrified to go because I had watched a video online that showed me how crazy sometimes the drivers in Italy can be. But when I was in Austria, and this is all about talking to people, I talked to this woman at a bar, I was at a bartender, and she said, where are you traveling to tomorrow? I said, I'm going into Italy. But I'm a little nervous about it because I've watched these videos about, and people warned me about how crazy Italian drivers are, and she said, you know what? Here's not like you're going into Calcutta or something where it's just going to be insane traffic, all doing whatever it wants to do.

(29:39):
Yeah. She said, it's still Europe. That was her phrasing. And I thought, well, it's kind of interesting to hear her say that, but she gave me the best tip she could have ever given me. She said, when you're driving your car in Italy, pay attention to the front of your car, not the back of your car. Let everybody else worry about the back of your car, but just take care of the front of your car. And the first time I'm driving through Milan in rush hour traffic, and a car comes over, turns his turn signal on, and immediately pulls in front of me, even though he doesn't have enough room, I slowed the car down and he got over into the lane without a problem. And I went, ah, just watch the front of your car. And what was interesting was she also de-tuned my aggressive side where I felt like that person cut me off. And you know that you get frustrated if somebody does something you don't expect when you're driving. And of course, when we're driving, we're much more vocal probably than

Colleen (30:41):
We would be. Oh, that's ing. Oh, that's interesting.

Drew (30:43):
But in doing that, I also realize that I could be more aggressive in changing lanes as well, because people would

Colleen (30:50):
Move. That's just the rule of the road.

Drew (30:52):
It's how they drive.

Colleen (30:54):
Yeah. It's not that they're being mean or that they're picking on you. Exactly. It's just driving.

Drew (30:58):
It's just the way they drive in that country. And so if you can get yourself attuned to that,

Colleen (31:03):
Oh my gosh, spruce Pine, North Carolina, maybe that's just the way they drive.

Drew (31:09):
There you go. There you go. So yeah, I, and those are things, again, you kind of learn by vocalizing with the locals. Yeah. Because the locals know where to go. Yeah. They know what's cool to see they, and you can learn so much from them. And even how to survive driving around in a country you don't know.

Colleen (31:31):
So one of the things I like about travel is that you start to see how much we're alike as human beings in all those things. So there's all those little differences, but there's a commonality too.

Drew (31:45):
Well, and there's so much prejudice in the world, and I say that not in the hardcore prejudice way, but we tend to judgment just, yes,

Colleen (31:56):
Judgment is safety. We judge whether there's that subway is safe or not. We judge whether this is going to hurt us,

Drew (32:04):
Are these good people or these

Colleen (32:06):
Not good people? And that's why we do that, to keep ourselves safe.

Drew (32:09):
But what I found was, and this was my first eyeopener in terms of travel. I went to Quebec and I was going to practice my French, yes. My high school French. And I was scared to death to do it, but I said, I'm going to do it anyway. What the heck? I would just go to McDonald's all the time and order Nu Oh, right. Nu nu. Oh. But what happened was before went, I did all this research and I was looking, even in guidebooks, it was saying that people in Quebec do not English speakers. So now I'm carrying that with me, adding to my fear as I go into Quebec, and I'm going up in the Gas Bay peninsula. So I'm going in the middle of nowhere Quebec. And so I'm going to meet people who don't speak English at all. And I know that's going to happen as I go along.

(33:07):
Everywhere I went, and this was my first trip up there, I just butchered my bonger. I mean, it was obvious that I was not a French speaker. When I would go up to people, and everybody was extremely nice to me, even if they couldn't speak English, they were just bending over backwards to help me however they could help me. It was the last day I was there, and I went to down to check out of the hotel, and I said to the guy behind the reservations desk, I said, I read that people in Quebec were not very friendly to English speakers. And I, I said, I've just been shocked the whole time I've been here. Everybody's been so nice. And he said, how do you introduce yourself? And I said, well, I say, Bonjour. And he said, well, there's the key. Yeah. He said, you are making an attempt to fit into the culture. Even if you don't know French, you've already opened a doorway to say that you respect the country that you're walking into enough to at least learn a word or two. And what I found was, what he said was, especially in Quebec, the problem is that there's about 20% of the population that refuses to speak French. So if you say hello. Oh, they assume you're one of that 20%.

