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Interview with Wells Jones- A Line in the Sand
21 Plays5 days ago
In this episode, we sit down with author Wells Jones to talk about his compelling book A Line in the Sand. We dive into the inspiration behind the story, his journey through the publishing process, his incredible travels around the world, and so much more. This was a refreshing and exciting interview for us—we’re sure our listeners will enjoy it just as much as we did!
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Transcript
Introduction to Hosts and Guest, Wells Jones
00:00:06
Speaker
amazing rewatch listeners. This is Jessica and Sadie and today we have a special guest with us. um His name is Wells Jones and he is the author of the book called a Line in the Sand.
00:00:21
Speaker
And he reached out to us a few months ago and wanted to chat with us and do a little podcast interview and we are really excited to talk to him. I was able to listen to the book um a couple months ago.
00:00:33
Speaker
And i I, it was really interesting. I learned a lot. so ah this will be something different that we have not done on our podcast before. And we're excited. Great. Well, it's very nice to be here.
00:00:44
Speaker
We're happy to have you. Yeah, welcome. And thank you for reaching out to us. We're um excited to have like a branch out to a little bit of a new type
Podcast's Adventure Theme and Guest's Inspiration
00:00:52
Speaker
of interview. We've interviewed contestants and racers from the Amazing Race in the past. So we're happy to hear from you because pretty much adventure is what we are. Yeah, our travel, adventure. We love it all.
00:01:04
Speaker
Well, that's the beauty of it. And that's what intrigues me is the is the, you know, how we can experience adventure in all these different avenues and different. is is broadcasted and then with your recount of these, it it just keeps it alive and keeps, you know, it's fresh and it's ah exciting and you see what people can do and what they endeavor to do, you know, levels of capacity, diversity, dealing with things, adventure.
00:01:34
Speaker
Yeah. If you, myself. Yes. I could call an amazing race. But wherever that goal is, I'm not certain where the destination is because it's always beyond the horizon. you know It's not yeah one thing to get another task, but there's always tasks and there's always surprises and there's always uncertainty.
00:01:59
Speaker
But there's also with it lot of lessons and a lot of learning. It's called life. Yeah. And travel, you learn so much when you travel, honestly, about yourself, about the world, about humans. Yeah.
00:02:14
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. and you And you both have done travel, yes? Or certainly with all the... Yeah. Yeah, yourself. That's great. That's great. Well, my travel has been focused in the Middle East, which brought around the book.
00:02:28
Speaker
But... um If you're interested in knowing how that all came about. Yes, that's what I was going to ask is just like, tell us how, what inspired you to write this book, how you went about it.
00:02:40
Speaker
Yeah. Well, there was a a previous inspiration and that was to go to the Middle East. And that was in 2005. I have a ah very, my best pal, you know, to the day we met, we became lifelong friends.
00:02:52
Speaker
Maybe that happened with you. i mean, it's just something that is, we, Miles Spencer, my co-author, on the book, and I have been very close.
Charitable Initiatives and Support for Peace Organizations
00:03:00
Speaker
We've done business ventures, television shows, money hunt.
00:03:04
Speaker
We've done kayaking across Long Island Sound called Kayak for a Cause. It's adventure with purpose. We raised money, people kayaking across the Long Island Sound raised money.
00:03:18
Speaker
And we wrote in the end, first of all, we had 313 kayaks, the same time. thirteen kayaks law at the same time Pods of 10, you know, the pirates, the the wenches, the this, the that, everybody named their thing.
00:03:32
Speaker
And mean we would bring in the Neville brothers or Dickie Betts in the Great Southern, the whalers, different years. We did it for 10 years. And we worked up to writing five checks of $50,000 each to charities.
00:03:49
Speaker
And so that was the purpose behind it. The purpose for going to the Middle East, and we used the same model in raising money, We identified a foundation that we wanted to give money to. And it turns out that it's Seeds of Peace, which is an organization that supports Israeli and Palestinian high school thought leaders to get together in Maine for the summer on a lake.
00:04:13
Speaker
You know, they do the whole, you know, campfire stuff, but they're there to handle conflict resolution, to get along. And it's been around since 1993. So we identified that group.
00:04:27
Speaker
We went to friends and and business people that we know and raised enough money to go to the Middle East.
Personal Motivations and Historical Contexts in Writing
00:04:33
Speaker
Why? Because it was 2005, we had heard, we'd seen, we'd been through 9-11.
00:04:41
Speaker
Both of us, in as well as many people, had very personal losses in that. 2005, I'd been in DC running a foundation that came back through Connecticut, New England.
00:04:54
Speaker
and where Miles is, where I used to live. And um he asked me if I knew anything about t e Lawrence. And I said, yeah, I was going to do a one-man show about T.E. Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia.
00:05:07
Speaker
I was an actor at a point in time, and I needed to make more money. I needed to know that I had a job that I could offer, you know, that was mine, that I wasn't waiting for some producer or director to hire me, that I could do it. I said, T.E. Lawrence, couldn't do it.
00:05:23
Speaker
He's five foot five and a half, and now he's very integral to the character that this man was. What he demonstrated by being five foot five and a half, that I mean, it was his drive to, you know, test himself.
00:05:39
Speaker
And he went very far. True man during the Arab revolt. And i he said, well, we should do a show and you should play T.E. Lawrence. I said, no, he was five foot five and a half.
00:05:50
Speaker
I'm 6'3". No, you you could be like Peter O'Toole. I said, no, no. We found a Broadway producer. We were introduced and we have been working for almost 20 years on a Broadway play to bridge an understanding of what is going on in the Middle East because it's just history repeating.
00:06:12
Speaker
But it goes back to Lawrence, World War I, the Arab revolt, and all the machinations of the declarations and the agreements and secrets and assurances that ended up being mandates.
