I recently spent three months traveling in Asia, Europe, and the USA. I visited Kyoto, Nara, Hiroshima, Tokyo, Kurashiki, and Nasushiobara, in Japan. I stopped in Newark, Boston, Washington, DC, and Portland, Maine, in the USA. I visited Bath, York, Whitby, London, Lancaster, Loughborough, Salisbury, Durham, and many smaller villages and towns in England.

I rode on planes, trains and in automobiles in those places. I saw the sights and shopped in the stores. I talked with as many people as I could, listened to many stories. I saw dirty cities and clean ones. I was treated well in some places and with contempt in others. I was ignored in some stores and eagerly helped in others. Some people gave me wrong information when I needed help and others worked diligently to make sure I had what I needed to get where I was going. I saw efficiency and I saw systems that didn't work at all.

In all that time I only felt my person safety was threatened in one of the above countries.

They say that travel broadens the mind. I have to agree. I once believed the party line, that the USA was the greatest nation on the earth. Now I have to ask what is it that makes people say that? Is the power of our military? Is it the fact that we waste more resources? Is it our history of pursuing freedom?

The reason I ask is that of all the places that I went the most inefficient, rudest, least amenable to travelers was the USA. The trains were not only late but there was no effort made to ensure people knew what was happening with them. The airports treated travelers like herds of animals, pushing them here and there with no regard for their individual respect. The shop keepers and clerks made no effort to make sure their customers were satisfied or even helped. And it was in the USA that I felt in danger of my and my wife's safety.

Is our country really the greatest or is that just a lie we tell each other?