Travel tips:

1. For an oral history of the place, look for an archaeologist sweating in the sun and buy him a drink.
2. To find out about nuances in the local political situation, look for Jewish names on shops and say hello in Yiddish.
3. Immediately after boarding an airplane, go to the bathroom. There is plenty of time, it’s clean, and there is no line.

My father was good at travel because of a lesson he taught by example: Instead of clinging to a safe job in a politically stifling climate, and even though he had only modest savings and looming college tuition for two adolescent children, he picked us all up, set out for the unknown, and made such a success of it that when he eventually returned home, he got a job that he loved.