What We Loved This Week: ‘Sequestered in Memphis,’ Russian Watches and Slow-Motion Camel Jumping

Travel Blog  •  World Hum  •  06.13.08 | 1:41 PM ET

World Hum contributors share a favorite travel-related experience from the past seven days.

Frank Bures
I loved slow-motion, Yemeni camel jumping. A lot. Video below.

Michael Yessis
Been listening to the stream of the upcoming The Hold Steady album, “Stay Positive.” It sounds like it would be perfect to listen to with the volume at 11 in a speeding American car, on a lonely highway, in a thunderstorm. Love the first single, “Sequestered in Memphis.”

Joanna Kakissis
I’ve been practicing Ashtanga yoga at a studio near my house for the last four months. The studio, Aion, is in a beautifully restored neo-classical house, one of the few remaining in the area, and it’s a welcome slice of peace in this crazy city. So far, I am hopeless at headstands and handstands but glad my very talented teacher is no longer speaking to me exclusively in English.

Elyse Franko
I really love this umbrella by Totes. See, I have a major problem with umbrellas. They’re either: A) small enough to fit in a handbag or backpack but too weak to avoid flipping inside out when touched by the slightest breeze, or B) sturdy enough to fight through a hurricane but too big to fit in any bag. (Also, due to the out-of-bag carrying factor, Type B umbrellas are bad for forgetful travelers.) But a family friend recently gave me the umbrella of my dreams. This impressively wind-resistant umbrella is light and compact, opens and closes at the touch of a button and has an awesome flashlight at the end of the handle. So you can go out in a thunderstorm in the middle of the night and look for the contact lens you lost on a dirt road in Vietnam. Or do something similarly awesome.

David Farley
imageI bought this Russian-made Slava watch during a 1992 trip around post-communist Europe, when, it seemed, the streets of cities like Budapest, Prague and Warsaw were awash in Soviet relics. I wore it for about six years and then one night it stopped. Someone had told me that I’d have to travel to Russian to get a new battery, so I stowed the watch away, awaiting a future trip to Russia, and forgot about it. But I found it the other day and took it to a watch repair shop on my block in Greenwich Village. The owner (who happens to be Russian) popped in a new battery and it now ticks just like the days when Gorbachev and Reagan were pointing missiles at each other. Watches just like this one are for sale on eBay. The going rate: $129.

Eva Holland
I had a friend visiting here in Ottawa earlier this week—just the inspiration I needed to get out and reconnect with downtown. I had almost forgotten about it, but the Byward Market in the summer is a pretty fantastic place to be: the area is filled with street performers, rickshaw runners, vendors selling everything from fiddleheads and berries to jewelry and sarongs, and crowds of tourists and locals wandering through it all, eating ice cream in the sun. Here’s a pic.

Jim Benning
I got a kick out of this comment from the editorial director of Interview magazine, when asked by Charlie Rose whether New York was still the cultural capital for artists: “I don’t think there is a cultural capital anymore. Ten years ago, they were all in New York and now they’re all on a plane.” He added, of course, that most can’t afford to live in Manhattan these days.

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2 Comments for What We Loved This Week: ‘Sequestered in Memphis,’ Russian Watches and Slow-Motion Camel Jumping

Lola 06.13.08 | 3:54 PM ET

haha!. great video :)

Russia Travel 08.02.08 | 2:24 PM ET

Slava watches are pretty cool and not only because my name is also Slava. They are only being made in Belarus these days which is as close to the USSR as it can get.

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