Podcast conversation with Charlie Wheelan.
Charlie is an amazing storyteller. During our conversation, he added extra color to many of the stories in his book about his family’s gap year around the world. It’s worth noting this is not his first book. He’s an exceptional writer who has written other books that attempt to make serious topics (like economics) more accessible and fun.
We Came We Saw We Left is a highly entertaining book that captures both the exciting and ordinary aspects of their year abroad. The flesh eating bacteria, the tribulations of transportation, the accidental eating of brownies from a stand with a marijuana leaf displayed. The beauty they experienced in the landscape, the food, and many people they met along the way. He explained the term Punjabi shortcut as the shortest distance between 2 points in the other direction. (This came about because they had to delay a visit with friends in India, so they took a side trip to Africa and then went back to India – an approximate 8,000 mile detour).
The year gave their family the opportunity to be connected in a period of their life when normally they’d all be going in different directions. If taking off a year is a dream you’ve had, we would both say do it!