Destination: Burma (Myanmar)
Finding Trouble in Asia: Let Us Count the Ways
by Julia Ross | 06.09.09 | 4:31 PM ET
Is it me, or has it been a surreal few months for Americans in Asia? Guidebook writers and State Department travel monitors, take note: a few new travel “don’ts” have entered the lexicon. To recap, here’s what we know not to do next time we journey East.
Email to friend
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! BuzzTravel Writing as a Political Act
by Robert Reid | 06.02.09 | 10:39 AM ET
REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco Lonely Planet writer Robert Reid explores the role of travel writers in a complex world
Yangon, Myanmar
by World Hum | 05.08.09 | 11:33 AM ET
REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun Devotees crowd the Shwedagon Pagoda during the Kason watering festival in Yangon, Myanmar (Burma)
Eight Great Family Travel Stories
by World Hum | 05.01.09 | 11:33 AM ET
iStockPhoto To mark World Hum's eighth anniversary, we've collected eight favorite travel stories from our archives that explore the family vacation in all its forms
Eight Photos to Inspire Wanderlust
by World Hum | 05.01.09 | 8:12 AM ET
REUTERS Indulge your armchair traveler. We've gathered eight wanderlust-inspiring travel photos from around the world.
See the full photo slideshow »
Pyinsalu Township, Myanmar
by World Hum | 04.30.09 | 10:31 AM ET
REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun A fisherman uses palm leaves to sail the Pyanmalot River in Pyinsalu Township located in Myanmar's delta region.
Six Great Women Travelers in Asia
by Julia Ross | 03.20.09 | 10:57 AM ET
March is Women’s History Month, so this seems a good moment to call out a few of history’s great women travelers. Because so many 19th- and early 20th-century adventurers found themselves drawn to Asia, I’ve narrowed this list to women who made their mark on that continent, fording the Indus River or crossing the Tibetan Plateau, in defiance of social norms and often at great risk. These are the women I wish I’d been in another life. Herewith, my top-six list of the most intrepid Western female travelers to take Asia by foot, camel or donkey.
Morning Links: A Wordy Map of St. Petersburg, the Joy of L.A. Traffic and More
by Michael Yessis | 02.26.09 | 9:38 AM ET
- New Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says yes to body scanners.
- World Hum contributor Tim Patterson chronicles the struggle of the Kachin people of Myanmar.
- USA Today looks at “what might be the most endangered airline in the USA.”
- NPR has an interview with the world-traveling ethnographers from The Linguists.
- Happy 450th birthday Pensacola, Florida.
- Matthew Polly goes to St. Petersburg, Russia, in Slate’s latest Well-Traveled.
- This map of literary St. Petersburg was created using lines from Russian writers about St. Petersburg. (Via The Book Bench)
- Daniel Fox aims to shoot more than 100,000 digital images from around the world for the Wild Image Project.
- The Freakonomics blog is in the midst of a six-part series about the facts and fiction of Los Angeles Transportation. I find it compelling, though maybe I’m just looking at the gray skies here in D.C., waiting for winter to end, daydreaming about my upcoming trip back home.
Got a suggestion? .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) your link.
Morning Links: Australia’s Great Ocean Road, LEGO N.Y. and More
by Michael Yessis | 02.04.09 | 8:21 AM ET
- World Hum contributor Tony Perrottet drives Australia’s Great Ocean Road.
- Scott McCartney: “Perhaps no other consumer-service business is so rule-bound as the airline industry.”
- Travelers can now link Delta and Northwest frequent flier accounts.
- Arjun Basu meditates on the size of airports.
- Photos: The making of an Interstate highway (via Coudal)
- Slate calls Aung San Suu Kyi “the world’s most effectively sidelined leader.”
- These baggage handlers at Edinburgh Airport “played tig” while waiting for planes to land.
- I LEGO N.Y. is currently the most emailed story at the New York Times.
- Video: Did you know Steve Martin was on Flight 1549?
- I’m fantasizing about a future of travel that involves this.
Got a suggestion? .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) your link.
Burma, Redrawn
by Julia Ross | 01.29.09 | 9:39 AM ET
I wonder if Burma’s generals are kicking themselves for allowing an unassuming Canadian cartoonist to live within their borders for 14 months. They should be. Guy Delisle’s terrific graphic memoir, Burma Chronicles, portrays the surrealism of life under the junta in a way few Western journalists have been able to conjure.
In his third illustrated travelogue, Delisle, who traveled to Burma in 2005 to accompany his aid worker wife, has fun at his own expense, drawing himself as a wide-eyed foreigner and stay-at-home dad who observes the quirks of Rangoon from behind a baby stroller. He opens a Time magazine to find articles mysteriously cut out by censors; struggles to make change in bills issued in denominations of 15, 45 and 90; and watches bemusedly as the government packs up and moves, virtually overnight, to a new capital city.