00:06:27
Speaker
No self-determination for the Arabs in the Middle East. there's a lot of country here, you know, in the Middle East. And at the time, that was hugely disappointing.
00:06:40
Speaker
And it has continued. to be disappointing where there's been all this conflict. And so we wanted to uncover, discover, and first of all, if the people were as kind and nice and gracious and lovable, if you can imagine that, i mean, what ah what a word to ascribe to an Arab at certain points in time, yeah you know?
00:07:03
Speaker
and And Lawrence was a man that He understood them. He could speak their language. He knew how to eat like them. He ended up dressing like them because of the work that he did.
00:07:17
Speaker
tried to change them. He didn't try to say, well, this tribe shouldn't be fighting with that tribe and they need to move over here and you know just sort of divide them up. He worked with them and loved that. Well, we found the same thing to be true, but we had to go there. So we were going for the play.
00:07:36
Speaker
We knew that we wanted to bring whoever's going to play T.E. Lards back to the Middle East. They'd have to get their butt the saddle of a camel, go through the desert, and feel the heat.
00:07:49
Speaker
Feel the purity, the the sense of it all. you know Some people don't like sand. I heard, Jess, you love sand. So you don't, do you? You do, you don't. and I like sitting in the sand on the beach, but when it gets into my shoes and my hair and Well, what, there it does. When the wind blows, it just, you know. Yeah, I bet that's like just right in your face.
00:08:14
Speaker
Yeah. I don't know if I like that, but.
Experiences and Immersions in the Middle East
00:08:16
Speaker
Real quick, as quickly as I can, the two reasons for going was one, to see with our own eyes. And we translated that into Arabic. So then when we met people, if they were to say, well, why why are you why you here?
00:08:29
Speaker
I don't even remember what it was technically in Arabic. To see with our own eyes. You Ameriki. This is unheard of. It is now 2006 when we went.
00:08:42
Speaker
So we followed Lawrence's path. We figured out how to get into Jeddah. Miles is a member of YEO, Young Entrepreneurs Organization. It's now called EO.
00:08:53
Speaker
and But they're young entrepreneurs that have a certain level. you know They had to have a million or more in assets. Found out that there was a chapter in Jeddah.
00:09:06
Speaker
He had written a book based on our television show called Money Hunt, which was a precursor to Shark Tank. Oh. And yeah, you can check it out. And your listeners can check it out. Money Hunt, Wikipedia will explain what it is and send you to you know shows and stuff. We ran for three years on PBS.
00:09:24
Speaker
And we were also going around to do models in other countries. We had six countries lined up. The dot-com blew up. This is all right in you know the late nineteen ninety s And so we, you know, that business closed, but it was extremely exciting. And we found the whole point was to find businesses that we could invest in.
00:09:45
Speaker
And we were doing it through the TV, getting business plans, culling the deck, putting them on on the air, going to venture capital conferences, You know, they would say, money hunt One of you are going to be on money hunt. And so the people there before they went on stage to present their business plan, their pitch to investors in a big hall was a big deal back in the late 90s, this kind of thing.
00:10:09
Speaker
And then we would select one and then announce it at the end of the conference. and So such and such company is going to be on money. on yeah So. We, Miles and had done the work that work and and kayak for a cause.
00:10:25
Speaker
And now we called it Lawrence on Arabia. We wanted to see with our own eyes. We got into Jeddah because he wrote a book based on Money Hunt, the show. It took months to get in.
00:10:37
Speaker
And once we got there, it's 2006 in the spring. And to a person, it was, why are you here? no Americans are coming unless it's Blackwater, Triple Canopy, Centurion, the security firms.
00:10:55
Speaker
And basically they went out Amman, Jordan and doing the road to Iraq, to Baghdad. And so we got in and we had it set up to travel from Jeddah following the Arab revolt, hitting all the places, including you know when we're in in and Saudi Arabia We were in places like Magal-el-Sharid and Shaib.
00:11:23
Speaker
And Moses lived there. This is in Saudi Arabia. Now Moses from the Bible. And what we found out was that our driver, who could barely speak English, stopped the car. He said, hey, we're good to go. Yeah, we did. And it's like, okay, well, I know. He stopped the car. We're going to listen.
00:11:39
Speaker
And he's pointing down to just like these little shelters down in the valley. And it's just... sand, little rolling hills, and the Red Sea is right there.
00:11:52
Speaker
And he says, and so Musa and Ibrahim and he's going, wait a minute. What do you say? Musa. I said, are you saying Moses?
00:12:06
Speaker
He said, 10 years. Right there. I said, Moses lived here 10 years. He goes, yes, with his daughters. And so if you go back in the Bible, you can, yeah, you lived in Magir, Asharib.
00:12:18
Speaker
So going through these places was fascinating, as well as the obvious places, Wadi Rum, Aqaba, Wadi Rum, you know, and and some of the the amazing race has been through these areas.
00:12:33
Speaker
Petra, Jarash, going to the Citadel, the Acropolis in Amman. There are so many fantastic places to do the amazing race.
00:12:45
Speaker
I'm telling you and change change the tasks around. You know, we're always thinking whatever adventure we're on, there's got to be more than just like we're going to get money where are we just, you know, we want to just, it's like peak bagging. No, purpose.
00:13:03
Speaker
We want purpose. And so, yeah mean, I would change some of these re-races around, especially in the Middle East, to, you know, to offer the the viewers a sense of history and really tie that in and not just Star Wars. No, Star Wars is great.
00:13:21
Speaker
You know, Lords of Arabia, yes, it was filmed here, blah, blah, blah. We can plant things and, you know, set it up and make it kind of cool, but forget just being cool. And what about the core to the place?
