The Gazette-Enterprise

SEGUIN — Talks of world travel will be the topic of conversation at the library this week.

On Thursday the Friends of the Library will be holding its fall meeting, including a discussion of the book “Traveling as a Political Act” by Rick Steves with former Texas Lutheran University professor and experienced world traveler, Evelyn Streng.

Jackie Gross, director of the Seguin-Guadalupe County Public Library, said the group hosts regular Book Talks, but this evening one will be the organization’s kick off for the new fiscal year.

“It’s the Friends of the Library’s fall meeting and they always have a presenter come and speak and they decided this year they were going to do a book talk for their fall program,” she said.

While the title may suggest that the book is about politics, Gross said, it is about much more.

“It is about learning about different cultures and how you can use travel as a way to do that,” she said. “It is really important now to know — more than ever — that you understand how to deal with people from different cultures, what their beliefs are, what they hold valuable as opposed to what Americans would.”

Jack Linden, Friends of the Library vice president, said the book shines a new light on the world of travel.

“It’s kind of a new prospective on it. It tries to connect people to people and helps us to live life more productively in a shrinking world,” he said. “In the book he takes the first step in helping you experience the world.”

Traveling and sight-seeing are always fun but Gross said it’s always good to know more than just the basics.

“Dr. Streng will be discussing the book and highlighting how travel can broaden your horizons and to use travel not only to see the sights and monuments that regular tourists see but also to get know the culture that you are traveling to, so that perhaps we can all be emphathetic towards different cultures and their beliefs,” she said.

The organization will be hosting more presentations in the months to come, Linden said.

“We are trying to get people to explore different things during the whole year,” he said. “Coming up we are going to have Yvonne De La Rosa talking about clothing and mariachi music and we are going to have another one called Gardens of the Spirit which will be looking into gardens in a different way.”

The Book Talk event will be held on Thursday Oct. 15 at 7 p.m. at the library and is open to anyone who would like to attend.

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