Travel Blog: News and Briefs
Cruise Passenger: ‘Up Until I Got Shot I Was Having a Great Time’
by Michael Yessis | 02.08.08 | 5:01 AM ET
Steve Storton is one hardcore cruiser. He was shot during a port call on the island of Margarita in Venezuela, “then was rushed to hospital, where docs put him in a wheelchair and x-rayed him three times before discharging him two hours later with just painkillers,” according to The Sun. He was having so great of a time that he then climbed back aboard the P&O cruise ship Oceana and completed the last five days of his trip.
Email to friend
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! BuzzBBC: ‘Airbus Predicts Air Travel Boom’
by Jim Benning | 02.07.08 | 12:43 PM ET
Is this really a news story? Isn’t a plane manufacturer’s prediction that planes will be in great demand a little self-serving? How about wrapping a headilne around this, BBC: “World Hum forecasts explosive growth in armchair travel.”
Kibbe and Myth in the Mississippi Delta
by Joanna Kakissis | 02.07.08 | 11:06 AM ET
If you go to any family-run diner in the Mississippi Delta, chances are you’ll find tabouleh, dolmas and the Lebanese meat dish called kibbe tucked between the barbecue and fried chicken on the menu. That’s because waves of Lebanese settled in Mississippi between the 1870s and 1960s, setting up grocery stores and restaurants to make a living, according to NPR’s Kitchen Sisters and “the Faulkner of Southern food,” John T. Edge.
‘International’ Novels: ‘There’s a Bit of a Buzz on the Web Right Now’
by Michael Yessis | 02.07.08 | 7:31 AM ET
Rory MacLean follows it to, among other places, a World Hum blog post, and offers some book recommendations of the best fiction books for transporting readers to a foreign land.
Related on World Hum:
* Crime Fiction Where You Least Expect It
NYC Shops to Visitors: Give us Your Huddled Euros Yearning to be Free
by Jim Benning | 02.06.08 | 1:24 PM ET
In what Reuters reports is a sign that the U.S. dollar “just ain’t what it used to be,” some New York City businesses are now accepting euros and other foreign currency—and they’re finding plenty of takers: “The increasingly weak U.S. dollar, once considered the king among currencies, has brought waves of European tourists to New York with money to burn.”
French Designer Unveils Plans for Hotel-Blimp Hybrid
by Michael Yessis | 02.06.08 | 12:30 PM ET
It looks like a flying whale, but creator Jean-Marie Massaud calls it the “Manned Cloud.” He claims his floating luxury hotel will contain 20 rooms and fly at 18,000 feet, and will be able to zip around the globe in just a few days. And he promises it will be green.
R.I.P. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
by Jim Benning | 02.06.08 | 11:50 AM ET
The 1960s icon and one-time Beatles guru helped put Rishikesh on the counterculture map and inspired countless young Westerners to wander East across the Hippie Trail. He died Tuesday at his home in the Netherlands at the age of 91. Just how great was his influence on travel?
More Than One in Four Domestic U.S. Flights Delayed in 2007
by Michael Yessis | 02.06.08 | 9:37 AM ET
The Department of Transportation reports that 26 percent of flights last year arrived late at their destinations. Only 2000 had a worse record, with 27 percent of flights delayed or canceled.
What’s Joshua Tree National Park Without Joshua Trees?
by Jim Benning | 02.06.08 | 7:09 AM ET
That’s what park rangers and visitors are wondering, given a new prediction that in just 50 to 100 years global warming will make the southern California park too warm to support its namesake trees. I’ve spent a lot of time at Joshua Tree park, hiking, playing on boulders and even shivering through the 2000 New Year’s Eve there.
The Ryugyong Hotel: ‘The Worst Building in the History of Mankind’?
by Michael Yessis | 02.05.08 | 10:14 AM ET
Longtime World Hum readers will be familiar with the Ryugyong Hotel, a sad icon of North Korea. “It’s a hotel that stands 105 floors, has 3,700 rooms and is crowned with five revolving restaurants,” we wrote in 2005. “No one has ever stayed in it. In fact, it has stood derelict since 1989.” Esquire recently dubbed the building the worst in the history of mankind.
Your Dream Trip? Priceless. Cost of the Journey in ‘The Bucket List’?
by Jim Benning | 02.04.08 | 1:42 PM ET
That would be $105,730, according to the Los Angeles Times’ Mary Forgione. She added up the cost for two people to follow in the footsteps of Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson in the film “The Bucket List”—and to do it “in style,” taking into account that you’d want to “stay in each place longer than a Hollywood scene change.”
Dark Days on Galapagos
by Julia Ross | 02.04.08 | 10:33 AM ET
Unsettling news out of the Galapagos Islands: The BBC reports on the mysterious killing of 53 sea lions in the islands’ nature reserve. While poachers have been known to target the animals for their skin and teeth—prized ingredients in Chinese medicine—that doesn’t seem to be the case here, and park officials are at a loss to explain the slaughter. The tragedy hits the Galapagos at an uncertain time, with green groups warning that the islands’ unique ecosystem is suffering under a sharp increase in tourism.
World Hum’s Most Read: Jan. 26-Feb. 1
by Jim Benning | 02.02.08 | 2:07 PM ET
Our five most popular features and blog posts this week:
1.) Fire Breaks Out at Monte Carlo in Las Vegas
2.) 10 Sizzling Hot Travel Tips From Sir Francis Bacon
3.) Q&A With Michael Palin: The New ‘New Europe’
4.) The Trouble With ‘Smile When You’re Lying’
5.) The (Full Moon) Party’s Over
New U.S. Passport Design: The’ Ugly Khaki Shorts’ of Passports?
by Jim Benning | 02.01.08 | 12:48 PM ET
We’ve written before about the over-the-top patriotic design of the new U.S. passport. Reviews are still trickling in, and I like Karrie Jacobs’s take. “When I travel, I try to be the Complex American—a citizen of the fascinating, nuanced, multicultural, messy and basically decent place I know this country to be,” she remarked yesterday in a short essay on public radio’s Marketplace. “But I feel like this passport blows my cover. It’s like suddenly, against my will, I’m wearing ugly khaki shorts and talking way too loud.” That’s right, Karrie. You might as well be wearing these at every customs checkpoint.
R.I.P. Miles Kington, King of ‘Franglais’
by Jim Benning | 02.01.08 | 12:05 PM ET
Miles Kington “satirised the earnest but doomed efforts of native English speakers to handle French,” as the BBC put it. (Example: Bill Wyman’s remark, “Je suis un rock star.”) Kington coined the term “Franglais,” and his books on the topic included Let’s Parler Franglais! He died Wednesday, prompting the fitting BBC headline: “Au revoir Mister Franglais.”
Related on World Hum:
* New Addition to the Travel Lexicon: ‘Geotourism’
