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Speaker 1: Happy Saturday, everybody. We have a new podcast launching on

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Speaker 1: our network. It is called Parklandia, and it's about the

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Speaker 1: journeys of Brad and Matt Kirowack, who bought an r

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Speaker 1: V and they are traveling full time, trying to visit

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Speaker 1: as many national parks as they can and documenting their

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Speaker 1: journey as they go. So in the spirit of that theme,

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Speaker 1: today we are going back to our episode on Freya Stark,

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Speaker 1: who's also known as Freya of Arabia, who spent much

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Speaker 1: of her life traveling and documented her travels in a

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Speaker 1: series of best selling books. And stay tuned at the

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Speaker 1: end to get a sneak peak at Parklandia. Welcome to

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Speaker 1: Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Sarah Dowdy and I'm Deblina Choker Boarding. And not

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Speaker 1: too long ago, we talked about a few real Indiana

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Speaker 1: Jones possibilities and one of the guys who made our

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Speaker 1: short list. We didn't go into too many d tales

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Speaker 1: about him, but one of the guys who made our

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Speaker 1: short list was the very famous T. E. Lawrence, better

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Speaker 1: known of course as Lawrence of Arabia, and I think

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Speaker 1: Lawrence of Arabia could still make a really great solo topic.

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Speaker 1: But today we're going to discuss someone who's occasionally associated

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Speaker 1: with him, Dame Freya Stark, who's sometimes called the female

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Speaker 1: Lawrence of Arabia. To me, though, Stark really reminds me

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Speaker 1: less of Lawrence of Arabia and more of another podcast

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Speaker 1: subject we've discussed, Ottoman traveler Eleachellaby. They explored mostly different

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Speaker 1: areas of the world. They were obviously separated by several centuries,

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Speaker 1: but they really stand out from other adventures we've talked

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Speaker 1: about before because of their attention to detail. They were

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Speaker 1: almost more writers before they were travelers, you know, that

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Speaker 1: that was what they were really focusing on. They bothered

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Speaker 1: to meet all different types of people and learned local customs,

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Speaker 1: speak people's own languages, and they always preferred the slow

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Speaker 1: road to I think if you remember when we talked

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Speaker 1: about Evlia, he didn't like ships kind of because he

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Speaker 1: was scared of them, but it made his travel really slow.

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Speaker 1: And the same is true for Freya, who could have

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Speaker 1: taken a car a lot of places, but preferred to

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Speaker 1: travel by donkey or by mule. You know, really take

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Speaker 1: her time with it. There were some differences between them,

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Speaker 1: though Chellaby ultimately produced one epic travel account and one

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Speaker 1: very impressive map. Stark, writing in the modern age, broke

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Speaker 1: her accounts down into volumes. In her one hundred years,

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Speaker 1: she produced twenty four travel books and autobiographies and eight

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Speaker 1: volumes of letters. Many of them were best sellers, depicting

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Speaker 1: arrest by the French, trips to the Fortress of the Assassins,

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Speaker 1: the Secret Life of Harems, and a month long siege

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Speaker 1: at the British embassy in Baghdad. But her personal life

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Speaker 1: and her penchant for wild hats is really just as

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Speaker 1: interesting as this sort of professional life she had. It

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Speaker 1: all starts in an appropriately bohemian fashion. She was born

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Speaker 1: in January thirty one, eighteen ninety three, in a mom

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Speaker 1: watch studio, to artistic parents who were also first cousins.

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Speaker 1: When she was only two years old, her parents started wandering,

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Speaker 1: carrying her and her baby sister over the Alps in

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Speaker 1: a basket. Yeah, very romantic sounding life. The most settled

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Speaker 1: period of her childhood, though, was spent in her father's

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Speaker 1: home at Devonshire, where she slept in a bed her

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Speaker 1: mother had painted with ships, again, all very romantic and

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Speaker 1: appropriate for her later life. But the family basically lived

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Speaker 1: all over Europe, and she grew up speaking English with

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Speaker 1: an accent, which is kind of ironic considering she was

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Speaker 1: often thought to be the quintessential english woman. Um German

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Speaker 1: was really her first language. She also knew French and

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Speaker 1: Italian as a child, and learned a few other languages

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Speaker 1: later on. As we'll see, it wasn't really quite as

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Speaker 1: fun as it sounds, though, this life of childhood wandering,

