Travel Blog
Travel Headline of the Day: ‘Eight Reasons You Need to Fly Private’
by Jim Benning | 02.27.08 | 10:13 AM ET
Oh, Forbes, how you amuse me so.
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Yahoo! BuzzAirlines Offer ‘Service George Orwell Could Get Behind’
by Michael Yessis | 02.27.08 | 9:57 AM ET
Rob Lovitt offers “compelling evidence that George Orwell is still with us and gainfully employed in the airline industry.” His MSNBC story is doubleplusgood.
Related on World Hum:
* Big Brother in Burma
R.I.P. Dutton’s Books
by Jim Benning | 02.26.08 | 1:36 PM ET
Sadly, Los Angeles’ beloved literary bookstore, located in Brentwood, plans to close April 30.
The Dancing Old Men of Patzcuaro
by Jim Benning | 02.26.08 | 1:07 PM ET
Tracking the Lapita, ‘Pioneers of the Pacific’
by Michael Yessis | 02.26.08 | 12:31 PM ET
Fascinating story in National Geographic about how the Lapita managed to explore and colonize the Pacific Ocean beginning 3,000 years ago. Roff Smith writes:
The ‘Bedbug Epidemic’: Real or Media Generated?
by Joanna Kakissis | 02.26.08 | 12:21 PM ET
“[I]t’s like they’re all rooting for the bedbugs.” That’s how Joe McInerney, president of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, describes the reporters he’d spoken with about the so-called epidemic. There’s so much to love about the hideous bloodsuckers, the Washington Post reports, especially if you’re a trend-hungry newspaper reporter looking for a story.
High-Speed Train From Southern California to Las Vegas ‘Picking up Steam’
by Michael Yessis | 02.26.08 | 10:13 AM ET
The plans for a high-speed link between Los Angeles to San Francisco make more sense to me. Alas, they’re stalled. So are the plans for a Disneyland to Las Vegas MagLev train. That has given an opening to the DesertXpress, a privately funded high-speed project that seeks to connect Las Vegas with Victorville, California, perhaps best known as the place where, when you’re driving from Los Angeles to Sin City, you can stop off for a Double-Double at In-N-Out.
Travel Writer to Reader: Don’t Blame me if Your Vacation is Ruined
by Jim Benning | 02.25.08 | 3:57 PM ET
Why? Because Susan Glaser of the Cleveland Plain Dealer just won’t have it. She wrote a story about a visit to a Mexican beach resort. After her story was published, she learned that a storm washed away part of the resort’s beach. She wrote a follow-up, but not before a reader booked a trip. Then Glaser received the reader’s angry e-mail, implying “it would be my fault if her 15th wedding anniversary trip was ruined.”
Is Max Gogarty the New Kellie Pickler?
by Eva Holland | 02.25.08 | 2:23 PM ET
Well, there may not be a video going around for this one, but a major travel blogging scandal is generating plenty of attention. The chronology, so far as I can tell, goes like this:
Tokyo Foodies to Michelin: ‘You Still do Not Know us or Our Cuisine’
by Michael Yessis | 02.25.08 | 11:47 AM ET
All those stars Michelin awarded Tokyo restaurants are impressing many, but not a core group of prominent Tokyo chefs and critics. “Japanese food was created here, and only Japanese know it,” chef Toshiya Kadowaki told the New York Times. “How can a bunch of foreigners show up and tell us what is good or bad?”
Are Empty Oxygen Tanks to Blame in Passenger’s Death?*
by Jim Benning | 02.25.08 | 11:36 AM ET
That’s the suggestion in a troubling story about the death of a 44-year-old woman suffering from heart disease aboard an American Airlines flight Friday.
* Update, 3:30 p.m. ET: American has issued a statement denying oxygen was not administered: “We are investigating this incident, as we do with all serious medical situations on board our aircraft, but American Airlines can say oxygen was administered and the Automatic External Defibrillator was applied.”
A Journey to Remote Kenya to Meet Granny Obama
by Jim Benning | 02.25.08 | 10:17 AM ET
Fascinating column Sunday from Nicholas D. Kristof, who visits a remote village in western Kenya to meet the elderly woman Barack Obama calls his grandmother. She’s illiterate and lives without electricity or running water. Among the wacky political highlights: “You might think that all Kenyans would be vigorously supporting Mr. Obama. But Kenya has been fractured along ethnic lines in the last two months, so now Mr. Obama draws frenzied support from the Luo ethnic group of his ancestors, while many members of the rival Kikuyu group fervently support Hillary Rodham Clinton.”
World Hum’s Most Read: Feb. 16-22
by World Hum | 02.22.08 | 5:23 PM ET
Our five most popular features and blog posts this week:
1) One Man’s Odyssey into ‘Eat, Pray, Love’
2) Starbucks vs. the Traveler
3) Traveling While Texan
4) ‘Eat, Pray, Loathe’? More Reconsiderations of Elizabeth Gilbert’s Travel Memoir, ‘Eat, Pray, Love.’
5) 10 Sizzling Hot Travel Tips From Sir Francis Bacon (pictured)
What We Loved This Week: Shad, U2 in 3D and Bidding Adios to Fidel
by World Hum | 02.22.08 | 4:58 PM ET
World Hum contributors share a favorite travel-related experience from the past seven days.
Joanna Kakissis
I might have been a Breton-Celtic maiden in a former life. My sister is going to northern France this weekend, and she asked me if I wanted a souvenir. “How about the latest Kornog album?” I said. I love this Breton-French band, especially the songs that feature the bombarde. Its music sounds Celtic but with overtones of Eastern European mystique and it resonates with cinematic energy. Here’s a clip from Brest in 2001:
‘What is Happening in the World of Souvenirs These Days?’
by Jim Benning | 02.22.08 | 4:47 PM ET
“It used to be you could count on finding at least one delicious, kitschy, wonderful item at tourist attractions everywhere,” writes World Hum contributor Daisann McLane in the International Herald Tribune. “Classics like the Everglades rubber alligator, and those lovely, giddily printed linen tablecloths from Hawaii. But something has happened to these wonderful souvenirs of yore. They’ve gotten boring, tasteful even.”
