"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"

"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" asked Henry Morton Stanley.

"Yes, and I feel thankful that I am here to welcome you." replied Dr. Livingstone.

With those trite words, Mr. Stanley became the first European to greet David Livingstone in six years. Though, he seemed to be a little dodgy in the eyes, when Stanley found him on the shores of lake Tanganyika. Turns out her majesties famous explorer had become very ill and a little crazy. Stanley urged Livingstone to come with him but the doctor was determined to finish his mission in Africa. Despite his inglorious later years, David Livingstone was an important Victorian figure who, for the better or the worse, helped shape Africa's future.

I've been looking at some of my books on the guy and I realized there are a couple of things that any traveler can take away from his experiences. I have summarized and cheapened them below for your convenience.


Three Things David Livingstone Can Teach the Modern Explorer:

1. Travel light.

Often, the person toting the triad of upright rollers with their entire wardrobe and "essential shower kit" on a trip is not the most prepared. Also, it's usually not the scruffy dude with the least amount, either ("I'm sorry you didn't bring enough deodorant but that's what we call a 'non-sharable' item."). As with most circumstances, there's a happy medium. Pack only what is necessary (and, no, your Gameboy is not necessary unless you work for a game developer and you're headed to a conference). True essentials. Only what the journey calls for.

My problem is usually books. "What if I need to look this up? Or reference this other tome?" I usually need someone to talk me down and show me reason, "Eoghan, do you really think that you'll use this un-abriged Webster's dictionary on this weekend's camping trip? And, I know you've been wanting to finish it for a while, but...Moby Dick? Really? For the weekend?" Once it's pointed out to me, I feel foolish but lighter. We all have our traveling guilty pleasures- books, hair care products, video games, DVDs- and we all have a friend that is willing to tell us how stupid we'll feel when we get tired of carrying it all.

Livingstone was known for traveling light and it came in handy. Most other Europeans at the time traveled to Africa with huge posses of slaves and servants armed to the teeth. Not surprisingly, the locals assumed that they were either being invaded or feared that the approaching whites were slave traders. Doesn't start things off on the right foot. Which brings us to...

2. Don't Piss Off the Locals

Duh? Right? Wrong. There's a reason that American's are not well thought of in certain places around the world (other than the Middle East) and we can't blame it all on the Bush years. A couple of words of wisdom: yelling doesn't increase another person's comprehension of English, snapping at waiters and using "garson" as a universal term for serving staff is borderline colonial and for heaven's sake don't giggle at every stone carving of a penis you see.

Don't get me wrong, America isn't the only nation being held back a grade for cultural insensitivity. I stayed at a jungle lodge in Peru once where the majority of the lodgers were wealthy British folks. One night I heard Juan, the Peruvian bartender, called "boy" so many times that I had to retire early.

One huge step toward ingraciating oneself to the citizens of a country is to learn a toast and cheers to their health (again, other than the Middle East). I haven't been able to find a specific toast to health in Tswana but I did find "Masego ke ao" which means "Good luck!" That should suffice until I learn a good one.

A friend of mine met a group of Russians one night at a bar in New Zealand. He doesn't speak Russian but he knew, "Na zdorovje!" True, if you do a little research, it turns out that this is not really a drinking cheer but an answer to "spasibo" (thank you). It didn't matter, though, he hung out with them all night and had a great time. He had no idea what they were saying but they smiled and laughed and that's universal.

Livingstone apparently had a knack for winning over the chiefs of villages during his travels. He became so beloved in the village where he died that the residents refused to release his body to the British government. When they finally did return it, his heart was cut out and there was a note that read, "You can have his body, but his heart belongs in Africa!"

3. Don't let the stooge make you the stooge.

Unless you're traveling as a pair (occasional stooging but hopefully you made a good choice in travel companion) or by yourself (if you're traveling by yourself and there's a stooge, you need a moment next to a tulip field or something), there is bound to be a stooge at some point. The stooge can switch people and it can be a conglomerate of personalities riled up over a circumstance and each other. In big groups, it doesn't seem to shift. Pretty early on the stooge shows their face and then it's up to you not to snap.

Someone will have a problem with every single food item put before them. Someone can never stop trying to tell the rest of the group what to do. Someone thinks their Carlos Mencia impression is spot on even though its only similarity with the source material is that it's really, really bad.

The stooge has a way of pulling others into their world. Suddenly, because the stooge is annoying you, you start to become annoying and add to the stooge. Don't let the stooge get you down! Don't let someone make you responsible for their good time. If it comes down to it, you can always just walk off singing Safety Dance.

Okay, so anyone who knows a little bit about Livingstone, knows that this one is a little bit of a stretch. For one thing, if there was a stooge in some of Livingstone's expeditions, it was him. On the Zambezi expedition, John Kirk, Livingstone's physician, wrote, "I can come to no other conclusion than that Dr. Livingstone is out of his mind and a most unsafe leader." But if you look at it from the explorer's point of view, he had a job that he was going to do despite any objections. Maybe back then, they called the stooge a Livingstone.