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Speaker 1: but it really did make Freya resourceful. She didn't have

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Speaker 1: very much formal education, and she and her sister would

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Speaker 1: instead study with occasional governesses, pick up a few things,

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Speaker 1: and just read as much as they could. According to

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Speaker 1: Jacqueline McLean and Women of Adventure, she later said quote,

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Speaker 1: our wandering life made us precocious and pretty tough. But

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Speaker 1: when Freya was ten years old, her mother left her

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Speaker 1: father for a twenty three year old broke Italian count

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Speaker 1: and took the kids with her to northern Italy. Before

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Speaker 1: her mother's money was cut off, the count bought a

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Speaker 1: rug and basket factory, and the family managed to make

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Speaker 1: a meager living off of that. Then just before FRA's

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Speaker 1: thirteenth birthday. While visiting the factory, she got her hair

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Speaker 1: caught in some machinery. It pulled her up to the

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Speaker 1: ceiling and mangled her scalp and her right ear before

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Speaker 1: she could finally be freed, so horrible infections almost killed her,

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Speaker 1: but doctors in turn ultimately were able to save her

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Speaker 1: life with skin graphs that came from her thighs. But

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Speaker 1: the accident really made her quite self conscious. She would

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Speaker 1: dress her hair over the right side of her face,

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Speaker 1: and later she would wear large hats. You know we've

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Speaker 1: mentioned that already, But um it also gave her some

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Speaker 1: time to recover too, and some time to start exploring

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Speaker 1: new things. While she was recovering, she started to read

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Speaker 1: adventure stories and get really fixated on the idea of travel,

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Speaker 1: something um I guess she had grown up doing but

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Speaker 1: wasn't really doing by this point, just sort of stuck

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Speaker 1: in northern Italy, where she was pretty unhappy. Eventually, though,

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Speaker 1: her father, who was now living far off in Canada,

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Speaker 1: agreed to send her to college in London, where she

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Speaker 1: studied English literature and history. She wasn't there for long, though,

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Speaker 1: before World War One began and she had to return

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Speaker 1: home to Italy, and there she became a nurse during

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Speaker 1: the time that she was gone, though her younger sister, Vera,

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Speaker 1: who was just eighteen at the time, married her mother's

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Speaker 1: Italian count boyfriend. Kind of a strange situation there is, indeed,

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Speaker 1: according to Claudia roth pier Point in The New Yorker,

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Speaker 1: there's some disagreement between Stark's biographers about how this actually

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Speaker 1: played out. Some of them suggests that account for courted Freya,

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Speaker 1: or that he simply chose Vera instead, and that whatever

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Speaker 1: the case, they had a very happy life together with

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Speaker 1: four children, and this left Freya feeling either that she

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Speaker 1: had made the wrong choice or that she had been

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Speaker 1: passed over. Others suggests, though, that Vera had a horrible

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Speaker 1: life with the count, and that Freya was instead troubled

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Speaker 1: by her sister's unhappy situation. Still, I mean, I'll say

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Speaker 1: it again, just kind of a strange situation more than kind.

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Speaker 1: It's definitely odd to have your father stepfather become your

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Speaker 1: husband and brother you had known since you were ten.

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Speaker 1: But Freya had her own broken engagement to While she

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Speaker 1: was acting as a nurse in Italy, her fiance had

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Speaker 1: left her when she got typhoid. But after the war

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Speaker 1: was over, Freya and her mother lived in a house

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Speaker 1: on the Italian riviera and they were just barely scraping by.

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Speaker 1: They were very poor. Freya grew flowers so that she

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Speaker 1: could sell them and supplement their income. Again, she was isolated,

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Speaker 1: she was bored, and to get away from this really

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Speaker 1: claustrophobic life, she got into mountain climbing and started scaling

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Speaker 1: the Alps, and she started studying again, something I guess

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Speaker 1: she had sort of put aside for a while. While

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Speaker 1: she was nursing, a teacher of her suggested, well, why

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Speaker 1: don't you learn a new language. You know, she already

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Speaker 1: spoke English, German, French, Italian. Why don't you learn a

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Speaker 1: language that's a little bit outside of the ordinary. And

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Speaker 1: he suggested maybe Icelandic would be a cool one to learn.

