Globe-trotting Las Vegan makes a life of exploring new worlds

Thursday, June 1, 2000 | 8:36 a.m.

Las Vegas author Jeffrey Kottler is living the life of Indiana Jones, the fictional motion picture hero with a split personality who spends part of his life as a meek professor and the other as a death-defying adventurer.

Kottler is a former UNLV professor, a writer, a lecturer and a man who likes nothing better than a good adventure.

"I'm hungry for new experiences," the 49-year-old globe-trotter said. "I never traveled anywhere as a kid. Seven or eight years ago a dean at UNLV arranged for nine faculty members to go to Singapore for eight weeks. That was the turning point for me. Ever since then I have been on the road."

He returned May 17 to Las Vegas from a five-month adventure in Iceland, where on one occasion he witnessed the eruption of a volcano and on another was trapped for four days in an unheated shed on a glacier during a snow storm.

Kottler, never one to waste time, also wrote two books while he was in Iceland, began a third one, taught two courses in counseling at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik (the nation's capital), was a consultant for primary and secondary schools in the region and conducted workshops for teachers in Greenland and the Faroe Islands, as well as Iceland.

He is not an ordinary tourist. In 1977 he received a doctorate degree in counseling psychology from the University of Virginia and lectures on the subject all over the world. He has written 40 books on psychology, education and other topics for counselors, teachers and students, as well the general public.

In 1999 he co-authored a book with UNLV student Jason Moss entitled "The Last Victim: A True-Life Journey into the Mind of the Serial Killer," (Warner Books), which made the New York Times' best-seller list.

Kottler has worked as a teacher, counselor, therapist and researcher in a variety of settings including hospitals, mental health centers, schools, crisis centers, clinics, universities, corporations and private practice.

He taught at UNLV for seven years, leaving in 1997 to write full time and teach and lecture part time.

University spokesman Tom Flagg had Kottler as an advisor. "I enjoyed him very much," Flagg said. "He relates well to students. His personal style sets him apart. He is very open, warm and friendly."

For the past three years Kottler has taught at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, flying there from Las Vegas twice each semester for an intensive course in counseling that lasts 10 days, rather than being spread out over months.

"I like living in Las Vegas and I'm not willing to leave it (permanently)," Kottler said.

Nan Hudson, with the college of education at Texas Tech, described Kottler as one of the most popular professors with students and instructors. "He is so diversified and knowledgeable. We were pleased that he was here," Hudson said.

Kottler is wrapping up his stint in Texas and this fall will teach similar intensive classes in Australia and Hong Kong for three years, traveling to that part of the world three times a year for a month's stay. He will teach courses for two weeks at a time in each locale and continue his quest for adventure.

"I may have the longest commute in the world," Kottler said..

Mission improbable

Kottler's adventures sometimes begin with the receipt of an electronic message although, as a rule, the request for his services is not a mission impossible, just a mission difficult or a mission exciting.

As his reputation as an author and lecturer has grown and the number of invitations to speak has increased, Kottler has become more selective about the ones he accepts.

"Every week I check my e-mail and there are invitations to go somewhere," he said. "I don't have that much time so I have to be selective about where I go."

He conducts workshops and seminars for teachers, educational administrators, therapists, professional organizations and other groups. At least one weekend each month he lectures somewhere in this country. His international tours may last weeks at a time.

Occasionally his wife, Ellen, a curriculum specialist with the Clark County School District, joins him. "But she's more of a home person," Kottler said.

Kottler's trip to Iceland was the result of a Fulbright Scholarship, a federal educational and cultural exchange program that was created in 1946. He had a similar grant about 20 years ago to teach counseling in Peru and said he may be the only person to have received two of the coveted scholarships.

"I'm not looking for anything in particular (when I travel)," he said. "I just like going to new places and doing new things and seeing new parts of the world.

"I like adventure and doing something good for people. Frankly I don't care where I go as long as I haven't been there before. ... I've lived in some unusual places -- New Zealand, Australia, Singapore. I get so many invitations from all over the world to speak, if they will set up some sort of an adventure for me I may go. I support myself now as a writer so I'm looking for novel experiences."

