@Adrienne107
That’s what I like about hosting: hosting gives guests the opportunity to surprise hosts. Sometimes a guest can really surprise us with something that stirs our heartstrings and this means that we change as people through hosting, because we develop into people less cynical, more open, more giving.
The lesson is simple and clear: we are not strangers to each other. We all really care about each other. Whatever our education, religion, culture is, almost all want to be good to people.
This concept, which we have all deeply rooted in our hearts, is regularly contradicted by the events in the world.
While despair and mutual mistrust prevail, while divisions in the world thrive on prejudice, hosting reminds us that we are all members of a large family and that hosting is the result of great kindness from good people.
In many years of hosting, I learned two things. The first thing is that it's much harder to be nice to friends than to strangers. And the second thing is that these unexpected encounters transform us, forging life links and bonds with the world.
One night, long time ago this emotional connection took the form of a skinny, dirty Greek traveler who knew the right spell. One year later I was at his sister's home in Alicante.
For me, this special bond was a loving young couple in 2012. Some years later I received my invitation to their wedding.
Sometimes these bonds are so full of surprises, as when I found out that not all the Japanese sleep on beds. A lovely Japanese couple told me that they slept on the floor, on mats. They used to bring in a travel queen-size futon. They were both big fans of Andrea Bocelli. I promised I’d send them a signed photograph of himself and so I did, and when I went to Japan five years later, they invited me to their home.
These bonds had such an effect on me. Somehow all these people transformed me, helping me to see our human differences with awe and wonder, and not as a threat.
But for me, those were the years that the word “hosting” got a lot bigger: a visible sign that we are all closely linked together on the journey of life. We’re the ones who build this world. With all our embraces.