Travel Blog: News and Briefs
‘We All Suffer the Indignity of the Passport Photograph’
by Eva Holland | 02.24.10 | 1:17 PM ET
Yes, as the folks over at Very Short List noted when they linked to this fascinating Flickr gallery, even literary geniuses and Hollywood celebrities get saddled with unflattering passport photos. Everyone from Ernest Hemingway to Cecil B. DeMille and Frank Lloyd Wright is represented.
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Yahoo! BuzzVideo: After-Hours at the Pittsburgh Airport
by Eva Holland | 02.23.10 | 3:51 PM ET
(Via Boing Boing)
Tell Your Travel Story at TBEX ‘10
by Pam Mandel | 02.23.10 | 11:42 AM ET
It’s the hybrid offspring of a poetry slam and a reading. It’s a chance to share your remarkable travel story with a room full of people who really want to hear it—the bloggers attending the sold out Travelblog Exchange this summer in New York City. (As we’ve noted, World Hum is a media partner and will be there.) It’s the TBEX ‘10 Community Keynote.
The idea? A “best of the blogs” session that showcases amazing travel storytelling by independent bloggers. Your hosts and curators for the reading? SkyMall expert Mike Barish and ukulele enthusiast Pam Mandel. And no, you don’t have to be at TBEX to participate. Any other questions you might have are probably answered on the submissions form.
Great narrative about travel often gets lost in a market that calls for top ten lists, packing tips and deals, writing that’s more copy than story. But narrative makes us tick. It’s why we blog about travel. We want to tell stories. The TBEX Community Keynote will give the spotlight to the kind of writing we love to read and love to write.
Want to be part of it? Submit your story for consideration here.
New National Monuments in the Works
by Eva Holland | 02.22.10 | 11:53 AM ET
The federal government has drawn up a list of potential new national monuments, mostly in the southwestern states—and this New York Times story explains why some local politicians see the move as “a land-grab device for East Coast politicians.” Regional politics aside, shouldn’t “Lesser Prairie Chicken National Monument” be something we can all get behind?
What We Loved This Week: VQR, ‘The Reporter’ and the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum
by World Hum | 02.19.10 | 6:11 PM ET
Frank Bures
I loved the new issue of VQR, with great stories from across North Africa. So far, I loved Joe Sacco’s graphic piece on immigration in Malta, Nicholas Schmidle’s story on the Somali community in Minneapolis, and Marco Vernaschi’s amazing story and photos about the coup last year in Guinea-Bissau. Brilliant photography, fiction, and lots of other stuff I haven’t gotten to yet.
Machu Picchu to Reopen April 1
by Eva Holland | 02.18.10 | 1:29 PM ET
The Peruvian Times is reporting that the iconic site will once again be open to tourists April 1—the first time since last month’s devastating floods. The story also hints at a new approach for Peruvian tourism going forward. Said the president of the Cusco region: “This disaster should give us an opportunity to redesign the tourism activity, we can’t focus everything on Machu Picchu.” (Via @laurably)
What We Loved This Week: Bill Murray and Bourdain, the Saints Victory Parade and ‘Finding Farley’
by World Hum | 02.12.10 | 5:25 PM ET
Frank Bures
I loved this story about Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” and “Karaoke-related killings” in the Philippines.
Facebook and America’s Social Geography
by Eva Holland | 02.09.10 | 12:45 PM ET
Here’s a fascinating map put together by PeteSearch, showing the regional connections between America’s Facebook users. The data creates some unexpected clusters and movement patterns: For instance, users in the northeastern states—dubbed “Stayathomia”—tend to have more local and fewer long-range connections, while users in the “Nomadic West” generally have more far-flung friendship networks. (Via Kottke)
‘Distance and Difference are the Secret Tonic of Creativity’
by Michael Yessis | 02.09.10 | 9:54 AM ET
Another welcome addition to the Why We Travel canon, this one from Jonah Lehrer. He recently wrote about the cognitive benefits of travel in the San Francisco Panorama:
Travel, in other words, is a basic human desire. We’re a migratory species, even if our migrations are powered by jet fuel and Chicken McNuggets. But here’s my question: is this collective urge to travel—to put some distance between ourselves and everything we know—still a worthwhile compulsion? Or is it like the taste for saturated fat, one of those instincts we should have left behind in the Pleistocene epoch? Because if travel is just about fun then I think the TSA killed it.
The good news, at least for those of you reading this while stuck on a tarmac eating stale pretzels, is that pleasure is not the only consolation of travel. In fact, several new science papers suggest that getting away—and it doesn’t even matter where you’re going—is an essential habit of effective thinking. It’s not about vacation, or relaxation, or sipping daiquiris on an unspoiled tropical beach: it’s about the tedious act itself, putting some miles between home and wherever you happen to spend the night.
Thanks for the tip, Todd.
Video: Saints Super Bowl Victory Party in New Orleans
by Eva Holland | 02.08.10 | 3:06 PM ET
I’m not much of a football fan, but as a traveler who got hooked on the Crescent City awhile back I can’t get enough of this video. From the music to the Magazine St. bars to the Mardi Gras-bead-wearing beat cops, it’s all NOLA.
(Via Ta-Nehisi Coates)
What We Loved This Week: ‘Point Omega,’ Vicarious Ramen and the Canadian Rockies
by World Hum | 02.05.10 | 5:21 PM ET
Photo by Kevin Fay Michael Yessis
Matt Gross’ story about eating his way through Tokyo’s “sprawling ramen ecosystem.” Made me long for a bowl of noodles—and another trip to Japan.
Men at Work Loses ‘Down Under’ Plagiarism Case
by Eva Holland | 02.05.10 | 2:29 PM ET
An Australian court has ruled that the flute section in the catchy travel song was lifted from “Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree,” another Aussie classic that dates to the 1930s. Frontman Colin Hay has issued an emotional dissenting statement in response. Here’s the song in question:
New Travel Book: ‘China: Museums’
by Eva Holland | 02.05.10 | 12:21 PM ET
This illustrated guide to China’s many lesser-known museums is due out in April. The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos has a thoughtful Q&A with co-author Miriam Clifford, on her favorite spots and the way China presents itself, to visitors and to its own citizens.
Museum Tags From Around the World
by Eva Holland | 02.04.10 | 11:39 AM ET
Fast Company takes a quick look at the origins and recent decline of the ubiquitous metal museum admission tag. Don’t miss the colorful accompanying infographic of museum pins from Zurich to Ontario.
Even Astronauts Want to be Travel Writers
by Michael Yessis | 02.03.10 | 1:19 PM ET
At least one well-known astronaut does: The one who happened to be stuck in the middle of the drive-non-stop-from-Houston-to-Orlando-allegedly-in-diapers love triangle. In reporting on the case, Florida Today notes that former astronaut William Oefelein and former Air Force Capt. Colleen Shipman—she was the victim of a pepper spray attack by her rival—are currently running this travel writing website.
Welcome to the travelsphere, William and Colleen! Please note, however, that someone is already on the disposable underwear beat.