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Speaker 1: But Freya had a smart hunch that there was potentially

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Speaker 1: more promise in learning Arabic. So after World War One,

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Speaker 1: the Ottoman Empire had been broken up and the British

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Speaker 1: and the French controlled much of the Middle East, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq,

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Speaker 1: Jordan's and Freya knew that large parts of the air

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Speaker 1: speaking world. We're starting to open up. Two travelers, archaeologists, cartographers,

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Speaker 1: and p B doing government work. And so she hoped

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Speaker 1: that knowing Arabic would get her interesting work and quote

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Speaker 1: lead me out into some sort of fairyland of my own.

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Speaker 1: Plus she had romanticized notions of Arabian nights from her

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Speaker 1: readings as a girl. Yeah, she was hoping it would

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Speaker 1: be some grand adventure in a way for her to

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Speaker 1: go somewhere new, someplace far away from where she was.

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Speaker 1: So she took her study very seriously. She saved you know,

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Speaker 1: we mentioned she was barely scraping by here, but she

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Speaker 1: saved her lessons at the London School of Oriental Studies

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Speaker 1: and added Persian to her repertoire too, as well as

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Speaker 1: improving her Arabic. But it wasn't until nineteen six, after

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Speaker 1: her sister Vera died from a miscarriage that Frey had

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Speaker 1: decided that it was time to put her skills into practice,

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Speaker 1: time to go for it and travel like she had

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Speaker 1: always wanted to. So she started off by taking a

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Speaker 1: cargo ship to Beirut, and she recognized that that was

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Speaker 1: a good starting place for her because it had a

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Speaker 1: strong French influence. It wouldn't be completely foreign. She could

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Speaker 1: work her way in, she could keep studying Arabic, and

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Speaker 1: she was really welcome when she came to town because, um,

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Speaker 1: she said that people thought she was their quote, neither

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Speaker 1: to improve nor to rob, just to learn stuff, just

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Speaker 1: to observe and really practice her language. By March of

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Speaker 1: now confident in her language skills, Freya traveled to Damascus.

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Speaker 1: According to McLean, this was kind of the first bubble

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Speaker 1: popping of that romantic Arabia idea that she had. She

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Speaker 1: found this city war torn, cold, full of fleas, and

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Speaker 1: herself sick with dysenterry. But she also proved her early

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Speaker 1: Traveler's Medal by not letting any of that stop her

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Speaker 1: from exploring ruins and wandering the city. Yeah, she really

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Speaker 1: got out there and did what she had hoped to do.

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Speaker 1: But of course she didn't get her eventual reputation as

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Speaker 1: a bold explorer for just powering through dysentery, you know,

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Speaker 1: getting out there, and it is admirable, But um, she

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Speaker 1: had to do more than just wander around an already

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Speaker 1: well known city. She got that reputation because she went

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Speaker 1: to places where she wasn't supposed to go in the

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Speaker 1: first place, and her first major expedition like this was

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Speaker 1: south of Damascus to the Druis tribe in a region

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Speaker 1: that had rebelled recently rebelled against French control and had

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Speaker 1: been suppressed by the French. And then the French had

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Speaker 1: actually placed the entire area under martial law and bar

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Speaker 1: travelers from entering, so she was definitely not supposed to

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Speaker 1: be visiting there. But Freya and a British friend slipped

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Speaker 1: at the border and dodged the French authorities as long

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Speaker 1: as they could. When they were finally caught, Freya and

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Speaker 1: her friend played dumb traveler lady. They were just kind

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Speaker 1: of like, oh, my goodness, are Thomas cook guide book?

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Speaker 1: Must have misdirected us? How did we get here? Shouldn't

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Speaker 1: be Yeah, I didn't know. That didn't quite work though.

