During a trip with friends across the nearby Canadian border, I whipped out my passport as we slowly moved along the queue at the nearby checkpoint. My friend reached for my passport, having never seen an actual passport before, and started flipping through it while we waited in traffic for our turn to cross.

"Wow, you've got a lot of stamps in yours!" she commented.

Thumbing through my passport got the three of us on a discussion, on our way to Toronto, about my various multi-cultural adventures over the years. From the time I was a young child, I was always fascinated by travel, different cultures, and biographies of famous people who spent time traveling the world. Because I wanted to be an artist and a writer and had a romanticized idea in my head as to what that would involve, it seemed only natural for me that travel would be involved in there somewhere, based on the biographies of other artists and writers I have read.

My parents had a hard time understanding my wanderlust, being content to explore no further than the American Mid-West. They had a difficult time when, at the age of 15, I convinced them, somewhat begrudgingly, to let me be an exchange student that summer between my Sophomore and Junior year. I originally signed up to go to Australia, but during the application process, I was assigned to go to Austria (in Europe) instead.

This turned out to be providential in the long run, as I later became a Christian during post-college European travels. I spent an eye-opening summer living on a farm near the Czech border with a family that spoke no English, far from McDonald's, Wonder bread, and anything else familiar from my suburban Detroit upbringing. Years later, I'd return to Suessenbach, and from there travel all over Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Northern Africa with friends I'd met along the way.

To me, every stamp in my old, now-expired passport (the newer one only has one stamp so far) represents not just an arrival date to a new country, but many more personal memories. When I hear the names of cities and countries on the news, radio, or television, memories of people I know and experiences we shared come flooding back. Those stamps in my passport touch off thoughts of food and feasts, laughter and tears, deep discussions and fun times, and cross cultural worship within the universal body of Christ.

I believe my travels brought greater understanding of different cultures and people. I may not always agree with different world views within other cultures, but getting to know people within those cultures has allowed me to at least get a feel for where they are coming from.

For me, the people of a region are just as interesting, if not more so, than the landmarks and tourist attractions of a destination. I often get a little sad when I hear about people traveling on a strict itinerary with a tour group, though it is probably more efficient.

Certainly, in some areas, travel with a group is necessary for safety. However, I feel that this kind of travel insulates us from the real people and culture of the area we are hoping to experience. As I lived in Salzburg, Austria one year after college, I would look on with amusement at the tourists all going to the same places in their groups, and missing out on some of the more off-the-beaten-path treasures that Salzburg had to offer.

My thoughts about different parts of our world are forever changed by my post-college travels. When I hear, for example, the name of Istanbul or when I hear about Turkey in the news, my mind goes to a day spent walking through the Grand Bazaar, and another afternoon spent in the kitchen of a confectionery, owned by a friend of a friend, as I learned to make authentic Lokum (Turkish Delight). I had only expressed interest in how they made it, and soon my host was busily trying to find someone to teach me. I later learned that they were flattered that, as an American, I loved their food.

From the time I spent there, I associate Turkey and Istanbul with those who influenced me while there, and the foods we ate together around the meal table and prepared together in the kitchen. I can barely eat Middle Eastern food without thinking of the different tables I sat at in that region of the world, breaking bread with friends I met along the way.

Thanks to the Internet and other newer forms of communication, I've been able to reconnect more frequently with those I've met while traveling. E-mail and Skype have both been a blessing to all of my cross-cultural friendships. I still marvel at being able to talk face to face with a friend on the other side of the world using a web cam. Like my travels, this kind of technology has only helped to make the world feel a little bit smaller for me.

My friend in Southeast Asia and I were talking on Skype about what we were making for dinner that night. We originally met while we were both living in Salzburg. She was renting a small apartment from the family I was working for as an Au Pair, and though we had no common language at first, we bonded over food.

Some 20 years later, we still bond over our passions for cooking. On that early morning Skype conversation from two sides of the globe, she told me about dinner at her house that night: some typically spicy southeast Asia curry dish. I was telling her about my Italian style dinner I had planned for this evening at our happy home. Her young daughter came into the room, and she quickly translated for her what we had been talking about.

The daughter then said something to her mother in their language which gave my friend pause, and then a quiet smile. After her daughter walked away, I couldn't help but ask.

"What did she say?" I wondered out loud. Children that age, the world around, always have an interesting view on the world around them, and I could tell from my friend's expression, this was one of those "out of the mouths of babes" moments.

"Well, I told her what you were having for dinner, and how we can't even find the ingredients for it over here, but how much I enjoyed it when you made it for me back in the day. I also told her that you thought our dinner tonight sounded very good, but you don't get to eat authentic food from our culture too often. She said ..." My friend paused, smiling to herself, "that she couldn't wait for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, because there will be some food from every tribe and culture. Isn't that cute?"

"Wow, I never thought of that before. It doesn't really say that in the Bible, just that there would be some people from every tribe and tongue before the throne, but I wonder now what we'll be eating."

"I know, me too. Maybe she's right. Maybe we'll have a grand multi-cultural feast on that great day. That would be lovely, I think."

"Wouldn't it though? That would make a great day even better!"