http://www.travelpod.com/traveler-iq

I got a 99 on the Latin America one... really neat.

I got 102 on the world one.

When mom gave me the school assignment to read the 'complete and unabridged' Pilgrim's Progress, I was kind of miffed. I didn't want to read some old, hard to understand book. I figured I would cheat and pretend I was reading it. I would just skim it enough to tell mom about what I had 'read'. And for the first 20-30 pages, that's what I did. Then, to my great surprise, one day I found that I was actually reading it. Today I was reading and I just wanted to share what I read. I love how everything is in parables. Don't take it for what it says on the surface... dig deeper and apply it to today's world and how you think.

Evangelist. My sons, you have heard, in the words of the truth of the
gospel, that you must, through many tribulations, enter into the
kingdom of heaven. And, again, that in every city bonds and
afflictions abide in you; and therefore you cannot expect that
you should go long on your pilgrimage without them, in some sort
or other. You have found something of the truth of these
testimonies upon you already, and more will immediately follow;
for now, as you see, you are almost out of this wilderness,
and therefore you will soon come into a town that you will by
and by see before you; and in that town you will be hardly beset
with enemies, who will strain hard but they will kill you; and
be you sure that one or both of you must seal the testimony
which you hold, with blood; but be you faithful unto death, and
the King will give you a crown of life. He that shall die there,
although his death will be unnatural, and his pain perhaps
great, he will yet have the better of his fellow; not only
because he will be arrived at the Celestial City soonest, but
because he will escape many miseries that the other will meet
with in the rest of his journey. But when you are come to the
town, and shall find fulfilled what I have here related, then
remember your friend, and quit yourselves like men, and commit
the keeping of your souls to your God in well-doing, as unto a
faithful Creator.

Then I saw in my dream, that when they (Christian and Faithful) were got out of the
wilderness, they presently saw a town before them, and the name
of that town is Vanity; and at the town there is a fair kept,
called Vanity Fair: it is kept all the year long. it beareth the
name of Vanity Fair because the town where it is kept is lighter
than vanity; and, also because all that is there sold, or that
cometh thither, is vanity. As is the saying of the wise, all
that cometh is vanity.

This fair is no new-erected business, but a thing of ancient
standing; I will shew you the original of it.

Almost five thousand years agone, there were pilgrims walking to
the Celestial City, as these two honest persons are: and
Beelzebub, Apollyon, and Legion, with their companions,
perceiving by the path that the pilgrims made, that their way to
the city lay through this town of Vanity, they contrived here to set up a fair; a fair wherein,
should be sold all sorts of vanity, and that it should last all
the year long: therefore at this fair are all such merchandise
sold, as houses, lands, trades, places, honours, preferments,
titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures, and delights of
all sorts, wives, husbands, children, masters,
servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls,
precious stones, and what not.

And, moreover, at this fair there is at all times to be seen
juggling cheats, games, plays, fools, apes, knaves, and rogues,
and that of every kind.

Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, thefts, murders,
adulteries, false swearers, and that of a bloodred colour.

And as in other fairs of less moment, there are the several rows
and streets, under their proper names, where such and such wares
are vended; so here likewise you have the proper places, rows,
streets, (viz; countries and kingdoms,) where the wares of this
fair are soonest to be found. Here is the Britain Row, the
French Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row, the German Row,
where several sorts of vanities are to be sold. But, as in other
fairs, some one commodity is as the chief of all the fair, so
the ware of Rome and her merchandise is greatly promoted in this
fair; only our English nation, with some others, have taken a
dislike thereat.

Now, as I said, the way to the Celestial City lies just through
this town where this lusty fair is kept; and he that will go to
the city, and yet not go through this town, must needs go out of
the world. The Prince of princes himself, when here, went
through this town to his own country, and that upon a fair-day
too; yea, and as I think, it was Beelzebub, the chief lord of this fair, that invited him
to buy of his vanities; yea, would have made him lord of the
fair, would he but have done him reverence as he went through
the town. Yea, because he was such a person of honour, Beelzebub
had him from street to street, and shewed him all the kingdoms
of the world in a little time, that he might, if possible,
allure the Blessed One to cheapen and buy some of his vanities;
but he had no mind to the merchandise, and therefore left the
town, without laying out so much as one farthing upon these
vanities. This fair, therefore, is an ancient thing, of long
standing, and a very great fair. Now these pilgrims, as I said,
must needs go through this fair. Well, so they did: but, behold,
even as they entered into the fair, all the people in the fair
were moved, and the town itself as it were in a hubbub about
them; and that for several reasons: for --

First, The pilgrims were clothed with such kind of raiment as
was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair.
The people, therefore, of the fair, made a great gazing upon
them: some said they were fools, some they were bedlams, and
some they are outlandish men.

Secondly, And as they wondered at their apparel, so they did
likewise at their speech; for few could understand what they
said; they naturally spoke the language of Canaan, but they that
kept the fair were the men of this world; so that, from one end
of the fair to the other, they seemed barbarians each to the
other.

Thirdly, But that which did not a little amuse the merchandisers
was, that these pilgrims set very light by all their wares; they cared not so much as to look upon them;
and if they called upon them to buy, they would put their
fingers in their ears, and cry, 'Turn away mine eyes from
beholding vanity', and look upwards, signifying that their trade
and traffic was in heaven.

One chanced mockingly, beholding the carriage of the men, to say
unto them, 'What will ye buy?' But they, looking gravely upon him,
answered, 'We buy the truth.'




...Think on that...

Remember, think about what each sentence really means.