Travel Blog
Ernest Hemingway Sofas, Frida Kahlo Tequila, Renoir Mineral Water, and Now Lady Chatterley Thongs?
by Jim Benning | 12.16.05 | 12:35 PM ET
Oh yes, and those are just the beginning. There’s also Jane Austen writing paper and the Virginia Woolf Burger bar. The Times of London today offers an amusing overview of the products bearing the names of artists and novels of yore, as well as the controversies that surround them.
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Yahoo! BuzzEsquire Names Roadtrip Nation “Best and Brightest” of 2005
by Frank Bures | 12.16.05 | 9:06 AM ET
The road trip may be a time-honored American tradition, but the guys from Roadtrip Nation, who were just chosen by Esquire as three of the “Best and Brightest” of 2005, have found a way to make it more than that.
Final Score: United States 5, Burma 5
by Jim Benning | 12.15.05 | 1:51 PM ET
Five journalists, that is. The Committee to Protect Journalists has issued a report on nations detaining correspondents. The news isn’t pretty: The United States and Burma (perhaps the most Orwellian nation on the planet) tied for sixth place for most held, with each nation detaining five journalists. None of the five journalists being held by the U.S. in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba has been charged with a crime. China is holding 32 reporters, more than any other nation. The New York Times has the gory details.
Paul Theroux to Bono: Stop Hectoring Us About Africa Development
by Jim Benning | 12.15.05 | 12:52 PM ET
The Hawaii-based writer, who has traveled extensively in Africa, doesn’t believe the continent will be saved by the kinds of solutions proposed by Bono and other celebrities. “If Christmas, season of sob stories, has turned me into Scrooge,” Theroux writes in an op-ed piece today’s New York Times, “I recognize the Dickensian counterpart of Paul Hewson - who calls himself ‘Bono’ - as Mrs. Jellyby in ‘Bleak House.’ Harping incessantly on her adopted village of Borrioboola-Gha ‘on the left bank of the River Niger,’ Mrs. Jellyby tries to save the Africans by financing them in coffee growing and encouraging schemes ‘to turn pianoforte legs and establish an export trade,’ all the while badgering people for money.”
Attention Everyone in Groups A, B and C, and Rows 42 Through 1: Get on the Plane! Now!
by Michael Yessis | 12.14.05 | 12:38 PM ET
A mad boarding scramble by passengers may be a more efficient way to seat an airplane than having them load into the back rows first, according to a team of scientists and mathmeticians at Israel’s Ben-Gurion University. Eitan Bachmat and his colleagues arrived at their conclusion using concepts more commonly applied to the theory of relativity and prime number theory, writes Philip Ball in Nature.
Gilmore v. Gonzales: Should U.S. Airline Passengers Have to Show ID?
by Michael Yessis | 12.14.05 | 1:08 AM ET
Last week the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals heard arguments in the Gilmore v. Gonzales case, in which San Francisco resident John Gilmore is challenging the requirement for air passengers to show identification before boarding a flight within the United States.
A Rick Steves Christmas
by Jim Benning | 12.13.05 | 11:55 PM ET
All the big stars have done at least one TV Christmas special: Jackie Gleason, Charlie Brown, Nick and Jessica. This year, finally, a travel writer has gotten into the act. PBS Europe travel guru Rick Steves has produced Rick Steves’ European Christmas, and it’s airing this month on PBS stations around the United States. The show features Steves taking in holiday celebrations in seven locales, from Italy to Norway. He and his family play in the snow and sit down to delicious dinners, and watching it makes you wish the dollar wasn’t in the tank and that you, too, could afford a winter jaunt to Europe.
Newsham Pulls Plug on Impeachment Effort
by Jim Benning | 12.13.05 | 11:19 PM ET
We noted early last month that travel writer Brad Newsham had launched a campaign to impeach President Bush. He sent word Tuesday that he is calling off the effort. “As the impeachment movement is alive and well and growing, and as my Impeachment Pledge project did not generate the momentum I had hoped for, I am pulling the plug,” he wrote in an e-mail. Newsham urged readers to support other impeachment efforts.
Bradley Murdoch Found Guilty of Murdering British Backpacker
by Michael Yessis | 12.13.05 | 10:43 PM ET
Peter Falconio was killed four years ago in Australia’s Northern Territory, near the end of an around-the-world trip, during a drive from Alice Springs to Darwin. A jury concluded Tuesday that Bradley Murdoch, a mechanic from Broome, was guilty of the crime. The Australian, among many news outlets covering the events, has a report about Murdoch’s conviction and a detailed story recapping the crime.
Tom Haines Goes to Mexico
by Jim Benning | 12.12.05 | 5:44 PM ET
The Boston Globe published the first installment yesterday of a two-part series about Mexico by Tom Haines. He covers a lot of ground and writes evocatively of the uneasy relationship between Mexico and the United States.
‘The Simpsons’ in Arabic? Meet ‘Al Shamshoon.’
by Jim Benning | 12.12.05 | 12:14 PM ET
That’s right, that’s the name of “The Simpsons” in the Middle East, where an Arabic satellite channel has begun broadcasting the show with Arabic voiceovers. But the show has been “culturally modified,” too. Homer—make that Omar— doesn’t drink Duff beer, he drinks Duff juice. And he doesn’t hang out at a bar but a coffee shop. Fans in the region who are familiar with the original show aren’t happy.
The Importance of Branding Nations
by Michael Yessis | 12.12.05 | 7:46 AM ET
It’s an idea that’s been popular at least since World Hum launched in 2001, but it has gained new currency in 2005. In its annual Year in Ideas issue, the New York Times Magazine salutes Simon Anholt, who “foresees a day when the most important part of foreign policy isn’t defense or trade but image—and when countries would protect and promote their images through coordinated branding departments.”
Russia: ‘Cold, Dark, Drowning in Vodka, and Ruled by the KGB’
by Michael Yessis | 12.12.05 | 6:37 AM ET
The land of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky has an image problem. In brief, it is this: When people in the West think about Russia, rarely do Tolstoy or Tchaikovsky come to mind. According to a terrific article by Julian Evans in Foreign Policy, a poll commissioned by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government revealed just how deep the problem goes.
Playboy Cyber Girls Busted for In-Flight Antics
by Michael Yessis | 12.12.05 | 1:31 AM ET
Danielle Gamba and Carrie Minter, two Playboy Cyber Girls of the Month, were “yelling and cussing” and were “intoxicated to the point that they were a threat” to everyone on a Frontier Airlines flight from Denver to San Antonio last week. In an effort to avoid potential criminal charges, Gamba allegedly greeted police officers in San Antonio with “sexual advances.”
Brazil
by Ben Keene | 12.09.05 | 2:44 PM ET
Population: 186,112,794 (2005 est.)
Coordinates: 12 0 S 50 0W
While the mystery of what came first, the chicken or the egg, may remain unsolved, another question pertaining to trees and countries is decidedly less vexing. Brazil, the largest and most populous nation in South America, actually takes its name from the reddish hardwood once found in abundance among the continent’s virgin forests. Over time, the immense Terra de Brasil, or land of crimson brazilwoods, as the Portuguese called the region, became known simply as Brasil—Brazil to many of us.
—.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) is the editor of the Oxford Atlas of the World.
