"Travel guru stands firm on war and weed"

Seattle P-I (Susan Paynter):

The main stage of Hempfest, broad daylight on Saturday and Sunday, in the middle of Myrtle Edwards Park, is no place for smokescreens and timid souls.

But, then, even if it costs him clients and endorsements, travel guru Rick Steves has never been a shrinking violet when it comes to speaking his mind.

He opposes the war in Iraq. And, as he has seen done across Europe, he flies a peace flag outside his Edmonds headquarters despite the fact that, when it went up, an angry man approached sneering, "Boy! I bet if you realized how much that cost your business, you'd think twice!"

He wouldn't.

It is Steves' deep, internationally informed opposition to this country's criminalizing of personal marijuana use that will send him to the Hempfest stage.

"I'm not going to sit at (Edmonds') Fifth and Main streets and smoke a joint," Steves told me. "But 800,000 people in the U.S. were arrested last year for marijuana while, in Berne (Switzerland) they're in public, smoking and playing backgammon and not bothering anyone. It (criminal prosecution) forces people into the street to deal with scary people. It's just so wrong."

I caught up with Steves -- he was on the Danube -- by phone this week. He was taking a flight home on Friday. Among other things, I wanted to ask if such public stances cost him.

We live, after all, in a world of maximized profits and secret agendas where we must excavate before finding out that a billionaire Sonics owner gave money to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth attacks on John Kerry and to a group dedicated to banning marriage rights for gays.

Steves supports apple pie issues as well as sticky ones. Weeks ago he gave $80,000 to American Forests for 80,000 trees as a hedge against the CO2 generated by the flights of his "Europe Through the Back Door" tour members. He renovated and donated the use of 24 Lynnwood apartments to the Trinity Project's transitional housing for single mothers and their kids. "I can't imagine the weight of having no money, no roof over my head, no job and small children to care for," he says.

He gives $30,000 a year to Bread for the World and challenges 300 of his travelers to give $300 each. And he supports Mercy Corps. "If you know what's good for you, you don't want to be 'filthy rich' in a desperately poor world," Steves says.

Being anti-war and pro-weed aren't as easy. "But I won't be quiet because it's better for business," Steves told me. "Why would I compromise my ideals just to make more? I marvel at those who are 10 times as wealthy as me who don't speak out because they want to make even more. I'm having too much fun with my work to worry if a few people wonder, 'Can I trust this pot head?' "

While visiting Germany, Steves has talked with those who recall shops there replacing the usual morning greeting with "sieg heil" because it was better for business. "I don't want to live in a 'sieg heil' world," he said. "It's better to speak out earlier than later."

Steves' frustration over both punitive drug policies and people's unwillingness to even speak against them drove him to regularly shout "MARIJUANA!" out the open windows of his Edmonds offices a while back. He'd remembered his human sexuality professor at UPS years ago saying, "Penis!" over and over simply to get students over the shock of it.

"The whole marijuana thing is awareness just like (educating the public that) gay people are not going to infect your children or give you AIDS. Someone who smokes marijuana is not a bad person. In fact, they're probably gentle, creative people."

He first tried it in Afghanistan at age 22 and, yes, he still smokes, but not when he's working. Then, he laughs, he can't afford to be that "relaxed."

Off camera and off mike, so many people who interview Steves on radio and TV whisper "Right on!" to him but only a few celebrities and high-profilers risk saying it out loud. "We're embracing a lie in a country based on truth and freedom," Steves said. "And it hurts the credibility of parents and teachers and the police. If I were a kid, I wouldn't listen to any of them."

Actually, if he gets time to explain and contrast the medical "harm-reduction" policies of Europe with the moral and legal approach of the U.S., feedback shows that at least half of the people who hear him agree.

He gets more static about his stance on the war. A woman traveler booking with one of Steves' many B&B contacts in Europe recently signed her reservation letter with, "God bless our troops!" And, when the host wrote back that she was welcome but that he probably wouldn't be blessing her troops, she objected angrily that Steves would list such a man in one of his travel books.

He says you have to take a tough-love approach with people who are that ethnocentric in their outlook. Being open and non-judgmental is the very essence of travel. And, whether it's war or weed, Steves is in a position to speak up and let the chips -- and the ashes -- fall where they may.

IF YOU GO

Rick Steves will speak at Seattle Hempfest at 4 p.m. Saturday and 3:45 p.m. Sunday on the Main Stage at Myrtle Edwards Park.