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Speaker 1: The French authorities thought that they might be spies, and

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Speaker 1: so they were sent to the Army barracks, but Freya

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Speaker 1: managed to charm her way out of there. She uh

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Speaker 1: took part an Army Dinners horse rides. She even got

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Speaker 1: permission to keep traveling, and most importantly, she had drew

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Speaker 1: street cred. Now since she had been arrested by their enemies,

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Speaker 1: the French. She was cool with the Drews now So

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Speaker 1: Her next trip, which took place in nineteen nine, started

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Speaker 1: in Baghdad, which at the time was British controlled but

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Speaker 1: very diverse. It was filled with Arabs and Greeks, Turks, Jews, Armenians, Kurds, Persians,

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Speaker 1: and she really took advantage of that diversity too. She

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Speaker 1: upped her study of Persian. She began learning folklore. She

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Speaker 1: was very interested in history and literature and that type

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Speaker 1: of thing, and this improved Persian of hers prepared her

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Speaker 1: for the main goal of this trip, which was to

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Speaker 1: visit the El Boor's Mountains in modern Iran, which held

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Speaker 1: the ruined fortress of the Assassins. And Um. I think

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Speaker 1: I've heard the Assassins in conjunction with it's how we

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Speaker 1: have our word assassin or assassinate um, But I didn't

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Speaker 1: know too much about them, and I think they could

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Speaker 1: make a pretty cool podcast subject on their own. But

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Speaker 1: they were a murderous medieval sect that would do just

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Speaker 1: what you'd expect them to do infiltrate groups and then

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Speaker 1: assassinate somebody. So traveling in what became her signature style,

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Speaker 1: no servants, view guides, lots of medicine, lots of little presents,

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Speaker 1: and embossed letters of introduction. Start set out with mules.

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Speaker 1: The fortress had already been explored, but Stark updated maps,

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Speaker 1: she relocated a misplaced mountain, and she documented all the

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Speaker 1: people that she met along the way. She also popularized

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Speaker 1: the place writing the Valleys of the Assassins and other

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Speaker 1: Persian travels, which became a hit not just for the

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Speaker 1: main attraction, which of course was the assassins, but for

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Speaker 1: the other personal details that contained, like an account of

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Speaker 1: a poor woman offering Freya the only tomatoes from her garden,

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Speaker 1: but secretly slipping her son the leftover juice that came

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Speaker 1: out of slicing them. And I think this is a

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Speaker 1: good point to mention too, that Stark is really well

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Speaker 1: known for her depiction of women's lives. And according to

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Speaker 1: Roth Pierpont that New Yorker article we mentioned earlier, um

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Speaker 1: she'd often be the first European woman in an area.

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Speaker 1: So the first people who would be really interested in

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Speaker 1: her were of course the the local women. You know,

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Speaker 1: they were interested in seeing their first European lady, and

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Speaker 1: so she would make friends with them. Start talking with

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Speaker 1: them first, and learn about bridal customs and clothes and

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Speaker 1: jewelry and harems and kids and just day to day life,

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Speaker 1: and through them ultimately gain access to the men's world,

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Speaker 1: but pick up a lot about uh kind of an

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Speaker 1: unexplored aspect of life in the meantime. So after a

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Speaker 1: third two year trip, Stark began to be seen as

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Speaker 1: a Middle East expert. Back home, the Royal Geographic Society

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Speaker 1: honored her and began to help fund future trips of hers.

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Speaker 1: So in ninety four she decided her next trip would

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Speaker 1: be less about mapping and more about discovery. She really

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Speaker 1: wanted to find an ancient trading spot believed to be

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Speaker 1: the origin of the Frankinstance trade route and possibly the

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Speaker 1: capital of the Queen of Sheba. Pretty Much any foreign

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Speaker 1: explorer we should say here, um, pretty much any explore

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Speaker 1: in the Middle East at the time wanted to find

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Speaker 1: Sha Boa, which was believed to be buried. But the

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Speaker 1: area was a harsh, desert and contested ground between two

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Speaker 1: warring tribes, so it's pretty dangerous to attempt this, And

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Speaker 1: to make matters worse and even more difficult, Stark would

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Speaker 1: have to cross into independently controlled northern Yemen, where foreigners

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Speaker 1: were not welcome, and so she'd have to do it

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Speaker 1: in secret. So she went traveling with Bedouin guides and

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Speaker 1: um got you know, decent ways before she caught measles

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Speaker 1: from a child in a harem on a stop along

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Speaker 1: the way. She got pretty near to Chabla, but she

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Speaker 1: got thick again, this time with malaria, and then she

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00:14:52,720 --> 00:14:56,080
Speaker 1: made a bad mistake about mixing medications. She combined her

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Speaker 1: malaria medicine with her dysentery medicine, which caused major heart

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Speaker 1: problems and um she ultimately had to be evacuated by

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Speaker 1: the Royal Air Force, but while she was in the

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Speaker 1: hospital this mussage has been so disappointing. While she was

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Speaker 1: in the hospital, a German photographer found the fortress ruins.