00:13:36
Speaker
You know, use the place, Alexander the Great. And I mean, it just becomes, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we don't want a history story. I know. and know. But it it's like our book.
00:13:47
Speaker
We use a time travel device. Instead of doing a nonfiction, it's like, because we've been working on a play. We've had four writers, voluminous notes, found out what works, what doesn't work, but we don't want any spin.
00:14:03
Speaker
But this book, it came about just after October 2023. We said must write... we said we must write because we have something to say. it we We could have been saying it all along. We thought we were going to have a play. You know, we have our own lives, families, kids, grandkids, all of this stuff going on.
00:14:25
Speaker
And so was the week after October 7th. And when it happened, i just, I was so sick to my stomach. Yeah.
00:14:37
Speaker
Because when anger crosses over to hatred,
00:14:45
Speaker
There's no atonement. we've seen it. I mean, I've been watching it from a different view because of the history that I've learned of the foundation to the problems, right or wrong.
00:14:57
Speaker
I do believe at any period of time, people are doing what they think is at their highest level. And it could be referred to other people, but they're still doing what they think is right.
00:15:10
Speaker
And what was they were doing in the Middle East has created this problem. And it's not going away. And it led to the horrificness.
00:15:22
Speaker
Can you imagine? I mean, don you don't have to, but being at a concert and just unbelievable. Yeah. But that's where it's been escalated.
00:15:37
Speaker
levels of retribution, And the levels of righteous indignation. I mean, that's just being kind. That says, you do this, I'll do that. You do this, I will 10 times do that.
00:15:57
Speaker
And it's just, you know, I've been hit. I hit back. Or, you know, I've, um' you know, turned the other cheek and all that stuff. Yeah, I've worked that through. But it's not not been something that I wanted to kill someone.
00:16:11
Speaker
And when it gets to that level, and it's not it's not here, you know, it's not in Utah, here um New Mexico, Santa Fe, New Mexico. we hear But if you really put your head into it, or if you know someone that's there that is in the middle of it, and we do. So that's why we wrote the book.
00:16:33
Speaker
yeah to show the people, to to bring the young protégés. Abdul and Jeremy, we call it seeds of hope in the book. It's based on seeds of peace. Jeremy's a Jew, his mom's a Columbia, you know Middle Eastern history teacher.
00:16:49
Speaker
And he's between dad and mom, and he's in the IDF. he's got to serve. And he loves his country, he loves his religion, and totally perplexed.
00:17:03
Speaker
What do I do? And you figured out, well, what I do is that if I know i am in touch with all my camper friends. So I let them know.
00:17:15
Speaker
Get out. I don't tell them what's going on. I just keep them clear from danger. Are they here so-and-so? Leave now. And just doing that or getting caught doing that, is it's huge.
00:17:33
Speaker
Yeah. His conscience, his heart. And then Abdul, you know, being Muslim.
00:17:45
Speaker
And when you go, by the time we crossed over, so we followed Lawrence, Jeddah, North, went through all the forts. It was fascinating. And each one had history.
00:17:56
Speaker
and Got up to Aqaba, and that was the turning point of the war with the Arabs, just like in Lawrence of Arabia, for people that have seen it.
Historical Narratives and Strategic Events
00:18:03
Speaker
Yeah, Lawrence came up with the idea. All the guns in Aqaba were facing the water.
00:18:09
Speaker
There was no one that was going to come in from the desert because it's the sun's anvil. It's the hottest area. and you'd have to It took them two months to go around and to get the tribes to follow them, to come in from behind. and they took the for in like fifteen minutes
00:18:27
Speaker
because it was such a surprise. They didn't go to kill everybody. they went to capture the fort and take the prisoners, turn the world. So we went through all these wonderful places and along the way, tangents to here, like the Petra, of course, which was, you know, the sick, just walking through the sick and looking up through the light that's coming in to the, you know the separ the split in the in the geographical split in the in the ceiling.
00:18:57
Speaker
And then you you come around the corner. Yeah, it's like, so you see the treasure you just go, I can't even believe leave this And it looks so perfect. Yeah.
00:19:08
Speaker
Gorgeous. You know? So we went all the way through and we had many experiences along the way.
00:19:20
Speaker
many We went through 39 checkpoints. Before we went, we spent eight months training to go. So it was research on the place and the path, creating the path.
00:19:35
Speaker
Get into Israel because we're not going to to the Middle East and not go to Israel. Israel is not the Middle East. you know There's a kind of a definition about what what is the Middle East. It's Arab countries for the most part.
00:19:47
Speaker
Okay. I actually was wondering that. I was like, what is technically considered of the Middle Eastern countries? Well, it's it's Arab speaking.
00:19:58
Speaker
Okay. It includes Egypt, but Egypt really goes, is um they're North African. Yeah. Yeah.
00:20:09
Speaker
And Turkey is not. But they say, well, it's in the region, but it's not a middle considered a Middle Eastern in my understanding of the definition of the Middle East. I think there is a like a union of the Middle Eastern states.
00:20:28
Speaker
ah i I don't know if it's 13 or if it's 16, you know, but it is Saudi, Jordan, Syria. Those are the countries we were in. And Lebanon,
00:20:39
Speaker
And then we we crossed over in a very dramatic,
00:20:46
Speaker
very tense crossing, because we wanted to be on the ground and go through what other people go through. It's like doing the subway, you know, see see who travels on the subway, New York City or any city, you know, do public transportation. And we did that. And of course there,
00:21:09
Speaker
the concern is, uh, bombs.
00:21:14
Speaker
You know, we, we saw it for years getting blown up and the tension on the bus, it's in the book on the, you know, um I do remember that part of the book, just like kind of feeling like, Oh my gosh, this is like a big deal.
00:21:29
Speaker
yeah Yeah, it really was. And, um, it was tense. And when you look into the, to people's eyes and you just see that furtive look and the quiet and everything's in question or the diverting the eyes.
