Archive for May, 2007
Education in the U.S. and China
Nicholas Kristof had an interesting column earlier this week, comparing the educational systems in the U.S. and China. Here are some of the relevant passages: With China’s trade surplus with the United States soaring, the tendency in the U.S. will be to react with tariffs and other barriers. But instead we should take a page [...]
Seductive Seville
The city of Seville, Spain, is well known as a tourist destination and cultural center. It is apparently also a quite seductive and romantic place, at least according to this travel article from the Boston Globe: True to the legendary Don Juan who prowled its cobbled streets, this city seduces at first sight. Plazas blossoming [...]
Tourism and cultural differences
Hope everyone in the U.S. had a nice holiday weekend these past few days. There was a light-hearted article in the Sunday NY Times about travel, tourism and cultural differences, which is worth a read. Every summer, people all over the world become acquainted again with a deep truth spoken by the philosopher-tourist Steve Martin. [...]
Books by camel
I saw a unique story in yesterday’s newspaper about a library service in rural Kenya that delivers books by camel. And you thought the bookmobile was rustic. Try having your books delivered by camel, then reading them under the shade of the acacia tree. For 11 years, eager readers in Kenya’s isolated North Eastern Province have [...]
Travels in Turkey
There are a lot of issues simmering these days in Turkey, from negotiations to join the European Union, to agitations by the Kurds for more autonomy, to a debate about democracy between secular and Islamist parties. None of that lessens the allure of the country as a travel destination, however. Tom Haines, travel writer for [...]
The internet and culture in China
There is no doubt that technology can influence a society, but can it also change a culture? That question is part of an intriguing article in the Christian Science Monitor about internet use in China, which has grown rapidly in recent years. In 1999 there were just four million Internet connections in China; by the end of [...]
More medical tourism
I’ve written about medical tourism before, and the topic seems to receiving increased attention these days. There was an article about it in the NY Times Sunday travel section. In the story, Joshua Kurlantzick discussed his experiences with medical care in Thailand. Finishing my lunch at an open-air restaurant in downtown Bangkok, I felt slightly queasy. But by [...]
Inca ingenuity
The Inca Empire of South America was known for a few of its architectural achievements, as well as for a remarkable system of roads and bridges that enabled fairly quick communication among communities that were scattered throughout the rugged terrain of the Andes Mountains. The NY Times just ran an interesting article that combined a bit [...]
Experiencing the Ganges River
There was a five-part series on NPR recently in which a reporter delved into Indian life by traveling the length of the Ganges River. The waterway, which is considered holy by Hindus, extends more than 1,500 miles from the Himalaya Mountains to the edge of Bangladesh and cuts across a long swath of northern India. The [...]
New and old Beijing
China and Beijing are busy preparing for the 2008 Summer Olympics, so Ben Brazil went to Beijing to check out the scene. He discovered a fascinating city balanced on the edge between modernity and tradition and then wrote about his experiences for the Washington Post. Construction cranes perched on the skyline like flocks of gargantuan, robotic flamingos, and [...]
Aboriginal wisdom and weather forecasts
Even with all the achievements of modern science, there are still many times when we can benefit from the accumulated knowledge of the world’s indigenous cultures. One example of this can be found in a recent article in the Christian Science Monitor, which reported on the successes of Australian Aborigines in predicting the weather and understanding [...]
The Pope and religion in Latin America
Pope Benedict XVI just began a visit to Brazil, which has resulted in a spate of news stories about the religious changes afoot in Latin America. Although the region is home to half of the world’s Catholics, the Church has been losing adherents at a rapid clip in recent years. Rather than losing churchgoers to [...]
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Bob Riel is a writer and a traveler. Go here to read more about Bob, his work and the Travels in the Riel World blog.
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