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Speaker 1: She did later get credit from the guy who explored

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Speaker 1: them more fully, but she didn't get to see them

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Speaker 1: or discover them herself. Rather, when World War Two began,

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Speaker 1: Freya chose her English alliances over her Italian though her

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Speaker 1: home was in Italy and her nieces and nephews were

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Speaker 1: all Italian. She joined the Ministry of Information and was

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Speaker 1: posted to add In as the South Arabia expert. Her

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Speaker 1: job was basically to keep Yemen and later Cairo and

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Speaker 1: Baghdad pro British or at least neutral, so she essentially

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Speaker 1: became a pr woman, a propaganda woman. She'd battle Nazi

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Speaker 1: or fascist propaganda with pro British propaganda, trying to convince

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Speaker 1: people that the British could win the war, which was

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Speaker 1: something that was a little bit on the fence. In

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Speaker 1: the early years. She had also helped disseminate news, she'd

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Speaker 1: translate Reuter's reports for broadcast, and she'd even personally arranged

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00:16:07,680 --> 00:16:12,440
Speaker 1: propaganda exhibitions herself. In northern Yemen, for instance, she snuck

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Speaker 1: in a projector claiming that it was some sort of

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00:16:15,200 --> 00:16:19,840
Speaker 1: portable commode, and made friends with the minister there, or

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00:16:19,880 --> 00:16:22,840
Speaker 1: made friends with the minister's wife there. She would have

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00:16:23,040 --> 00:16:25,800
Speaker 1: tea with her, chat with her and Arabic to sort

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00:16:25,840 --> 00:16:30,479
Speaker 1: of get comfortable with everybody. Movies and recordings were forbidden

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Speaker 1: there for religious reasons, but Stark found a way around

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Speaker 1: that by describing the movies to the ladies of the Harem,

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00:16:37,520 --> 00:16:40,320
Speaker 1: and she must have done it enticingly enough that the

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00:16:40,400 --> 00:16:44,960
Speaker 1: ladies were eventually allowed to watch. They eventually pressured somebody

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00:16:45,000 --> 00:16:47,720
Speaker 1: to allow them to watch the movies, and soon enough

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00:16:47,760 --> 00:16:51,400
Speaker 1: the men were also watching these pro British propaganda films,

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Speaker 1: and uh Many credits Stark for at least partially being

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Speaker 1: responsible for keeping Yemen neutral during World War Two. In Cairo,

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00:17:08,160 --> 00:17:11,639
Speaker 1: she recruited members for an anti fascist pro democracy group

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Speaker 1: called Brotherhood of Freedom, and she had just gotten to

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Speaker 1: Baghdad to start a new chapter there when a pro

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00:17:17,720 --> 00:17:22,760
Speaker 1: Nazi coup took place in April. Most British allied foreigners

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00:17:22,800 --> 00:17:24,960
Speaker 1: tried to hunk her down at this point, but Stark

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00:17:25,040 --> 00:17:28,760
Speaker 1: just took a jount to Tehran and then remarkably came

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00:17:29,000 --> 00:17:31,879
Speaker 1: back to Baghdad because she was worried about all her

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00:17:31,920 --> 00:17:36,080
Speaker 1: embassy friends. She was arrested by frontier police, but managed

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00:17:36,119 --> 00:17:38,639
Speaker 1: to talk her way out of it, claiming that she

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Speaker 1: couldn't possibly stay without a lady's maid. And she kind

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00:17:41,560 --> 00:17:44,639
Speaker 1: of flattered the guard a little bit um And this

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00:17:44,840 --> 00:17:47,359
Speaker 1: was just the ladies made part of it was really

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00:17:47,760 --> 00:17:51,400
Speaker 1: it was opposite to her actual way of living. She's

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Speaker 1: so good at talking her way out of these situations,

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Speaker 1: even if it involves saying something completely counter to what

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Speaker 1: she really believed. So the guard did send her on

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Speaker 1: her way to Bagdad, where she slipped into the British

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00:18:04,840 --> 00:18:07,639
Speaker 1: embassy just as they were stand backing the doors for

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Speaker 1: a month long siege. So Frey spent the next month

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00:18:10,800 --> 00:18:13,960
Speaker 1: with three d and fifty other people inside that embassy.