Preparation and Security for Travel
00:21:47
Speaker
And for us, we were just on high alert always, which was probably the the biggest challenge was just being, we we were trained by a man that's an SAS person Retired major.
00:22:03
Speaker
His name is Jamie Lothar Pinkerton. Anyone can look him up. He was at the time also the private secretary to the Queen appointed by the Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth, for the protection and of Prince Harry and Prince William.
00:22:21
Speaker
He had just worked with Charlie Borman and Ewan McGregor. Pretty much, I mean, he took us on saying this and we had no idea. We were led to him. And then in meeting him, the you know, discussed that and that that was you and Charlie's training.
00:22:41
Speaker
Our training would be similar to that, which had to do without getting into detail, crisis management and conflict, kidnap and ransom, checkpoints, and really how to behave, how to dress, how to stay under the wire, to to stay, you know, not to draw attention.
00:23:09
Speaker
and And he said, and no matter what you do, you do draw attention, period. yeah No matter where you are and just know you're always being watched.
00:23:23
Speaker
and That's very interesting. It's a very different way to travel than so many people would ever know. um it's it's sad reality that a lot of people are not going to ever be able to experience those cultures and that history. There's such a long history in the area of the world.
00:23:41
Speaker
And because of conflicts happening in that area and you know some people not even being able to travel in different areas, it's just, it's it's hard to know that like there's so much to see and learn from these people, but so many people are not going to be able to ever experience that. So it's good that there's brave people like you, honestly, that have been able to go there and see that and experience that and bring that back and put it into a story that people are able to digest and people are able to like pique their interest and look into it more. i think that's really interesting. sadie That's really nice. You said pique their interest because that was the intention.
00:24:16
Speaker
And without getting pedantic and and, you know, preachy about one side or the other, we really worked to write a story, to write our story.
00:24:28
Speaker
and to be authentic to that. And then it didn't, there was no need to dramatize anything. We've played it down. Yeah. Yeah. From in the book.
00:24:40
Speaker
If, if, if I could go into stories that, that just would be inappropriate to do or to mention names, including my own in the situation,
00:24:51
Speaker
because there's been more than the trek. We ended up producing an eight-day sea festival. i'm ah I've done large live events around, and the eight-day sea festival was bringing in Formula One boats that represent each country. It's an intercontinental race, as well as hot air balloons, and we were the first American company, the three of us, that that were joined with, it was called VSA, that were given this contract.
00:25:22
Speaker
to create this out in the desert, ah the very southern part of Saudi Arabia, a little place called Al-Gahma.
00:25:34
Speaker
And it's about 50 clicks from Yemen border. And Yemenis are not well liked in Saudi. It's in the book. We asked, you know, how do Saudis feel about Egyptians?
00:25:50
Speaker
And And the Saudi goes, how do they feel about Yemeni? They take care of toilet.
00:26:01
Speaker
go, oh, OK. What about Lebanese? Oh, they're too slick. and said well you know They do all the advertising. And I found it in Saudi. there was a very They were very prejudiced towards everyone.
00:26:21
Speaker
Americans and our experience was we were welcomed and it was surprising right up to his royal highness Prince Khalid bin Faisal bin Abdul Aziz the son of a king that was actually killed by his nephew shot I think he was the third king of Saudi Arabia after you know Abdul Aziz and um We went to a majlis.
00:26:53
Speaker
We were invited to go to his meeting with the sheiks of the desert and their Bedouin and their camel owners. And they're considered the wealthy people of the, you know, the Bedouin people because they own camels and they have camel herds and they move them through it. ah It's a nomadic group.
00:27:14
Speaker
Day up there. It's just sand. and wells and places that people hang for a while and then they move to another area.
00:27:26
Speaker
it's It's almost like Native Americans you know back in the day.
00:27:34
Speaker
Well, that's another story with with him, but the point being is that we heard in 2006, we are so sorry.
00:27:46
Speaker
And they would always go, we are so sorry. Not all 19 were from Saudi, but about what happened in 9-11.
00:27:57
Speaker
And it's in the book, one guy. And we we put him in a cab. The real story of that is far more harrowing than it's in the book. And so that's why we used the fiction to protect so that it didn't get too...
00:28:16
Speaker
too much because there were times that it was too much. I mean, it was the man that was drinking and confessed to what he knew about was the people from his town.
00:28:31
Speaker
Well, it wasn't just his town. And that's where it gets. Something you don't repeat, but yeah, it's when we're so moved to be one ah Yeah, there are people that figure out how to get alcohol in Saudi. And if they're caught, I mean, they'll lose ah piece of themselves.
00:28:53
Speaker
I mean, that seems to be the way. and And that's true, you know. But the contrition is what was such an eye-opener.
00:29:07
Speaker
Yeah. so did you know they Did you know anyone? And they just say yes. Hmm. Wow, that's so fascinating. So that's that's some of
Translating Travel into Literature
00:29:20
Speaker
the travels. And, and you know, there's been travel in Scotland and in England and and New Zealand. And i was in Antarctica for several seasons on the ice. Wow.
00:29:35
Speaker
And I was pararescue. down there when I was a young guy. Oh
00:29:44
Speaker
oh my God. Got me in trouble once in a while.
00:29:50
Speaker
many on So I find that your show is wonderful and the amazing race. and And is there anything else you'd like to know about my stuff?
00:30:01
Speaker
So the book was was a response. It was using the trek. From 2006 and the people that we met from 2006 to 2009, which we don't explain, but it is these people are based on on that.
