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By: Susanne Pacher, Fri Dec 9th, 2005 07:47:48 PM

3. How do you manage to combine a busy law practice with your work as a dental surgeon?

I find that achieving balance is not as difficult to manage as one would guess. You have to know your limitations and priorities. My priorities have always been clear: I wanted to have a very strong family life and an equally fulfilling professional life. In law I am fortunate that I virtually only take on the cases that interest me. In dentistry it's a similar sort of thing - if something is beyond my capabilities or outside of my area of interest I refer it out to other specialists. Similarly, I spend a lot of my time with my little one. At the moment, she usually gets up around 5:30-6am and is in a good mood right away. Since I have the morning shift with her, I have to quickly buckle up and start smiling back at her. These hours are precious and more times than not, I seem to always learn a little bit from her every single day.

Essentially I eliminate the extraneous things of the day and somehow everything falls in place. I have to also say that I have a very supportive wife who is very organized and keeps things in check. My philosophy is "Just do it". If you like what you do, if you like your life and want to maximize the finite time we all have on Earth, then you do what's important to you. Even during law school I practiced about 20 to 25 hours of dentistry a week, and I missed out on going to the pub on every Thursday night. I also didn't just hang around and have coffee during the day waiting for the next class to start. I tried to maximize.

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In general, if people really need to do something they'll do it. It's the same with friendships - you make time for the people that are really important to you.

4. Please tell us a bit about your travel experience in general.

Someone I know and respect said recently: "life is made up of experiences. If I have to measure the quality of my life, I look to experiences that I can remember, that have moved me." Travel is one of those things. Travel is one of those pillars in life, like marriage or births or deaths or other major events, that has the ability to move humans.

I often, but not always of course, pick places off the beaten path since I enjoy seeing alternative places. Travel for me has to have some level of profoundness in general. It needs to be something that is moving. It's the closest thing that we as adults can do to bring us back to childhood. When you travel, you look at life almost with the curiosity of a little child, you look at street signs, light posts, the way people act. There is a freshness about traveling, it's childlike. When I observe my little girl I notice that she is so curious and playful. Travel brings us to that level of openness. It's very refreshing, liberating and reviving.

5. You have also volunteered in countries such as Canada, India, Malawi and Zambia. Please tell us more about these experiences.

I have practiced volunteer dentistry in hospitals in India. I have also helped out with such far out tasks as applying bug repellent on trees in Zambia, visited hospitals in Zambia and Malawi, and even have done dental work in Canada for troubled youth.

Volunteering in general is something where you always get more than what you put in. That's a fact. A few years ago I went to India, and it wasn't at the happiest time in my life. However, I feel like just when you have nothing left in your life, when you are empty, and then at that point when you decide to give more, you start to fill up. This is a very valuable lesson about volunteering in general. It is good for the soul. More than you know!

6. You have also participated in racial equity and leadership initiatives in South Africa, Poland and Germany. Please tell us more about these experiences.

These initiatives were actually started by my wife. She is very vocal proponent of racial equity in the Toronto School Board where she is a vice-principal now. She always had an inherent notion of equity, even before it became politically correct. She always seemed to be on the cutting edge.

She always brought home articles written by educators or other commentators about racial equity. This conveyed to me a little twist on how to see things. A few years ago she had an opportunity with a Catholic education organization to go to South Africa. Since she's a big friend of animals, and elephants in particular, she said that's a good enough reason to go. She just wanted to go for a few weeks. Once I started reading the outline, I decided that I was coming too. Whether she liked it or not!

30 of us went down and we got to speak with community leaders, went to leadership meetings, spoke with interesting people who helped South Africa come out of apartheid. We visited a lot of areas and it was an eye-opening venture. The experience was very moving, particularly since the free elections were in 1993.

The group leader that took us to South Africa was already thinking of studying the holocaust in Poland and Germany. I had already been to Israel earlier and since the tour was organized on a very high level, I wanted to come along. I was pulled into this by people that I respect and admire. That's how everything got started.

As the saying goes, 'if you hang around with eagles then you will soar, but if you hang around with turkeys.....'

About the author: Susanne Pacher is the publisher of http://www.travelandtransitions.com. It deals with travel to foreign countries and is chock full of advice, tips, real life travel experiences, interviews with travellers, insights, cross-cultural issues, and many other features. Participate in our travel story contest http://www.travelandtransitions.com/contests.htm and win great prizes, a fabulous cruise to the Amazon. Life is a Journey - Explore New Horizons.