Individuals Paying It Forward

It started out many years ago...... In my twenties we moved to Australia and lived and worked in several cities while there. In the beginning we were seeing the country with limited funds and a backpack. If you have ever travelled that way, you know how wonderful it is to spend a night in a home with a roof, a stove and warm water! Once we were settled and had jobs it was a different life with all the amenities that most take for granted.

North Americans seemed to find each other and often we would open our home to weary travellers we would meet. Often the decision to travel with backpack is not because there aren't funds back home waiting but because of wanting the 'experience' - the experience is great but not as glamorous as we may have dreamt. It was always magical to get a free nights lodging, we knew from our own experience. When we would give shelter and food to someone they would ask how they could ever re-pay us and we would tell them that after they got home to the States or Canada, just open their home and their hearts to a traveller like we had. We told them they could pay us back by helping someone else out. It was great! We would see them off confident in the knowledge that they would repay us by what we now know is to Pay It Forward, on a much smaller scale of course. I'm sure there are people all over the world still paying it forward from that experience. It warms my heart to think about it.

Thanks for letting me share this story.

Gail