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Speaker 1: Since the Royal Air Force Base had been closed by

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Speaker 1: the Iraqi Army, the British were attempting to uh shell

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00:18:20,840 --> 00:18:23,160
Speaker 1: the base try to reclaim it so they could get

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Speaker 1: their folks out, But despite sniper fire and summer heat

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00:18:27,320 --> 00:18:30,479
Speaker 1: and obviously close quarters in the embassy made people were

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00:18:30,480 --> 00:18:34,080
Speaker 1: sleeping on the lawns, Stark, who was after all by

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Speaker 1: this point kind of a British celebrity, really tried to

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00:18:36,960 --> 00:18:39,600
Speaker 1: keep morale up and keep folks entertained. There were already

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00:18:39,760 --> 00:18:42,240
Speaker 1: piano concerts and things that would be staged, but she

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00:18:42,320 --> 00:18:45,959
Speaker 1: gave a lecture about her travels. She made sure that

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00:18:46,040 --> 00:18:49,320
Speaker 1: the ladies were gonna have soap and face powder, even

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00:18:49,359 --> 00:18:52,760
Speaker 1: though in that request was granted, Even though one Iraqi

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00:18:52,800 --> 00:18:56,359
Speaker 1: policeman supposedly said he couldn't imagine why the harem inside

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00:18:56,720 --> 00:18:59,840
Speaker 1: would bother thinking about something like face powder, because they

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00:18:59,840 --> 00:19:02,679
Speaker 1: were all about to be murdered. Um when the siege

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00:19:02,680 --> 00:19:07,160
Speaker 1: finally did end. According to rough Pierrepont, Hitler was only

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00:19:07,200 --> 00:19:10,040
Speaker 1: able to commit two squadrons of planes because he had

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00:19:10,080 --> 00:19:12,240
Speaker 1: been in the process of sending these huge numbers of

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00:19:12,240 --> 00:19:14,920
Speaker 1: troops to the Soviet Union. So when the siege finally

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00:19:14,960 --> 00:19:20,120
Speaker 1: did end, Stark promptly headed out, but three new hats

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00:19:20,359 --> 00:19:23,760
Speaker 1: and um, just kind of a side note there too.

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00:19:23,880 --> 00:19:27,199
Speaker 1: She was really into not only hats but clothes. She

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00:19:27,400 --> 00:19:30,479
Speaker 1: apparently wrote, there are few sorrows through which a new

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00:19:30,560 --> 00:19:34,439
Speaker 1: dress or hat will not send a little gleam of hope. However, fugitive,

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00:19:34,920 --> 00:19:38,080
Speaker 1: I think that's kind of a surprising reminded me of

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00:19:38,160 --> 00:19:41,720
Speaker 1: Louise Boyd almost with her flowers she would wear in

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00:19:41,760 --> 00:19:45,600
Speaker 1: the Arctic on her Arctic expedition. Um that this lady,

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00:19:45,680 --> 00:19:49,720
Speaker 1: who obviously could rough it for a while, was still

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00:19:49,800 --> 00:19:52,800
Speaker 1: pretty interested in hats with clock patterns on them, and

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00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:56,439
Speaker 1: interesting clothes and that type of thing. Well, in she

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00:19:56,520 --> 00:19:58,240
Speaker 1: took those hats with her on the road when she

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Speaker 1: was sent on a tour of the US to try

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00:20:00,000 --> 00:20:03,520
Speaker 1: I had a influence American politicians to oppose the creation

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00:20:03,600 --> 00:20:06,840
Speaker 1: of a Jewish state in Palestine. While she was welcomed

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00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:09,520
Speaker 1: as a famous writer. Her speeches did not go over

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00:20:09,600 --> 00:20:13,280
Speaker 1: well at all, nor did her assertion that immigration required

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Speaker 1: Arab consent. She was really dismayed that many people considered

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00:20:17,280 --> 00:20:20,440
Speaker 1: her an anti Zionist and was horrified to be considered

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Speaker 1: anti Semitic. While she wrote a book during this period,

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00:20:23,359 --> 00:20:26,160
Speaker 1: it was her last on Arabia. Politics just turned out

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00:20:26,160 --> 00:20:29,080
Speaker 1: to be not really her thing. She preferred history instead,

