There Buchman was asked to address the student body of Robert College. One of the audience later described the occasion: 'Before him were seated, besides most of the faculty, about seven hundred hard-boiled, cynical students of many ages and nationalities. There were no oratorical tricks, no attempt to make an impression. On the contrary, one could feel his intense earnestness. He told us what happened to a real boy, with real problems, when God came into his life. At the end he asked us all to repeat that boy's prayer: 'Oh God, manage me because I cannot manage myself.' It went straight to the heart of the matter.'5

The vitality of the group left behind in Constantinople was typical of those left at other places on the journey. The same student, George Moissides - then a minister in Canterbury, Connecticut - described later how he and his friends, Gregory Vlastos, Homer Kalcas, Dashem Hussein Shams-Davari and Rashid Alajaji, were affected. 'What a total change that one weekend fifty years ago brought to my personal life and to that of so many of my friends!' commented Moissides.6 Most kept in touch with Buchman for many years, some till his death. Vlastos became Professor of Philosophy at Princeton, Kalcas taught in Turkey, and Shams-Davari managed the Persian Oil Company at Ahwaz, where he translated films and books about Buchman's work into Farsi.

The party sailed for Alexandria soon after the anniversary of the end of the 1914-18 war. Wade recalls that, as they passed through the Dardanelles, Buchman walked towards the stern of the ship, took off his hat, threw his Armistice Day poppy over the side and quietly spoke some lines of Rupert Brooke, who had died near there.

In Cairo they were joined by Sherwood Day and Van Dusen Rickert, an Oriental languages graduate from Princeton. Buchman was delighted to have Day with him again. Buchman said to the younger men, 'Sherry is dependable twenty-four hours in the day. It will be great when the rest of you get to that point. Sherry never maladapts.' In Cairo too, Shoemaker received a long-expected invitation to become the Rector of Calvary Church in Gramercy Park, New York, to which he replied, 'Judgement unfavourable now ... writing.'7

By the time the party reached Palestine, the atmosphere had become distinctly strained. Individually, they were devout enough. There were, Wade recalled, no regulated observances but all the group normally kept a time of private prayer and meditation and shared such thoughts as they then had with their room-mates. They were also able to help many of the people they met. Nevertheless, as the journey proceeded, strains and irritations developed to the point where Buchman noted, 'You can be in the Holy Land and Hell at the same time.'

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