A man's home, they say, is his castle. This woman's home is her travel museum, a tribute to her insatiable wanderlust, a jaw-dropping, eye-dazzling conglomeration of artifacts and photos chronicling trips to 150 countries. Now she's busy with "victory laps," encore visits to the places she loves the most.
Masks, carvings, puppets, ceramics and other exotic souvenirs cover every wall, all nooks, every cranny, floors, beds and tabletops. The overflow spills into a "miscellaneous holding room."
Hundreds of Disney collectibles and stuffed animals of all description reflect her girlish, young-at-heart outlook on life.
And that pink flamingo bathroom? Well, she calls it "a house with a sense of humor."
A retired business teacher who never married (she can't stay put long enough for that), Donna Shaver yearned for far-off places even as a tyke. In 1969, she finally took her first trip to Europe. She hasn't stopped gallivanting since.
Travel tales spew from her like an erupting volcano. Escaping a charging elephant. The serenity of a Buddhist temple. The sad, robotic people of North Korea. Stories galore.
Her father urged her to write a book. No way, she said. "Too much information." And besides, at 72, she's still gathering material.
"I grew up on the West Side on Sixth Avenue. My father worked at DuPont. My mom stayed home with me until I went to school then became a cook at Tiskelwah and then a secretary and moved up to the central office.
"I got it in my head when I was a child that I wanted to go to Europe. People who lived on Sixth Avenue didn't go to Europe. My dad thought I would be a professional student because I loved school so much and was a good student. My mom thought I would be a good teacher, but I didn't like the other side of the desk. I wanted to be a student.
"I went on to college not knowing what I wanted to be. I started as an art major but didn't have enough talent. I took a business class and ended up as a business major. I graduated from Morris Harvey, then Marshall.
"I was good at math and accounting, so I got a job with the Department of Welfare as a statistician. After I'd worked about 10 months, a friend who was a teacher asked me to take a trip over the summer to Miami and a cruise to the Bahamas. About a month before we were to go, my supervisor canceled my vacation because he wanted me to do something. I wasn't going to put up with that. My mother was right all along. I should be a teacher.
"I worked another year and picked up courses at Morris Harvey. I quit the job after two years to do my student-teaching. I was also doing graduate work at Marshall. I did that for another year and a half and loved it. I mean, I liked school.
"My mother heard about this opening at South Charleston High in the middle of the year and wanted me to try for it. I went for the interview to please my mother. I didn't really want to work. I wanted to play some more and I had nine hours to go on my masters. I did all I could not to get the job. But he was desperate. He asked me to stay just through the year. I stayed 30 years. I ended up liking it.
"Some of the teachers thought I was a little nuts. Well, I am a little nuts. I was a business teacher, but I was an offbeat business teacher. I played the kazoo for kids on their birthdays. Students have told me they didn't know they could learn and laugh at the same time until they had me for a teacher. Part of my brain is very business-centered, but I have this expressive child-like side, and it comes out to this day.
"In the summer of '68, I finished my master's in Huntington and started my first full year of teaching. I thought, now I am going to Europe. A professor from WVU took a group every year. This time, he only had five signed up and didn't know if they would let him make the trip. But the travel agency let us go.
"We rode the trains instead of buses, six of us. We were in Europe for 10 weeks. I left the day after school was out in summer of '69 and got back day before school started. I was dazzled, thrilled.
We went to every country on the continent of Europe and rented a minivan and went all over Greece. I was hooked. It was my dream. I would teach and travel in the summer.
"The next summer I fell in love with Hawaii. The next three summers a teacher friend and I went back to Europe and did the Euro pass thing because I knew how to do it. In '73, I took my first trip to Asia on a National Education Association tour. I went wild over there, too. I love the different cultures, the people. I thought maybe I was an Asian in another life.
"I love the scenery, the architecture, the ruins, but most of all, I love the people and how religion plays a part in the culture. I love Buddhism. My father always said I should write a book, but it's too much information. But I have a title: "If I Weren't a Baptist, I'd Be a Buddhist." I'm fascinated with it -- the monks, the nuns and temples, the incense and the chanting.