00:30:14
Speaker
And and what our understanding was and the food. Don't forget the food. There's food. Yeah. Love. yeah no
00:30:27
Speaker
I'm kind of a picky eater. So i i anytime I go somewhere new, I'm like, oh, am I going to like it? But I can usually find something I like. Miles looked at the goat that's on this huge platter, chalice thing. And he's just like... It's not that he's not a meat eater, but he was looking at the goat. It's just going...
00:30:52
Speaker
ah Maybe not. I think I'll just eat the cauliflower that's on edges.
00:31:00
Speaker
What was the dish that you wrote about in the book where like the three different women had like the same recipe? What was that called? Baba ganoush. Baba ganoush. Yeah, I've heard that word before. What is that? what like Is it like a soup? Oh, it's a dip. It's something that you, you know, everything is with your hand. You know, you get bread and just go into it.
00:31:21
Speaker
It's eggplant. It's eggplant and olive oil and spices. and And in this case, they use pomegranates. That's right. We use that running theme through the ground.
00:31:33
Speaker
You know, we wanted to include these voices in this. But the the recipes are real. And Miles actually is, i mean, he could be a professional chef. He's just such.
00:31:48
Speaker
If he ever invites you over to dinner, Okay. i I would go if anybody invited me to dinner. I'm like, well, somebody will cook for me. Fantastic.
00:32:00
Speaker
need to to So you said you so you started writing the book after October 7th? Yes. was it Were you like thinking of things over the years? Because you did your travels back in early 2000s.
00:32:14
Speaker
Were you like thinking that it would come across some time and... Yeah, you know, Sadie, the thing that kept us so fresh with it all was the play. And what we did also, along with hundreds of pictures and pictures that we secretly, we had a little teeny Lummox cameras, like, you know, three and a half inches, maybe three quarters of an inch.
00:32:37
Speaker
And I could hold it in my hand and take pictures. My hand's large enough and no one would see the camera and just. And so we took a lot of pictures, the play, keeping the writers on track with history and then with what we knew, because if they said something about, you know, Muslim or or that they they did just didn't know or was something that was way left.
00:33:02
Speaker
So and we had character descriptions that we wrote very quickly when we got back. We had that and dispatches were written every day that we uploaded through our satellite apparatus that we had at the time. was called a BGAN, which was a ah piece of equipment that perplexed anyone that could speak. And everyone was perplexed by it because looks like a computer, sort of white, and you open it up and it's thick, but there's nothing inside. And so you open it up and you think there's nothing there.
00:33:39
Speaker
And they're always going, aa what what is this? and they were meant it. And it's like, no, what is this? I mean, I said it's an internet connection.
00:33:51
Speaker
you oh and wow And of course, at the at the and immigration, Israeli immigration, that became a thing.
00:34:03
Speaker
Oh, yeah. ao It was. I just want to preface that I was zonked, tired. So was mine. He went one direction. i was held with with this very attractive, just, she just seemed alive.
00:34:20
Speaker
And, you know, we'd been in the desert and i had we had not seen a lot of women at all. And of course I'm married and i have daughters and you know whatnot, but it was like, I'd forgotten. And it was just, that I was like, I took a whiff of, I mean, I felt like it smelled like it was rose perfume and some people go, ooh, but it was really nice.
00:34:41
Speaker
and And looking away and she pulled my attention to her so quickly. and it was just like that dream or whatever was going on just went,
00:34:54
Speaker
get back, deal with what's going on here. This is serious. And she was, and rightfully so. And it's not because she was doing something personally to me. It's because that's what the situation in that country at that border demanded.
00:35:12
Speaker
She was a commando and she was straight and to the point. And there was no... Nothing else.
00:35:23
Speaker
You know, it wasn't like you go to Dubai. And first of all, whenever I arrived in Dubai, it was always like 2.30 in the morning. don't know why, you know, flying out of the bay, getting into Dubai. And it was just so, and there would be hundreds and hundreds of hundreds of people in immigration hall. And it was massive.
00:35:42
Speaker
There could have been 30 windows of of immigration officers down below and just the world, Somebody from all countries, the languages that were being spoken and the way people were dressed and just all of it.
00:35:58
Speaker
um And above the all these windows is a huge screen. and it showed Arabian horses, you know, rearing in the air and the wind blowing and the sand going and the blue sky and then ah hawking, someone hawking in their, you know, Arabian outfit like a prince.
00:36:20
Speaker
And then there's a voiceover that says, welcome, in a woman's voice. Welcome.
00:36:29
Speaker
And that was landing in Dubai. And it wasn't that way in Israel. There were no Israel signs.
00:36:42
Speaker
It was a loud voice and a direct order, stand back. And the women to the women that were trying to do going through immigration, the immigration officers to other women were brutal.
00:36:56
Speaker
Really? Brutal.
00:36:59
Speaker
It would open up their their bags and you would see everything flying out. it would land on the floor. There was no hesitation. And it was quick.
00:37:10
Speaker
And they're looking for weapons. They're looking for anything. People can walk in with a vest on and blow the place up. There were no um metal detectors. This is at the King Hussein Allenby Bridge. There were no metal detectors that we walked through.
00:37:25
Speaker
We stepped up to the the counter. Hmm.
00:37:30
Speaker
2006. Yeah. but My mother-in-law. oh sorry. I was just going to say my mother-in-law went on a trip to Israel probably in 21 or 22.
00:37:45
Speaker
So kind of before everything happened and, you know, travel is not really a thing there now, but is it the same like for tourists coming on a plane or is it just like border, like land border crossings? That's like this like strict checkpoints.
00:38:02
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Okay. Definitely. Yeah. And, and Jamie, our security guy said, how are you getting into Israel?
00:38:15
Speaker
it was it It was like a question. And so we're going over the King Hussein. He said, are you sure you want to do that? He said, just fly, fly into Israel. Fly into Tel Aviv and then get a car and come back and see the land.