Icelandic winter

He had several of those experiences during his stay in Iceland, which began in early January. One adventure almost cost him his life.

Kottler and two associates were going to spend 48 hours on the largest glacier cap in Europe to take pictures for "Icelandic Winter," his book of photographs to be released in a few months. An unexpected snow storm forced them to stay in a bare shed on the mountain of ice for 4 1/2 days. The tiny shack was used by scientists in summer months.

"We couldn't leave the hut. It was so cold that a couple of cans of beer we had froze," Kottler said. "We sang songs, took turns leading aerobic classes, jogged in place to stay warm."

The party had brought only enough food for two days. They were down to eating peanut butter and hard pasta when the weather broke and they were able to leave.

Kottler said that some of the best stories, the most memorable ones, are the results of bad experiences. "The four days in the hut were the worst four days in my life," he said.

But a second memorable experience in Iceland was a good one. Kottler went to the Mt. Helka volcano to take more pictures for his book. He happened to be there when it erupted for the first time in nine years. Geologists had predicted the eruption one hour before it occurred.

"It was the first time in history they have been able to predict a volcanic eruption and they did it within a couple of minutes of when it actually happened," he said. "I was the only still photographer there to capture it on film."

Kottler goes on his trips with an open mind, ready for "whatever life offers."

He ended up writing one book in Iceland he could never have planned for. On his first day there he met a man who spent 10 years as a butler for author Danielle Steel in San Francisco.

One of the butler's main jobs was to take care of Steel's prized potbellied Vietnamese pig named Coco. Kottler wrote a book he entitled "The Pig's Butler," which will be released in Iceland later this year.

Kottler doesn't know when he will complete the third book that will come out of the journey to Iceland. While there he made a side trip to nearby Greenland, visiting a remote fishing village where two years ago a 6-year-old girl was raped and murdered. He said the villagers knew who committed the crime but wouldn't say anything.

"What intrigued me about the case was not the murder and rape but the way the villagers reacted to it, which is they didn't react at all. When the police finally caught the guy who did it they exiled him. That was all," Kottler said.

During his Icelandic sojourn he spent several days at another fishing village where the population was suffering from a lingering case of depression brought about by a snow avalanche five years earlier that killed dozens of people.

"An avalanche came down at 4 in the morning," Kottler said. "Everyone in the village lost someone. They had to dig out their children, their parents. Five years later they were still pretty traumatized. They weren't rebuilding their village, nobody had gardens, nobody had repainted their house. When asked why, they said, 'What's the point?' "

Kottler went to the village school and talked to the children. He held a community meeting with the adults in a local pub. "We brainstormed about what they could do," he said. "We talked about why they weren't talking about it anymore. They pretended it didn't happen."

After the session he said the villagers were upbeat. "But the hard thing with an intervention is, does the effect last overtime?" Kottler said.

On the road again

The author has had enough unusual experiences to satisfy most people for a lifetime, but he has no interest in slowing down.

"I once spent six weeks on a lecture tour in Australia, visiting nine cities from Perth to Tasmania. In each of the cities I stayed in a local home and did a workshop for local counselors and therapists," he said. "The most interesting part of that trip was at Alice Springs, where I had a workshop with radical lesbians."

He spent a couple of weeks on a lecture tour in the Philippines and two months on tour in New Zealand.

"I get in trouble constantly," Kottler said. "In New Zealand I went hiking alone (one winter) and got hyopthermia (subnormal body temperature). I was just a few minutes from death when somebody found my body. The person who found me unconscious happened to be an expert in hypothermia. He had been working in Antarctica."

When Kottler woke up he was in a native hut surrounded by naked bodies. "The man (and his associates) dragged my body back and (had taken) off their clothes to transfer their body heat to me," he said.

But for the upcoming teaching positions in Australia and Hong Kong the modern- day Marco Polo doesn't know where his next adventure will take him and it doesn't really matter.

"Every place is the same," he said. "I mean, anyplace I haven't been is just as good as any other place. If what I'm after are new experiences and stimulation, it doesn't make any difference. Anywhere I haven't been I'm game to go."

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