Last June, I traveled to the tiny Taiwanese island of Kinmen, which lies a mere mile off the coast of China’s Fujian province. The waters between the island and the mainland constitute the narrowest point in the Taiwan Strait, and, standing on the Taiwan side, I found the view slightly surreal: I peered through giant telescopes to see Fujianese fishing boats bobbing happily in the middle of one of the world’s tensest political flashpoints. It seemed downright peaceful.

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Having recently lived in Taiwan, I’ve been watching with dismay as tensions across the Taiwan Strait have heated up over issues as varied as the Olympic torch route and Taiwan’s plan to hold a referendum on United Nations membership early next year. Now comes word that Lonely Planet has been ensnared in the China-Taiwan standoff. A story in The Age carries the first public confirmation from the Chinese government of rumors that have been swirling for years: that China has banned LP’s China guidebook over a map marking Taiwan and China in different colors, making them appear as separate countries.

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From the rooftop of my apartment building in Taiwan, Taipei 101 (pictured) blinks reassuringly in the distance, hovering just above the hills. Some nights it glows blue and gold in its upper reaches; other nights it’s green and purple. I’ve whiled away hours on the building’s fourth floor, home to the city’s best English bookstore, and spent New Year’s Eve watching fireworks explode around the skyscraper’s edges. The spectacle is guaranteed to net Taiwan much-coveted global exposure on CNN. The world’s tallest building is always within sight, but I didn’t realize I held such affection for the place until I read Saturday that the Burj Dubai had unofficially stolen Taipei 101’s towering thunder. Taiwanese have long known the day would come; still, I felt my stomach drop.

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Ozzy Osbourne, diplomat? The music icon/ drug-addled punchline, or, as Reuters calls him, “satanic- theme rocker,” will sponsor the Taiwainese band ChthoniC and its government-supported efforts to stir up support for Taiwan’s U.N. membership quest. ChthoniC will join this summer’s Ozzfest tour, and, according to Reuters, Ozzy will help out with transportation costs and let the band promote Taiwan’s U.N. membership. That will no doubt include performances of “UNlimited Taiwan,” ChthoniC’s song that “seeks to express Taiwan’s boundless vitality and its efforts to overcome international restrictions, isolation and prejudice,” says Minister Shieh Jhy-wey of the Taiwanese Government Information Office. Great. But if the band is going to take the message to the Ozzfest masses, one question remains: Does it rock? 

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‘Tis the season to look back on the year that has passed and make lists, and those of us in the maps business are no less backward looking than others. Borders shift, populations grow or shrink, and place names are altered. The pace of change can be mind-numbing. So I thought I’d compile my own short—and consequently incomplete—list of some of the most noteworthy geographical developments of the last 12 months.

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Paul Theroux, among others, has written of his preference for train journeys over air travel: “Although it has become the way of the world, we still ought to lament the fact that airplanes have made us insensitive to space; we are encumbered, like lovers in suits of armor.” That passage from The Old Patagonian Express, published in 1979, came to mind as I read a compelling new story on Alternet about air travel, its role in global warming, and potential solutions to the problem. The story notes a UK study showing that the predicted rise in air travel in the coming decades is bad news for the environment: “[F]actoring in the projected growth of air travel, carbon emissions would have to be reduced to zero in manufacturing, ground transportation and private households to meet the British government’s 2050 green goals.” So what’s the solution?

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After years of back-channel talks, China and Taiwan will officially sit down this September to discuss removing the ban on travel from the Chinese mainland to the Island, according to an Asia Times story by Ting-I Tsai. The potential talks come after China’s founding of the Cross-Strait Tourism Association, and Taiwan’s development of the Taiwan Strait Traveling and Tourism Association, two ostensibly private organizations created to handle the negotiations. China, a rising tourist power, currently allows its citizens to travel to just 81 countries, according to the Times.