00:38:29
Speaker
He said, no. He broke it down. Saudi Arabia, he said, if you get kidnapped, he said, you're gone. Within the borders, he's not talking about all the people, of the government. He's just saying in Saudi Arabia, it's not like Colombia, where it's a drug deal.
00:38:47
Speaker
you know It's usually around drugs. And they want a million bucks, five million, whatever it is. They get paid, you get released. on Jordan, very westernized, he said.
00:38:59
Speaker
Ten days before we went, two hotels, Marriott hotels were blown. Pieces of it. One had a wedding going on. A wedding, right? It was just destroyed.
00:39:11
Speaker
It was the place where we were going to stay. We already had reservations for that hotel. and it was like, do we go?
00:39:20
Speaker
Yes, we do. We've been through 9-11. We've seen what's going on. We want to know what's going on. We want to feel, you know. Jamie said always, if you stay in a hotel, stay on the first floor in the back.
00:39:35
Speaker
Oh. Just one of the things. First floor in the back. Right next to Texas, if you can. Yeah. Many, many, many other culturally, culturally wonderful things that helped us. But once you until you get there and you realize you've got to eat with your right hand and you've got ah figure out how to use the bathrooms. And, you know, there's just a lot of different and yeah it's And it's okay. It's great.
00:40:03
Speaker
It's just different. Because the people are, we were invited in. we weren't kicked out. Yeah. You know? Yeah.
00:40:15
Speaker
Well, you're definitely a storyteller. i could listen to these stories all day. And your book is very interesting as well. Was the actual like publishing process difficult? What did you find that to be like? were you Did you find any struggles there? or i would say i wish we had more had taken more time now looking at it because you know once you put something out there and then you go back through it and you see, I wouldn't say mistakes, but things that I wouldn't do.
00:40:47
Speaker
not even talking about content. I'm talking about presentation, page numbers. page number yeah different different editorial things.
00:40:57
Speaker
And um we were able to write it quickly because we started right after October seventh and we published March 8th or 12th was when it was, you know.
00:41:13
Speaker
the eighth That's pretty fast, yeah. and And we, because of all the dispatches that we had written, the characterizations of different people that are not in the book, there is just well but what we have, what I have, what Miles had.
00:41:31
Speaker
And Miles quickly did a structure to the book. He said, I've got it. I gotve got i mean, we're just going to follow the path. I was working on something else. And he said, see what you think.
00:41:42
Speaker
Oh, this is good. And so we just, the way we work is we we just fed each other and we there was no negative, no, it was just green light and for four months.
00:41:58
Speaker
And it was intense. And it was wonderful. I have a lot of acting background. And so when it came to the the narration, the voices, and yeah, there could be some stronger differences between certain things. But it was just so wonderful to and so as a performer and to think back on people and how they were and being able to write out dialogue.
00:42:29
Speaker
I loved it. Yeah. Yeah. When you have experiences like that, it's like, I just want to tell somebody. yeah It's true. Whether it's like stands out.
00:42:40
Speaker
I think that that what we wanted to do is get it out as soon as possible. And so, There's editing that could have been done that wasn't done, but we said we will just re-release. We'll do you know. Second edition.
00:42:57
Speaker
Second edition. And what has happened is that we're in the middle of our second book, which is, again, an adventure to understanding. And in this case, it's about Cuba.
00:43:09
Speaker
It's about Havana. Oh. And 1958. And so we're really...
00:43:19
Speaker
And it centers around the Marabana, the marathon of 2016. And then we have a time travel device as well so that we can go back to the, uh, always wanted to say the Cocobana, but it's not, it's, you know, it's, it's the real fancy Meyer Lansky and trafficante and all the Batista and all the machinations of, uh,
00:43:49
Speaker
the government and the mob and the sugar kings and the very, very poor people, they'd get nothing.
00:44:01
Speaker
And about the hubris of Western man, what does he want? He wants resources. He wants have this in Ukraine.
00:44:15
Speaker
Mm-hmm. you we're not going to help you until you give us some of that, a lot of that. yeah i mean, where it is today, and it goes this kind of thinking goes back to the oil. you know The Sykes-Picot Agreement basically was the British knew there was oil in you know certain parts of the area. They had no idea how much.
00:44:42
Speaker
They knew they needed it And there were people exploring exploration for oil back in the, at the turn of the century before the war. and And the need for for the British naval forces that was in competition with the Germans so that they had, so the Middle East became very important.
00:45:09
Speaker
Stop the Germans and get the oil. And no one talks about that, but that was very much a part of it.
00:45:20
Speaker
Oh dear. When you do a stream of consciousness and things flow, it's like, you got to tell me where we are. It's yeah it's it's so interesting because I mean, so much of world history is just so related to each other. Once you start going back to think about it, it's just like, oh, well, this led to this, which led to this, you know, and we're all just so interconnected without even knowing it. And so just educating people on that and making people realize, and I think that's what happens through travel as well, is you really learn how similar you actually are to other people. And that helps you become more understanding to different peoples and different cultures and things like that. And i think if more people were able to travel and learn about each other, you know, there'd be a lot more peace.
00:46:10
Speaker
Yeah. Not just what you hear on the news and and like thinking them thinking of people in other countries and other cultures as like actual humans instead of like this, you know, whatever they paint it to be in the media and yeah.
00:46:25
Speaker
And we think of that like The Amazing Race is such a, just like a blip, you know, they're in each country for like a couple of days, but it does open people's eyes to a little bit more of the world in an entertaining way, which I think yeah the same thing as your book, like in an entertaining way,
00:46:42
Speaker
you're opening up their eyes to different parts of the world. And um yeah like I said, they'll just like catch their interest, do a little bit more research on their own. And so I i love that about the race. I think that's great about your book. So yeah, it's just all all connected.
