Guest Post — Casa do Mancha: Resisting Vila Madalena’s Decay

Gaia Passerelli was in my class at Book Passage this year; I’m happy to share her write up of her neighborhood in São Paulo, Brazil. Vila Madalena has changed a lot. The place where I grew up is now São Paulo’s bohemian centre. “One of the coolest neighbourhoods in the world” according to National Geographic …


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Guest Post: A Perfect Romance in Venice

I sat on the steps of a Venice canal, watching as happy lovers in gondolas slowly drifted past. In the most romantic city in the world, I was alone, and crying, in the rain. My honeymoon was not going as planned. After our wedding – after Dan and I promised to love each other in …


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Guest Post: When Asked for Photos

“I know we offered to pay you for your hard work, now how about you give us something extra for free because we’re cheap?”

Guest Post: African Reunion

“Are you going to Africa?” the driver asked as I sat down in my taxi to the Seattle airport. Were my REI conversion pants were a giveaway? “Yes,” I told him, “I’m headed to Tanzania.” “I knew it! When you got in the cab I was immediately happy,” he shouted. As a college student in …


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Guest Post: Speaking in Tongues

Last year, after bidding a blubbering adieu to my Labrador, Henry, my husband and I uprooted our lives in Austin and moved to London for his next step up the startup ladder. Within a week I was consoling my dogless self by interrupting assorted cafe loungers and park joggers, asking wide-eyed and breathy if I …


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Azerbaijan is Ready for Mass Tourism, Almost

carpet museum
Baku’s latest pride and joy, the Carpet Museum

TL:DR? They’re working on it. They have all the components, but the people putting the engine together need more training and new tools.

It was after 7pm on a Monday night when I received the email inviting me to a press trip in Azerbaijan, barely three weeks away. The invitation was so odd, with its ongoing late night infomercial but-wait-there’s-more tone, that I had to read it twice to be sure it wasn’t extremely well targeted spam. The capper of this hard-sell invite was the equally hilarious and sad line, “Best of all, it is one of the few locations in that region free from any religious strife!” There wasn’t an exclamation point in the actual email, but it was implied.

Though my history with press trips has been spotty, I was intrigued by the destination. Azerbaijan was in an entirely new realm for me – kind of Central Asia, kind of the Middle East — though the people there insist they are in fact the gateway from Europe to Asia. Europe agrees, apparently, because Azerbaijan participates in the Eurovision Song Contest, even hosting the event in 2012 per tradition after their 2011 win, and will host the 2015 Euro Games

The most discouraging/frightening part was the schedule. I’d be flying across 10 time zones, more than 25 hours in transit each way, for barely three days on the ground ,then flying right home. My request to fly in early or stay late was denied without explanation. My ass ached just thinking about it. But like many travel writers, my curiosity about the unknown is far more powerful than my self-preservation instincts, so I agreed to go.


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