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Meanwhile, Kinczel is fulfilling his mission-arranging trips that have resulted in hundreds of lifelong friendships, and even the odd marriage. In the unusual case of a personality clash between host and guest, the local AIH organizer will come to the rescue with different arrangements. 'Maybe ten times out of 10,000 there's a real problem,' Kinczel says. 'Sometimes a new family has no idea what to do, and they do the worst possible thing. In that case, we give a refund.'

But usually expectations are exceeded-and clients, like Florida-based Huldah and Dick Bredenberg, get hooked. Heading to Moscow, the couple hoped that a homestay might offer them a more authentic travel experience. 'We didn't want to just see the sights,' Dick notes. 'We wanted to know what it was like during the war. What the schools were like.' They arrived as strangers to their Moscow host, but bonded quickly and got a few perks that weren't being handed out at the tourist bureau. The couple was eager to see a war heroes' cemetery that was off-limits to Americans at the time, so their host walked them right past the guards, heads down, while she chatted in Russian. 'When you get to know a person like that,' Dick says, 'it changes your travel experience. You're not only going to see what locals do, or where they go. You participate in their lives.'

Jim Koningisor, a Boston consultant, made the same discovery with his wife and four kids during a string of Native American homestays in the American Southwest. After deciding to avoid the usual 'drive-by vacation,' the family stayed with Sioux, Navajo and Hopi families on their reservations. They learned how to set up a tepee (and sleep in it). They heard the story of Wounded Knee-from a man who'd been there. Later, Koningisor's 12-year-old daughter gave the trip rave reviews. 'I saw and learned more than I ever had before,' she wrote, 'even if that meant eating buffalo guts.' Which it did.

The trip was arranged by anthropologist Robert Vetter, who runs Journeys Into American Indian Territory. He's recently added homestays to his cultural tour menu. 'The objectives of people traveling are changing,' notes Vetter. 'They used to go to be in a different place. Now that they've been all around, the objective is to get a sense of culture and the people who live there. There's a richness of experience when you've been accepted into the heart of the people who live there and shared meals and daily life.'

Going into a stranger's home, of course, does require education, openmindedness and, yes, some guts-on both sides. Unlike passive, window-seat modes of travel, homestays are intrinsically dynamic and immediate experiences. A cultural exchange will always be taking place between strangers sharing varied experiences-broadening two horizons in the process.

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