00:46:58
Speaker
it is. It is connected. And that and when I, I, when I was thinking about well what, how would I shape a, a, an amazing race or, or where I,
00:47:12
Speaker
i I think in terms of purpose and I think in terms of, you know, you've got the entertainment value just watching people struggle, you know, from point A to point B.
Educational Value and Purpose-driven Travel
00:47:26
Speaker
I mean, there's that.
00:47:27
Speaker
But to have ah higher level that's coupled with it, you know? Yeah. Go ahead. great Oh, sorry. I was going to say, i there's some locations that they'd go to, and I'm like, I wish they could spend an entire season here, just not one episode, not a couple of days. like I'd be fascinated by a whole series of just this one location.
00:47:51
Speaker
Sure. And when they do go to some places, like it's not super often, but like they've been to like some Western African nations where they went to...
00:48:01
Speaker
um like the gate where all the enslaved people left and they went to um Auschwitz. So they do try to be like sensitive to a few of these, like more ah well-known historical. Yeah.
00:48:16
Speaker
That's extreme. Yeah. Yeah. yeah So they do try and educate as they go, but they bring people in with entertainment and try to educate as well.
00:48:28
Speaker
But that's what we do to like every episode. I don't know how many of you if you've listened to any of our podcast episodes, but we like each location that we go to, we try to tell about the place and like try to make people learn something. Well, you see that I haven't I haven't I so found so much on Amazing Race and Rerace and other people commenting on the Amazing Race.
00:48:57
Speaker
And when I had the time, it was like this week to look into it. I realized you need to just find out exactly what the ah amazing race is. Cause I've not watched a show. You know, I haven't actually seen a a show and find out what the elements are that are, that are involved.
00:49:17
Speaker
And then I saw how much it's changed. It's evolved into. Oh yeah. Yeah. So I don't know your podcast is, I will look for them because it's because i want I'm drawn into it.
00:49:31
Speaker
yeah My draw into it is to find, because I'm a producer, the background has been television and stage and and and and whatnot from both sides, front and and behind camera.
00:49:49
Speaker
And it's to...
00:49:53
Speaker
to give as much that the viewer can absorb in an entertaining way. Like you were saying, you go to places and you try to bring points of this geographical location to the forefront.
00:50:10
Speaker
It's essential because that and a local story, you know, someone's story, you can't deny it. Right? If someone... Another country is saying, well, you know, when I was little and I did this and this and this.
00:50:23
Speaker
And you can't go, no. You can't say they're lying. can't You realize it's no different than you.
00:50:34
Speaker
It's a different place. It's a different way the you know way they dress or how they eat or whatever. But I mean, there's a difference between New England and the Deep South. Appalachia. Yeah. In our country.
00:50:47
Speaker
in now in our country and and And there are prejudices in our country against other people. You know, they're from Texas. Watch out for those Texas people. That's we hear here in New Mexico. Oh, yeah.
00:51:01
Speaker
And Texas keeps New Mexico alive. You know, it keeps the economy going. You know, yeah, well, they have real estate, but so what? I mean, that's their right. But so purpose.
00:51:17
Speaker
Purpose. no matter what that is, if I were to do a segment of The Amazing Race, you know, if I were to say, just just take Amman, Jordan, you could start at the Acropolis and you can look at all the refugee places and you're looking at refugees.
00:51:35
Speaker
or you can look at the citadels, or you can you know run to, i don't think you can run to Jirash, but check out some ruins. And these ruins are like amazing.
00:51:46
Speaker
It's not like there's just one little pole there. It's just like, wow, this is massive. It's like Petra. But Petra is not just the treasure. You keep going and it's like, wait a minute.
00:51:58
Speaker
What about the you know the high amount of sacrifice? The things you could do around Petra would be just,
00:52:05
Speaker
Just running through that place and and getting clothes in different locations, but tying it in to something that is bigger than just the task.
00:52:22
Speaker
That's where my thought would be. And what that is, I need a writer's room.
00:52:30
Speaker
All of us surround is like, think it through. Yeah. Well, if they ever need a consultant for you know that area of the world, they'll be like, we know a guy. yeah Not that we have any influence on that, but you know.
00:52:45
Speaker
I know what you mean, but we all appreciate you know what they are doing and we're taking that and and regurgitating it into making sense and bringing context to it. And that's valuable. Yeah.
00:52:58
Speaker
That's what a book is. You're doing it on a podcast. I did it in a book. try And we were compelled to do that. And so we did.
00:53:10
Speaker
And at this point, you know, we've got a combination of European and and American Amazon reviews. were We're getting close to a thousand reviews.
00:53:23
Speaker
and that's positive and it's about you're saying say it's about the history it's like i didn't know that and and and i've done podcasts i' i'm approaching 30 some odd podcasts and people are saying you know i didn't know that but what it did it made me check it out many you know go online and sites be go okay i get it now you know yeah for I get it.
00:53:51
Speaker
know And when you think of people striving and and
00:53:59
Speaker
when people are in those positions to pull the spring the strings and there's this sub layer that is feeding them information, you know it's always you've got the figureheads and then you've got all the worker bees that are underneath them.
00:54:14
Speaker
And Lawrence was that way. And Gertrude Bell was that way. And Amir Faisal was that way. And they were saying, this is not the way to go.
00:54:25
Speaker
And Lawrence recognized, you know, with this Arab man, Amir Faisal, who was Hussein. He was the first king of Iraq in Baghdad.
00:54:38
Speaker
His brother was the first king in trans Jordan that became Jordan, Hussein. That's the family. And it's Lawrence that was you know working with them and working with Churchill and other people to put them in positions that they deserved.