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00:20:29,359 --> 00:20:32,320
Speaker 1: and she preferred just traveling to After the war, she

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00:20:32,800 --> 00:20:36,120
Speaker 1: moved back to Italy. She found that Fascist officers had

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Speaker 1: been living in her house, and she got married. This

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00:20:39,400 --> 00:20:42,159
Speaker 1: is a very odd interlude in her life. She married

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Speaker 1: a historian and diplomat who she had met through her

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Speaker 1: wartime work and who had she had known for a

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Speaker 1: few years. Unfortunately, he was known to be gay by

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00:20:51,880 --> 00:20:55,560
Speaker 1: pretty much everybody except for her, and the marriage was

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Speaker 1: not what she was anticipating. She had not been expecting

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Speaker 1: a marriage between friends, and the two separated pretty soon after.

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Speaker 1: Though she did continue calling herself Mrs Freya Stark, which

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Speaker 1: I think is an unusual little nod to her married state.

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Speaker 1: She didn't get divorced either. She must have really liked

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Speaker 1: to have that and Mrs title, but have her own

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00:21:17,640 --> 00:21:20,280
Speaker 1: name attached to it. She was made a Dame of

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Speaker 1: the British Empire at age seventy seven. Wrote until her

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00:21:23,720 --> 00:21:27,520
Speaker 1: death in nineteen at age one hundred, traveled until she

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Speaker 1: was ninety three, visited much of Iran, retracing the route

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Speaker 1: of Alexander the Great's army, going to remote spots in

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Speaker 1: Afghanistan in her seventies and uh In her eighties and nineties,

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00:21:38,680 --> 00:21:42,360
Speaker 1: she stuck mostly to Europe, escorting her many god children

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00:21:42,359 --> 00:21:44,359
Speaker 1: on travels as well, so she sort of passed on

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Speaker 1: the travel bug in a way. It sounds like she

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00:21:46,160 --> 00:21:48,720
Speaker 1: did some of her god children to have even written

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00:21:48,760 --> 00:21:51,400
Speaker 1: about her accounts, And of course later in life too,

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00:21:51,440 --> 00:21:54,320
Speaker 1: she was doing a lot of photography and was considered

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00:21:54,359 --> 00:22:00,359
Speaker 1: pretty great at documenting places in an interesting, interestingly architectural way.

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Speaker 1: For such a lifelong traveler, though, it's maybe not too

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Speaker 1: surprising that she even saw her own death as as

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00:22:06,560 --> 00:22:09,600
Speaker 1: a type of journey. She told a friend quote, waiting

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00:22:09,640 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 1: for death, my dear, is very much like being in

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Speaker 1: an old fashioned steam train setting out on a journey.

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Speaker 1: Her story and her fame are more remarkable too, and

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Speaker 1: you consider that she wasn't a great explorer, as in

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00:22:21,880 --> 00:22:25,760
Speaker 1: she didn't make many important discoveries per se. Her bigger

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00:22:25,760 --> 00:22:30,600
Speaker 1: contribution was really her ability to observe and to document change,

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00:22:30,800 --> 00:22:34,440
Speaker 1: you know, paved roads, new states, things like that, as

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Speaker 1: well as traditions of all classes, men and men and women.

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Speaker 1: And her books are filled with incredibly descriptive passages. And

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00:22:42,480 --> 00:22:44,919
Speaker 1: she could convince people to open up to her, and

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00:22:44,960 --> 00:22:48,160
Speaker 1: that was a real talent, partly because she spoke their language,

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Speaker 1: and many of the people she met on her travels

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00:22:50,440 --> 00:22:53,040
Speaker 1: became lifelong friends of hers too. But I think what

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00:22:53,200 --> 00:22:56,399
Speaker 1: might be the most notable thing about Frese Stark's life

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00:22:56,440 --> 00:23:00,199
Speaker 1: was her almost complete disregard for danger. She just threw lea,

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00:23:00,200 --> 00:23:03,000
Speaker 1: didn't care. She could almost always get out of things.