"One time I was in Borneo in a Buddhist temple and here came a monk, and he had this incense he was swinging, and these candles were lit, and it was raining, and I thought, 'This is the most peaceful place I've ever been in my life.'
"I was in Burma in May. They have a very oppressive government, but it has lightened up in allowing people to visit, and I got another big dose of Buddhism.
"It's still 150 countries. Now I'm doing victory laps, going back to favorite places. I've been to Hong Kong seven times. I've been to North Korea. No victory lap to North Korea. I didn't mean to go there. On 9/11, I was leaving for a trip back to Nepal. I was going out the front door when the phone rang, and my cousin said, 'You aren't going anywhere today. Turn on your television.' I saw the second plane hit the World Trade Center.
"For five days, the skies were closed, and the trip was not going to happen.
I wanted to do Bhutan during the festival. This couple from San Diego who plan these unusual trips, I told them I wanted to go to the festival in September. She put me down as interested in Bhutan next September. She said the trip across Nepal wasn't going to happen again. In a few months, they called and said they had a couple from Colorado who wanted to go to Bhutan but they also wanted to go to North Korea. She said she could put it together for the three of us. So I went.
"The North Korean people were robotic. They were so sad. They looked like they were starving. They wouldn't let us take any pictures. At one point, we were on a little bus going by a dried-up cornfield and right in the middle of the field was a soldier standing at attention with his gun beside a little hut. What was he guarding?
"People always ask about my favorite place. It's the last place I've been. I'm still so thrilled with Burma from May. Let me tell you the Burma story. In '95, I was in northwest Thailand on one of my wild, independent trips. I hired a guide to take me to see some hill tribes. He asked if I wanted to see the long-necked women. I said, 'Aren't they in Burma. We can't go to Burma.' He said, 'If you want to see them, we will go.'
"On the way, we met two elephants. We went through a dry creek bed and over this hill, and we were in a village of long-necked women in Burma. Then we went to the village of the big-eared women. After the fact, I thought, if we'd gotten caught, I would still be in a Burmese prison. So when I went back 20 years later, I went with a visa and stayed 18 days.
"Next, I'm going on a victory lap to South Africa. I've been on five safaris. I thought five safaris was enough. But I'm going again. You're in a vehicle and all these animals are free. It's the most wonderful feeling. I've had some close calls with animals in Africa. I was asleep in a tent camp in 2010. I and I felt a pressure from outside the tent. From the sounds, I knew it was a cape buffalo, one of the most dangerous animals in South Africa. I had a whistle. They said to blow the whistle if you felt you were in danger. I thought his horn would gore the tent and he'd be in the tent with me. I was reaching for the whistle and he moved on. I nearly passed out from relief.
"When I came out the next day, I saw the paw prints of a lion who had passed by that night. I've been in a vehicle with elephants trumpeting and their ears flapping, which means they are coming for you. One time we couldn't get the engine started, and here came the elephant. He barely got it started and it knocked us all to the floor.
"I've had lots of adventures. I am constantly amazed. When I come back to this house, it's like I'm in culture shock. I'm still living my dream, 46 years since I took that initial trip to Europe.
I inherited this house from my parents. I'm a shopper as you can see. It's a house with a sense of humor. What do you call it? Eclectic? I travel and I'm a kid at heart, so this is what you get.
"I'm also a Disney fanatic. I go to Disney World every year. I'm just a kid. I grew taller, but I never grew up. One day my cousin and I were at Cornucopia. She found a card that said, 'If you didn't know how old you were, how old would you be?' She said she would be 32. I said I would be 7. You have to get old chronologically, but you can still be a child.
"I never married. I met some very interesting men, especially in my travels. I had a couple of long-term relationships, but I think I have a commitment phobia. I would think, 'I've got this life I love. Do I want to trade it for what I don't know is going to happen?' The answer was always no. It was the right thing. I wouldn't trade what I've had for what I might have had."
Reach Sandy Wells at 304-342-5027 or sandyw@wvgazette.com.