Rambo Goes To Burma: Worst Movie of 2008?
by Eva Holland | 01.12.09 | 12:19 PM ET
You remember the latest Rambo flick, right? Sylvester Stallone’s gory expose on the plight of Burma/Myanmar’s ethnic minorities? (Don’t worry, I had forgotten, too.) When it came out last year, the critics were less than wowed. Now, the movie looks to be in the running for Hollywood’s greatest indignity: a Golden Raspberry award for the worst of the worst in filmmaking.
According to a little bird at the MTV Movies blog (the list hasn’t been formally announced yet), ‘Rambo’ has landed Razzie nominations for Worst Picture; Worst Director (Sylvester Stallone); Worst Actor (Sylvester Stallone); Worst Career Achievement (Sylvester Stallone); Worst Prequel, Sequel, Remake or Rip-Off, and Worst On-Screen Couple (Sylvester Stallone and His Ego).
Hey, at least the folks in Yangon liked it.
Morning Links: Stilwell Road, the Delta Queen and More
by Michael Yessis | 01.05.09 | 8:14 AM ET
Photo by David Raterman - The amazing story of Stilwell Road— written by an anonymous Los Angeles Times writer.
- Robert Reid offers some suggestions for helping struggling travelers’ destinations. Among them: An alphabet throwing contest in Rila, Bulgaria.
- Passengers “run amok” on flight from England to Cuba.
- Christopher Elliott finds seven videos the airlines don’t want you to see.
- Gawker compiles video from a month of cruise ship disasters.
- P. J. O’Rourke on Disney’s “Innoventions Dream Home,” aka the House of the Future II.
- The Delta Queen: A new endangered historic site?
- Student abroad and accused murderer Amanda Knox was voted woman of the year in an Italian poll. Her trial begins later this month.
- The Cranky Flier remembers the airlines we lost in 2008.
- The New York Times discovers buzkashi in Afghanistan. We covered it in Tajikistan in 2002 and spelled it buskaschee. What is buzkashi/buskaschee? Goat-carcass polo.
Got a suggestion? .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) your link.
What We Loved This Week: Christmas in Germany, ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ and More
by World Hum | 12.19.08 | 4:33 PM ET
Photo by Terry Ward World Hum contributors share a favorite travel-related experience from the past seven days.
Terry Ward
German Christmas Markets. I’ve been drinking in the holiday cheer as much as possible since arriving in Hamburg. Tchotckes are everywhere. But the best way to get in the spirit is by hanging in the glühwein huts at the Christmas markets and going stall to stall sampling things like grünkohl (a hot dish made with kale) and lebkuchen (ginger bread).
Julia Ross
I finally caught Slumdog Millionaire this week and was swept away by director Danny Boyle’s breathless, vibrant take on life in modern Mumbai. The film’s conclusion, staged in the city’s iconic, Raj-era train station, serves as a hopeful counterpoint to the terrorist siege that occurred there just last month.
Pam Mandel
“The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by Junot Diaz. Dominican history, a vocabulary of nerd culture references and the eternal pursuit of sex ... all in voices so real I expected to see the narrators sitting on my couch surfing our WiFi every time I put the book down.
David Farley
I love Slate’s five-day Well-Traveled section, in general, and this week’s installment, in particular. Tony Perrottet does historical perverts better than anyone. The Pervert’s Grand Tour is a fun and intriguing read.
Kelsey Timmerman
Anna Quindlen’s piece in Newsweek, Stuff Is Not Salvation. Like everyone else, I’m wrapping up my holiday shopping, and she provides a great perspective on our consumer culture: “Ask people what they’d grab if their house were on fire. No one ever says it’s the tricked-up microwave they got at Wal-Mart.”
Visit Myanmar—That’s an Order
by Stephen Brookes | 09.09.08 | 12:58 PM ET
Photo by Stephen Brookes Travel to Myanmar has slowed to a trickle. But a decade ago, with great fanfare, the government launched a new tourism campaign. Stephen Brookes, then Rangoon bureau chief for Asia Times, remembers its bizarre launch ceremony.
Travel Outfitters Assist in Burma Cyclone Relief
by Jim Benning | 05.12.08 | 11:03 AM ET
The government of Burma (Myanmar) has blocked legions of foreign aid workers from entering the country to help with cyclone relief efforts, but a couple of outside travel companies have been able to offer at least some assistance. Most notably, Colorado-based Asia Transpacific Journeys, with dozens of local staff members and three Westerners in the country, has been distributing thousands of water filters around Yangon, the Los Angeles Times reports. Their efforts raise an interesting issue related to the ongoing debate over the ethics of traveling to Burma.
- « Prev Page
- Next Page »