00:54:56
Speaker
Yeah, yeah i could i could sit on Wikipedia and Google and ah for days just trying to like soak all of it in. And I need to go watch the Florence of Arabia. I've never seen it. yeah
00:55:08
Speaker
it's like it It's pretty old, isn't it? It is, but when you see it now, it doesn't seem old. It's technicolor. It's technicals so relevant. It's so relevant, but it's it's beautifully shot.
00:55:21
Speaker
And was done in same place. It's just one of those pieces that All the great, if you ask the great, or you can Google, you know, what is Spielberg's top 10 films?
00:55:33
Speaker
Lawrence of Arabia. It's right there. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, you know, draw cinema. Other people, you know, it's like just films that are so impactful.
00:55:47
Speaker
So anyway, tell you, it was so fun taking a camel from akaba it's It's about 50 kilometers to through Wadi Rum. We did it for four days.
00:56:00
Speaker
And so the book, it says it indicates there's more camel riding than we actually did.
00:56:08
Speaker
Fiction. we um I mean, it was incredible. Because I hadn't seen Lawrence of Arabia. I mean, being in these, they were big, tall camels.
00:56:21
Speaker
There's a difference, you know, just like with horses. They're thoroughbred. There's this and there's that. And I mean, I think my head was right around nine feet in the air.
00:56:34
Speaker
know Wow. And those camels could go 35, 40 hour. and you how can that be but it's true we we we raised them
00:56:49
Speaker
Of course. Yeah. Three, came four camels. One was a pack camel. Saba was from the town of the little village of Wadi Rum. And he was our guide.
00:57:02
Speaker
And he took us out into where no one is, you know, in in the desert in 115, 118 degree weather. And loving it.
00:57:15
Speaker
And loving it. You know, really finding quiet. peace.
00:57:23
Speaker
Antarctica was that way. There were places in Antarctica where it was so quiet. You know, if there was no wind, there's zero humidity there in Antarctica and zero pollution.
00:57:36
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Sure. And I'm speaking of the 70s when I was there, but it was the similarities. i mean, one is, you minus major degrees and one is very, very hot.
00:57:50
Speaker
Yeah. But similarities and even the way you dress you layer up yeah air for insulation against that sun and you wear that cafe and you wrap it around your face and it's it's brilliant to the way to engage with the culture and in the desert not in the city I wouldn't wear that kind of stuff in the city but see how people live and and see the practicality of it, the genius of it
00:58:24
Speaker
Yeah.
Cultural Adaptations and Reflections on Impact
00:58:26
Speaker
They learned how to adapt. So they obviously know something. That's right. Yeah.
00:58:34
Speaker
Well, I wanted to ask about, um are you, do you still work with that organization Seeds of Change? Is that,
00:58:45
Speaker
Seeds of Peace. Seeds of Peace. Yeah. what the Is that still active with like the current crisis? just use that If you Google it, yes, we do not have direct contact. But what we realized literally just recently is that I've been talking about Seeds of Peace quite a bit in podcasts and so that we need to make contact with the New York office.
00:59:09
Speaker
and and just say, you know, we're back. no We had contact with him after the event. And I was in Colorado.
00:59:20
Speaker
Miles was in New York and went to the Peace Market. And I mean, it was, we both went to one. It was the first time I heard John Legend.
00:59:31
Speaker
He was the, and this goes way back to 2007, right? And John Legend was the one that was the entertainment singing. Very cool.
00:59:44
Speaker
Yeah. And it's a fundraiser. but And I'm sure they have them every year. but it's time to go back now that we've got the book out and mentioning them. And we have it as Seeds of Hope is what it is, Sadie, in the book.
01:00:01
Speaker
Oh, okay. Yeah. Great. Brilliant organization. And we've we've discovered that any money, anything that we do, we want to, I mean, there's a thing around Havana that we'll do the same thing. We'll find an organization give to give money to that supports the mission that we're doing.
01:00:23
Speaker
Yeah. It gives intention, you know? I had to learn it early in my life. I did. i had to learn how to to lessen the ego, lose it in some cases, and find the purpose behind what's going on and not just because you're good or skilled or this or that, that it it's a higher service involved.
01:00:52
Speaker
And I don't mean just to God. I'm talking about to people.
01:00:57
Speaker
Helping, joy. children or whatever it is Yeah. Builders Beyond Borders. Women's organizations. And we did with Kayak for a Cause. We did a lot with that.
01:01:12
Speaker
Good. Cool. Yeah. Well, we urge our listeners to look into that. It seems like very good causes. And i think they'll be just as fascinated with your writings and your travels as we are. is very, very interesting to us. Very fascinating. We've been very entertained. Yeah. Yeah.
01:01:30
Speaker
Well, it's been a pleasure to talk with you and I will be following you, you know, to see what, just to see it you've you've drawn me in. And it really was this week that I was just like, wait a minute, this is really pretty cool.
01:01:47
Speaker
You know, it's it's opportunity. And I would suggest the more that you really double down on that, you know, the geography and a little bit of history, even if it's one golden nugget from each place. Did you know?
01:02:02
Speaker
And how this, you know, has gone on to mean this or influenced. Yeah. Yeah. That's one of our favorite parts of our episodes is doing little bit of deep dives.
01:02:13
Speaker
And will definitely follow you very much looking forward to your next book. I think that sounds really interesting. We don't know a lot about Cuba as well. So that would be really, really interesting to hear about that. And we'll um post our links and everything like that for our listeners to be able to find you um the best place to access your book. All, all the good stuff.
01:02:35
Speaker
This is really, really interesting. Sadie, really nice to meet you. Jess, nice to see you again after our first chat while ago. And thank you for working this out, being together. Yeah, we were happy to have you. Thanks for reaching It's been good. We love to expand our horizons, our listeners, so this has been great.
01:02:58
Speaker
Great. Thank you. Enjoy the rest of the day. Okay, you too. Thanks so much. So long.