One People. One Planet.

I met Andre Brougiroux in France in 2007 and invited him to speak at one  of my events that I organized in the Beaujolais. What an amazing soul  who had so many travel stories to share. Later, I asked Andre to do an  interview with me but we decided that it would be much easier for me to  just publish the following which was already in English. The man is  awesome!! - Annick Elzière
 

Best-selling author, Andre Brugiroux, who European newspapers have dubbed  “the Marco Polo of modern times” in his book entitled “THE EARTH IS BUT ONE COUNTRY” describes his epic journey of discovery and adventure through 135 countries around the world and 400,000 km over an 18 year period.  The book is now printed and available in English by Oneworld (UK) under the title: ‘ONE PEOPLE, ONE PLANET.”

At the age of 17,  Brugiroux left Paris with 10 francs in his pocket to realize a childhood dream of touring the world : not as a tourist, but rather as a student of mankind. After some years in Europe where he learned five languages, and in Canada*to arrange financing, Brugiroux set out to re-discover the world.

While living on not much more than a dollar-a-day, Brougiroux hitchhiked (on every conceivable type of transportation) for six years.  Over land and sea from North America, end to end, to the Pacific Islands; The Far East, Trans-Siberia, the Middle East, India, Iran and all of Africa!   

He also made a film (which he narrates himself in English) of this incredible odyssey of his visit to Alaska at minus 45°, the Australian desert at plus 50°, to the head-hunters of Borneo, the Bonzes in Bangkok, an ashram in India, a Kibbutz in Israel and a jail in Bolivia, where he was mistaken for one of Che Guevarra's guerillas.

Reaching the conclusion, as a result of his experiences with so many of the world's people, he decided that the title of his book should be “THE EARTH IS BUT ONE COUNTRY.”

“It took me altogether, 50 years to realize my childhood dream, to see all countries and territories of the world; I visited my last territory, the kingdom of Mustang in the Himalayas in 2004.”  

This summer 2009, André would love to do the gulags road of Oriental Siberia (Yakutz to Magadan). And this winter, he is planning a visit to the Island of Tristan da Cunha. Last November, André celebrated his seventieth (71) birthday in Saudi Arabia’s Maida’n Salahand just loved it. 

Visit André 's website: http://andre.brugiroux.free.fr/