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CAMERA-LESS IN DAKAR:
A Lesson in Art and the Immaterial
And these were the photos I lost…
When Odette came into Hotel du Phare des Mammelles for her morning shift, she entered with the majestic posture of all her African sisters. (They walk as if at all times they carry delicately on their heads all that is necessary for living.) She was tall, her most womanly features made unavoidably prominent by such a posture as hers. She noiselessly entered the kitchen and reappeared, her uniformly dark hands at her head tidying the loose ends of a newly donned white headscarf. Then she began to mop the floors, and the most mundane task was a dance. It was effortless and sensual, unapologetically so. She bent her tall figure at the waist and stretched the full length of her slender arms to th... read |
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TAKING A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE IN TANZANIA
With the largest concentration of wild animals in the world, Tanzania is the perfect destination to see “The Lion King” come to life. This spectacular country is comprised of three vastly different landscapes – from highlands (including Mount Kilimanjaro), great rift valleys in the northern and central regions, to islands and rolling ... read |
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A NEW STYLISH AMMAN
Asserts Itself
“Aren’t you going to check out the terrace?” Madian Al-Jazerah said to me.
It was just after sunset on a summer Thursday evening, and we were standing on the sprawling front deck of Books(at)Cafe, the combination bookstore, cafe and restaur... read |
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THE CHARMS OF CUBA
Freeze time, pause history, forget about modernism, put globalization aside and visit Cuba.
The first image that comes to mind to anyone in the Middle East is the infamous Cuban cigar and the rumor that the best ones are those rolled on the thighs of a “chica”.
Beyond the clichés, the most appealing part of Cuba is how the old is not ye... read |
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LANGKAWI:
THE ISLAND OF WISHES AND MUCH MORE…
I consider myself quite a city person but every once in a while I do like to reclaim my soul to call it my own. There are many times during the course of living a normal life, that the city along with it’s duties and responsibilities get you dow... read |
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NEW LIFE IN ANCIENT PERU
For many tourists to Peru, Ollantaytambo is simply a tongue-twisting stop on the train route from Cuzco through the Sacred Valley to Machu Picchu.
Most visitors ride in on a morning package tour, only to head out by afternoon. But some visitors are spending the night and discovering underappreciated ruins, a growing range of outdoor activities,... read |
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IN THE AEOLIAN AIR, ART AND VOLCANIC FIRE
The elegant, 19th-century palazzo on the remote Italian island of Salina looked like any other dilapidated building on the promenade paved with slabs of volcanic stone. Water stains streaked down its weathered stone facade and a blackened, cast-iron balcony was crammed with rickety chairs.
But then the fortress-like wooden doors s... read |
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THE TWO FACES OF GHANA
At midday, the heat was so palpable that it had its own color, a pulsing, iridescent yellow. I paused at a tiny market stall and bought a peeled and sliced half pineapple – sweet and juicy, not like the tart pineapples in the markets at home in ... read |
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THE GLORIES OF SARDINIA
On the ruggedly gorgeous coast of the Orosei Gulf, in eastern Sardinia, purple limestone cliffs erupt from the Mediterranean like thousand-foot-high walls of some unconquerable redoubt. Ravines wild with goats tumble onto isolated beaches. On hot days when the sirocco wind blows, the land can smell of wild rosemary and thyme.
For all its physic... read |
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KYOTO
On a glaring, color-drenched day in Kyoto, I walk unsteadily out of the traditional restaurant where I have spent the morning being costumed, painted and bewigged. Two chic dressers who turned a tatami room into a staging area for a literary fantasy mind the train flowing behind my heavy robes. Hiking up my red silk trouser skirts as I mince f... read |
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KENYA
Under a tented roof, an unknown world beckons
I walk carefully in the cool night air, focusing a kerosene lantern on the stone-paved path. Suddenly a figure approaches, one arm outstretched, his checkered red blanket gently flapping in the wind.
"Soap," he says as he stretches his arm toward... read |
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INDIA
Lessons on yoga and on life
The first sound in the morning is crows, right at 5. Then we hear waves off the Bay of Bengal slapping the shore. In the garden, a man meditates while walking quickly over the lawn of the ashram guesthouse in the dark. Along the shore, other men p... read |
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BOHEMIA
Cold War legacy
The border between the Czech Republic and Austria was less than a mile away, when an old man mysteriously appeared in the middle of the leafy one-lane road. A generation ago, he might have been shot for being this close to the former buffer zone o... read |
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RUSSIAN RIVIERA
Olympics loom, sochi hurries to be ready
From where I was standing, Tolstoy seemed to have gotten most of the details right. A clear, rapid stream lay behind me, and in front there were dark, mysterious forest-clad hills. The only thing Tolstoy left out of his description of the foothill... read |
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