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00:23:03,240 --> 00:23:05,480
Speaker 1: I think a great illustration of this was when she

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00:23:05,600 --> 00:23:10,080
Speaker 1: was exploring ancient graves in what is today Iran and

404
00:23:10,240 --> 00:23:13,199
Speaker 1: she crossed yet another border illegally seems to be a

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00:23:13,200 --> 00:23:16,760
Speaker 1: common theme here and was stopped by the police. When

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00:23:16,760 --> 00:23:19,320
Speaker 1: she was delivered by the police to the governor, he

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00:23:19,480 --> 00:23:22,960
Speaker 1: was more amazed than angry because she was alive, and

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00:23:23,000 --> 00:23:25,600
Speaker 1: she had been in this area that was riddled with bandits,

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00:23:25,680 --> 00:23:28,360
Speaker 1: and in fact, she later learned that murders had been

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Speaker 1: stalking her right before she was captured by the police.

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Speaker 1: And I think that's a such a strange example because

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Speaker 1: we've seen all these ones where she talks her way out,

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Speaker 1: but how many near misses were there too? That's true.

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Speaker 1: It's interesting too that she seems to have really like

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00:23:44,400 --> 00:23:48,800
Speaker 1: embraced this aspect of her personality of the thirst, and

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00:23:48,840 --> 00:23:51,600
Speaker 1: it's really indicative, I think in this quote of hers

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Speaker 1: where she said I wanted space, distance, history, and danger.

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Speaker 1: So there you go. Thank you so much for joining

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Speaker 1: us on this Saturday. If you have heard an email

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00:24:07,480 --> 00:24:09,880
Speaker 1: address or a Facebook you are l or something similar

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00:24:10,000 --> 00:24:12,439
Speaker 1: over the course of today's episode, since it is from

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00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:15,080
Speaker 1: the archive that might be out of date. Now, you

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00:24:15,119 --> 00:24:18,280
Speaker 1: can email us at history podcast at how stuff Works

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00:24:18,320 --> 00:24:20,399
Speaker 1: dot com, and you can find us all over social

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Speaker 1: media at missed in History and you can subscribe to

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00:24:23,640 --> 00:24:26,960
Speaker 1: our show on Apple podcasts, Google podcast, the I heart

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Speaker 1: You Missed in History Class is a production of I

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Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcasts,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. The National

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Speaker 1: Park system is home to some of the most beautiful

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Speaker 1: land and wildlife you are ever going to see, and

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Speaker 1: they belong to everyone, including you. I'm Bred and I'm

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Speaker 1: Matt and on our show Parkway India, we're bringing you

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Speaker 1: on the road with us as we explore the wonders

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Speaker 1: of the Everglades, Petrified Forest, yellow Stone and many more.

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Speaker 1: Join us as we go beyond your typical sightseeing guides

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Speaker 1: for conversations about ecology, climate change, life on the road,

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Speaker 1: and of course, the fun you can have as we

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Speaker 1: explore the culture in and around the parks. All from

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Speaker 1: the perspective of two former city dwellers who bought in

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Speaker 1: r V and live on the road full time, just

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Speaker 1: the two of us and our dog Fin. Basically, South

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Speaker 1: Florida is the perfect place to go shop for Gucci

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Speaker 1: bags and then kayak with croc Ailes. That classic one

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Speaker 1: two punch's quite comfortable if you're wearing like a light

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Speaker 1: jacket or a sweater like it's actually also really comfortable

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Speaker 1: if you're wearing a bath suit or whatever that's bandex

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Speaker 1: thing that Robin wears. You know, Oh yes, this is

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Speaker 1: perfect superhero spandex climate. You have this one aspect of

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Speaker 1: our v living that we've really come to an understanding

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Speaker 1: and agreement to is that spending quality time alone is

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Speaker 1: also super important. Yeah. I feel like we relaxed and

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Speaker 1: recharge in different ways. I wish I could relax. I

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Speaker 1: wish I was capable of just like chilling. No um

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Speaker 1: docksins plus kayaks they don't really go well together, but

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Speaker 1: it would be cute to see him in a life est.

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Speaker 1: The terrain is mostly dry sand and rocks, but it's

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Speaker 1: all dotted with small greenery like these spiky looking Mescow plants.

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Speaker 1: I love me some my scale. That made things worse

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Speaker 1: because while I was out there suffering, it just made

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Speaker 1: me thirsty for Mescow cocktails. If you want to refreshing,

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Speaker 1: relatable look at the outdoors, listen to park Landia coming

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Speaker 1: August seven, to Apple podcast, the I Heart Radio app,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts. You don't have to

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Speaker 1: be an expert camper to enjoy going outside