Travel Blog
Makeover Planned for Honolulu’s Diamond Head
by Michael Yessis | 07.19.07 | 12:03 PM ET
The Hawaiian icon—you may have seen it on a T-shirt or a bottle of wine or, perhaps, in your own photo just like the one above—will undergo a multi-million dollar makeover to, among other things, improve safety around the volcanic crater. Diamond Head has apparently been doing what geological formations are known to do: shed rocks. In May, according to the Honolulu Advertiser, a rockfall injured a woman who was picnicking at the base of Diamond Head.
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Yahoo! BuzzNew Addition to the Travel Lexicon: ‘Geotourism’
by Jim Benning | 07.19.07 | 11:29 AM ET
In our ongoing quest to chronicle the comings and goings in the travel lexicon we bring you “geotourism,” a term describing travel that, in the AP’s words, “focuses on a destination’s unique culture and history and aims to have visitors help enrich those qualities.” Coined several years ago by the National Geographic Society’s Jonathan B. Tourtellot, the term hasn’t yet caught on among most travelers. But according to the AP, “it’s on the lips of travel professionals who describe it as a step beyond the better-known environmentally friendly ecotourism. While geotourism encourages treading lightly on nature, it’s also about authenticity and making a place better by visiting and spending money.”
The Man Who Cast Starbucks from the Forbidden City
by Jim Benning | 07.19.07 | 10:06 AM ET
Why did Starbucks close its outlet in Beijing’s Forbidden City? In part, because of the campaign launched by a popular Chinese TV news anchor on his blog. His name is Rui Chenggang. He travels the globe and speaks near perfect English, according a terrific profile in the Los Angeles Times. Seven months ago, Rui wrote that the Starbucks outlet “undermined the Forbidden City’s solemnity and trampled over Chinese culture.” His post prompted a widespread response. Interestingly, he said he still drinks Starbucks coffee—there are well over 200 outlets in China—he just doesn’t think the chain should be hawking lattes in such a sacred Chinese site.
Counting Down to Our New Seventh Wonder
by Jim Benning | 07.18.07 | 5:38 PM ET
As we noted, Starbucks in Beijing’s Forbidden City closed recently, leaving us with only six wonders of the shrinking planet. We need your help. There’s still time to post a suggestion for a new wonder to take its place. We’ll consider any and all ideas. Look for an announcement of our new wonder Monday.
New Record Set By World’s Airports: 4.4 Billion Passengers Flew in 2006
by Michael Yessis | 07.18.07 | 3:48 PM ET
Who’s responsible for a good chunk of the 4.8 percent increase from 2005? China.
Tons of Goods Confiscated by TSA Equal Thousands for State Coffers
by Michael Yessis | 07.18.07 | 12:32 PM ET
We touched on this early last year, but who knew it would become a big bucks business? Turns out all those outlawed items TSA agents take from air passengers at security checkpoints have become a solid source of revenue for states. From a story by Paulo Prada in the Wall Street Journal: “Pennsylvania, which collects goods at 13 airports including New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, says it collects a total of 2.5 tons of TSA goods a month and that the items, sold on eBay, since 2004 have raised $360,000 for state coffers, as of June.”
In India, an Antidote to Monsoon Hair Drama
by Terry Ward | 07.18.07 | 11:04 AM ET
There’s another great slice of life piece—this one from Delhi, India—in the Washington Post’s enlightening Time Zones series. It’s the start of the monsoon season in India, writes Emily Wax, and well-heeled Indians are making their ways to city salons in Delhi to battle a universal enemy—the bad hair day. For both sexes in India, healthy, long hair is a major beauty symbol, and Indians take tress management seriously.
Get Used to the Liquid and Gel Ban—For a While, Anyway
by Terry Ward | 07.17.07 | 12:05 PM ET
Continue to keep the Purell out of your purse. Or at least bag it accordingly. That’s the word from the TSA, according to an article in the Washington Post about continued restrictions on gels and liquids in carry-on luggage. The 3-ounce container rule (with liquids and gels presented in a plastic bag) will continue to apply to carry-on luggage until “sometime next year,” when new technology may become available to better screen for liquid explosives.
