Destination: Asia
The Titanic Awards: 10 Worst National Cuisines
by Doug Lansky | 05.05.10 | 10:29 AM ET
More than 2,000 travelers from 80 countries voted in the Titanic Awards survey. Here are the unlucky winners.
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Yahoo! BuzzYosemite Through the Eyes of a Chinese Artist
by Jim Benning | 05.04.10 | 12:31 PM ET
Lovely piece in The Smart Set about Chinese artist Xie Zhiliu’s renderings of Yosemite National Park, which are now part of an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Xie visited Yosemite in 1994, a few years before his death.
There, he produced a series of paintings that are a testimonial to cognitive dissonance. He paints the mountains and trees of Yosemite, but they look vaguely Chinese. The vegetation looks sparse, like in the drawings that accompany Chinese calligraphy. The stones of Yosemite rise up with the stalagmite abruptness we expect of Chinese art.
Cognitive dissonance at work on a canvas can be a beautiful thing. I’m reminded of these impressionistic West-meets-East paintings by Van Gogh.
Shanghai Launches its own Chinglish Crackdown
by Eva Holland | 05.04.10 | 11:40 AM ET
In the lead-up to the 2008 Beijing Games, we noted the government’s efforts to clean up the city’s more creative English signage. A couple of years later, Shanghai is ready to follow suit: 10,000 signs—and counting—have been tidied up by the Shanghai Commission for the Management of Language. Says one of the campaign’s leading proponents: “The purpose of signage is to be useful, not to be amusing.”
Confessions of a White Woman in India
by Michael Yessis | 05.03.10 | 2:22 PM ET
Sharell Cook lives in Mumbai and is married to an Indian man. She shares the raw details of her life and her travels in India in an essay in Open.
How foreigners are regarded in India is a curious matter. Our white skin, and the belief that we have power and money, unwittingly elevates us to the top of the social hierarchy. Doors will open for me in India, while at the same time remaining closed for many Indians. Shop assistants will beckon for my attention,while ignoring other potential customers. Everyone wants to have a foreigner for a friend. I’ve lost count of how many times my neighbours have knocked on my door, asking me to meet every relative who visits them. They’re not interested in my husband, though.
World Travel Watch: Strikes in Greece, Ongoing Protests in Thailand and More
by Larry Habegger | 04.28.10 | 10:38 AM ET
Larry Habegger rounds up global travel news
A Linglei’s Life in China
by Eva Holland | 04.26.10 | 12:08 PM ET
The Millions has a compelling essay about a Chinese-American novelist’s life as a linglei —a “different species”—in Beijing and Shanghai. Deanna Fei writes:
I’d moved to Beijing for a year of postgraduate study with some notions of mastering my mother tongue and reclaiming my heritage. I hadn’t expected to feel at home, but I hadn’t anticipated feeling quite so alien. Like most Asian Americans, I’d always been asked the question, “Where are you from?” with the expected answer being China, or someplace equally foreign. Now, this question was asked even more relentlessly of me by Chinese people in China, but the answer never satisfied them. But you don’t look American, they might say—or, You don’t sound Chinese. They’d assure me that I wasn’t really American, even as their suspicious expressions made clear that I certainly wasn’t really Chinese.
Fish Rock in Japan
by Jim Benning | 04.22.10 | 4:17 PM ET
Fish rock is music aimed at promoting greater fish consumption in Japan, where it’s on the decline. Public radio’s The World explains.
Here’s a, uh, taste.
Coming Soon: Same-Sex Weddings on Everest?
by Eva Holland | 04.22.10 | 11:09 AM ET
Nepal’s new government has some ambitious plans to rebuild and expand the country’s tourism industry, the Times of London reports. One way to make that happen? By becoming Asia’s biggest gay tourism destination—and, with a same-sex marriage bill also in the works, same-sex weddings on Everest could soon be a major part of that effort.
Said Nepalese MP Sunil Babu Pant: “There are plenty of gays and lesbians who want adventurous, sporty, outdoors kind of tourism. In other Asian countries which offer this, they are either not welcome or considered criminals.”
Taco Bell to Indians: ‘Visit Mexico for 18 Rupees’
by Jim Benning | 04.21.10 | 2:59 PM ET
Yes, Taco Bell is invading India, offering such classic Mexican delicacies as “Potato & Paneer Burrito.”
The offerings, with an Indian twist designed to appeal to local tastes and vegetarian diets, sound genuinely intriguing in an Indian-Mex-fusion kinda way.
World Travel Watch: Drug Violence in Acapulco, iPad Ban in Israel and More
by Larry Habegger | 04.21.10 | 12:40 PM ET
Larry Habegger rounds up global travel news
Political Pundits, Lay Off the Kabuki References
by Eva Holland | 04.14.10 | 4:21 PM ET
Slate writer Jon Lackman has a message for America’s Washington-watchers and op-ed writers: Stop using “kabuki” as a stand-in for “political posturing.” Lackman thinks the stylized Japanese theater tradition deserves better. He writes:
[T]here’s nothing “kabuki” about the real Kabuki. Kabuki, I’ll have you know, is one of UNESCO’s Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity! And it’s nothing like politics. It does indeed use stylized gestures, expressions, and intonations, but it’s far from empty and monotonous… Unlike a Dick Durbin stemwinder, the quintessential Kabuki moment (known as a kata) is colorful and ruthlessly concise, packing meaning into a single gesture. It is synecdoche, synopsis, and metaphor rolled together—as when, in one Kabuki play, a gardener expecting a visit from the emperor cuts down all his chrysanthemums except one, the perfect one. And in contrast with our own shortsighted politics, Kabuki concerns not the present so much as a “dreamlike time shrouded in mist but ever present in the subconscious,” to quote critic Shuichi Kato.
The history he digs up on the term’s arrival in American political discourse is fascinating.
World Travel Watch: Chaos in Kyrgyzstan, Protests in Thailand and More
by Larry Habegger | 04.14.10 | 12:14 PM ET
Larry Habegger rounds up global travel news
Protests and Parties in Bangkok
by Eva Holland | 04.12.10 | 1:56 PM ET
The State Department has issued a warning for travelers to Thailand following this weekend’s violent clashes between protesters and police in Bangkok, which resulted in 21 deaths. From the latest alert:
U.S. citizens are reminded that even demonstrations intended to be peaceful can turn confrontational and escalate into violence. U.S. citizens are urged to avoid the areas that may be targeted for demonstrations and to exercise caution in their movements around Bangkok.
Despite the warning, though, World Hum contributor Newley Purnell reports that it’s business as usual for tourists on Bangkok’s Khao San Road, where water fights have replaced the earlier unrest.
The water fights are “badass,” says Sayed Jiwa, a 20 year old from Calgary, Canada, when asked about the festivities. He added that the protests were no joking matter, however… It was scary, says Jiwa, but “the vibe is all good” now.
Video You Must See: Soothing Thailand
by Eva Holland | 04.09.10 | 9:49 AM ET
Calm beaches, warm light -- we're not in Bangkok anymore, folks
World Travel Watch: Crime in Bali, Burj Dubai and Machu Picchu Re-Open, and More
by Larry Habegger | 04.07.10 | 3:03 PM ET
Larry Habegger rounds up global travel news