Colleen (34:30):
One of them.

Drew (34:31):
One of them, yes.

Colleen (34:32):
So you said it earlier in the podcast, and it caught my ear because you said something about being curious, just going into this whole thing, being curious. And I think that that's going to make this a very powerful podcast. And I think it makes your travel powerful. So to be able to walk into Quebec and just be curious about why is everybody treating me well when I thought they were going to treat me right. Horrible. And so I think that that's really kind of cool. And so your travels in the podcast are going to your travels in the world.

Drew (35:09):
I'm hoping that my guests actually inspire me where to go.

Colleen (35:13):
Well, they will.

Drew (35:13):
And how to get out of my comfort zone, because just already talking to a couple of guests already having thoughts of, if I go to Ireland, why don't I just get a bike? I was thinking of driving a car and having the challenge of learning how to drive on the left hand side of the road. And wouldn't that be a fascinating, well,

Colleen (35:35):
Just be sure to ride your bike on the proper side of the road.

Drew (35:38):
Yeah. Ooh. Yeah. That could be messy.

Colleen (35:42):
You know what? This went really well. Yeah. I wasn't sure. This is what I wanted. Well, good. I wanted to sit down and just chat with you. We were on the airplane, and I think we did. Yeah,

Drew (35:52):
Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I think that sometimes having a microphone shoved in front of your face can sometimes feel a little intimidating at first when you think about it. But to me, it's like travel, once you get in there and you start doing it,

Colleen (36:07):
Yeah.

Drew (36:08):
You kind of lose that. You just get comfortable

Colleen (36:13):
With it. Well, I just think you're a neat person, and I wanted the rest of the world to hear a little bit more about you, because you're going to be on the other side of the interview from here on.

Drew (36:21):
Yeah. Well, thank you very much. Yeah. I appreciate it. I appreciate you stepping outside of your comfort zone and actually doing this. She suggested this while we're sitting on the couch, just having a chat with my brother, and I was telling them all about my ideas for the podcast. And one thing that I really wanted to do was, you'll notice at the beginning of the podcast that the person who is the guest actually starts the show off. And to me, one of the biggest challenges that I have, again, is getting myself from a physician of always sharing my stories and actually getting in and making the guest the star of the show, because it's really what the purpose is, is to get their story. Because I could tell my stories and left everywhere else, but they're the ones who I think are going to even stretch me and make me. So to me, that was just brilliant because why do I want to do a five to 10 minute introduction of myself by myself in a monologue? Yeah. Because that's not what this show is about. So yeah, it was a fantastic suggestion. So I appreciate it.

Colleen (37:34):
Well, this was fun because like you said, took me out of my comfort zone, and I kind of have this little dream about being a podcaster. I don't know what the heck I'd podcast about, but yeah. So thank you for letting me join in.

Drew (37:47):
Sure. Absolutely. You did a fantastic job. Well,

Colleen (37:49):
Thank

Drew (37:50):
You. You may be a guest host for Somewhere Down the

Colleen (37:53):
Road. Well, and the other thing is, if you get stuck for a guest one time, we can do this again, because you can tell me all about your travels, and I can ask tons of questions.

Drew (38:03):
Absolutely.

Colleen (38:03):
So, yeah.

Drew (38:04):
Fantastic.

Colleen (38:06):
Yeah. Or maybe we'll travel together and do one while we're traveling. There

Drew (38:09):
You go. Yes,

Colleen (38:10):
Frog.

Drew (38:11):
Live on the spot, on the location. We'll do a Facebook Live from wherever we're at.

Colleen (38:15):
Exactly.

Drew (38:17):
Nice.

Colleen (38:18):
All right. Thank you. Thank

Drew (38:19):
You.

(38:21):
I think A Star is Born. I want to thank my sister, Colleen Hanish for stepping up to the mic and doing this little introduction. I hope it was insightful and entertaining in its own way. And don't forget to check out the show notes page on Travel fuels life.com for any links that we talked about in there. And feel free to comment about the show. You can talk about the overactive air conditioner if you want to, or any thoughts on the show in general. I love getting your feedback, and I will read through those messages and I will respond as appropriate. So again, thank you very much for taking the time to do that. In the meantime, until we meet again, I'm Drew Hanish. Thanks for listening to Travel Fuels Life.