Spaniard holds title of second most traveled around world
For 2017, Sanchez would like to visit Tajikistan to see the Gorno-Badakhshan autonomous region, which could be an independent country someday. Tajikistan is the only UN country Sanchez has not spent the night. In addition, when his son, Lázaro grows older, Sanchez would like to travel with him and his wife so he can gain knowledge to understand life on the planet and the people living in it.
62-year-old Jorge Sanchez is currently ranked number two on The Best Traveled website.
A Barcelona native, Sanchez, dropped out of school at the age of 13 with a poor background and thus worked at low-paying jobs at farms, restaurants, gold mines, and dozens of other places across the globe.
“Jobs for me have been a means to earn money to keep travelling.
“I have worked in a dental laboratory in Paris; sold cheese in the markets of Italy; played chess for money in The Philippines and Indonesia; worked with a group of gold miners in the Madre de Dios region in the Peruvian jungle.
“I was a busboy in a Puerto Rican restaurant in Greenwich Village, in New York City, and [did] many other jobs. I have done any job imaginable, but I have no real profession,” Sanchez said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
Despite the hardships Sanchez has encountered with his life, he has managed to travel to all 193 countries recognized by the United Nations (UN) and to every region of most of the world’s countries.
“In fact, when you calculate the money that you will spend travelling, you have to deduct the money that you would spend remaining at home.
“For some people, travelling and living several months in low-cost countries such as India, Indonesia, The Philippines, Bolivia, Peru, Morocco or Mozambique is even cheaper than staying at home,” Sanchez said in the interview.
Sanchez has done this by strategically using his resources and relying on the kindness of others he has never met.
“If the desire to travel is strong, those people must travel; otherwise, they will feel dead in life. The most important thing isn’t to travel or not to travel, but to find your own way.
“If you are sure that travelling is your destiny, you have to follow it. It doesn’t matter if you don’t have money; you can work – something along the way will happen that will help you. It’s always like this,” Sanchez in the interview.
The Spaniard sees travel as a pilgrimage to knowledge and learning. He believes if one wants to understand the world, one must see it. Although this is, he also believes every great traveller should know when it is time to go home.
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