Al Gore, Are You Out to Destroy Travel Literature?
by Jim Benning | 07.17.07 | 10:46 AM ET
We know you’re out to save the planet, but have you given any thought to how your campaign to reduce emissions will affect travel literature? What’s that? You haven’t really considered it? Well writer Steve Coronella has. “[L]ately I’ve been wondering whether Al Gore has signaled the end of travel writing as we have come to know it,” Coronella writes in the Cape Cod Times. “Will the long-haul literary excursion become an indefensible extravagance in the face of global warming and the accompanying public outcry that we all need to reduce our ‘carbon footprint’ to combat it?”
The Art of Mileage Running
by Michael Yessis | 07.17.07 | 9:45 AM ET
Few know the ins and outs of airline frequent flier programs like mileage runners, a subculture of hard-core travelers—“airline hackers,” according to a recent Wired story—who create elaborate itineraries and fly around the world with no other purpose but to pad their mileage accounts. “Mileage runners are the high-tech nomadic wanderers of the air,” writes Wired’s Dave Demerjian. “Predominantly male, generally obsessed with flying and miles, and typically employed in white-collar careers that involve significant business travel, they scour the web for cheap flights, phoning in sick or using vacation days to fly the longest itineraries they can string together.”
China’s Wulingyuan National Park: A Gasp at Every Twist and Turn
by Michael Yessis | 07.16.07 | 5:02 PM ET
Add Simon Winchester to the list of heavyweight writers recently filing stories from China. The New York Times has Winchester’s dispatch from Wulingyuan National Park. “This is central China,” he writes, “and a remote part of the mountains of northwestern Hunan province, until lately seldom visited and indeed until 50 years ago barely even settled.” The two main draws now: a two-mile, $200 million tunnel to ease access, and “one of the most remarkable geomorphological spectacles existing on our planet,” the sandstone pillars of Wulingyuan.
In Krakow, Jewish Culture has Become Hipster Culture
by Terry Ward | 07.16.07 | 4:03 PM ET
In June, more than 20,000 people descended on Krakow, Poland for the city’s annual Jewish Festival—complete with Hasidic dance performances, Hebrew calligraphy lessons and klezmer music galore. But perhaps the most interesting thing about the gathering was that very few of the festival-goers were Jewish. Jewish culture is gradually making a comeback in Eastern Europe. And in Krakow, it seems, it has become downright trendy.
The Ikea Hostel: Norway’s New Take on Sleepover Tourism
by Julia Ross | 07.16.07 | 2:45 PM ET
Though Ikea has reliably provided me with inexpensive towels and silverware over the years, I’ve never looked forward to spending a Saturday trekking to one of its warehouses. So I was surprised to read in The Guardian that Norwegians consider the stores a destination, a must-see on the summer travel circuit. Now Ikea is capitalizing on this interest by turning hotelier, at least temporarily. This month the company will open a one-week overnight hostel at one of its Oslo locations, where up to 30 shoppers will have the chance to bunk down in-store each night, sample the cafeteria’s Swedish meatballs and wrap themselves in bargain-basement Ikea bathrobes, all free of charge.
Iweala: Stop Trying To ‘Save’ Africa
by Michael Yessis | 07.16.07 | 1:00 PM ET
Vanity Fair’s Africa issue prompted World Hum contributing editor Frank Bures’s examination of the West’s efforts to “save” the continent. Beasts of No Nation author Uzodinma Iweala’s inspiration for a piece on the subject in the Washington Post this weekend was an encounter with a “perky blond college student” who yelled at him, “Don’t you want to help us save Africa?”
So Long, Forbidden City Starbucks. Help Us Pick a New Wonder.
by Jim Benning | 07.16.07 | 11:33 AM ET
Earlier this month, we named the Starbucks outlet in China’s Forbidden City one of the seven wonders of the shrinking planet. It was, we wrote, symbolic of both globalization and, because of the ongoing protests surrounding its near-sacred location, any nation’s struggle to maintain its cultural identity amid rapid change. But now, like the ancient wonder the statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Forbidden City’s Starbucks outlet has bitten the dust. According to Reuters, it closed on Friday as a result of protests. The closure has left World Hum with only six viable wonders of the shrinking planet, and that’s just wrong. Now we need your help.
