My blog has migrated to a new host and is being painstakingly reconstructed here. Please bear with me as I iron out wrinkles, hammer out the dents, and apply enough spit and duct tape to hold it all together.— Karen
Contrary to popular belief, living abroad doesn’t require you to be wealthy, retired, or willing to spend years restoring a crumbling farmhouse with the help of semi-literate but wise and amusing locals. But if you do choose to become an expat, there are three things you will need to survive the general upheaval of the move…
The Erratic Boulder is said to be near this fountain. (Photo: Ecelan) It’s a curious but well-known phenomenon among travelers that once you’ve been presented with a list of must-sees in the district, you feel almost honor-bound to pay each one of them a visit. Even if you’d never heard of, say, The Erratic Boulder…
From Travel+Style’s Best Travel Quotes So yesterday I ran across this marvelous quote on Pinterest , from philosopher Martin Buber : “All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” And what is our secret objective? I often think it’s an unconscious desire to have travel change us in ways we don’t see…
I love the holidays in Seville, which is good, because here they last from December to early June. The attitude seems to be: Why skimp on the fun? While many of these holidays are based on Catholic religious festivals, their roots are far older, lying deep in way our most ancient ancestors celebrated of the…
Alligator we served at our 10th anniversary party “Want to try the fried flies?” asked our Bangkok guide. Who could resist? I popped one in my mouth. For the record, fried flies are salty, oily, crunchy, and much like roasted peanuts – except for the wings. They’re not bad as snacks go. But I don’t…
“Ah, civilization,” Rich said as we stumbled into our Romanian hotel just short of midnight. We’d been staying in a rural village that had scarcely changed in 500 years, and it was comforting to be in a modern, well-appointed hotel. A sleepy young woman handed us keys, and when we got to the room, we…
Rich on the ferry arriving in Genoa “Genoa? Last time I was there, it was full of prostitutes and muggers,” commented a friend upon learning Rich and I were planning to take a ferry there last summer. “Especially down by the docks.” Yikes! Arriving shortly after dawn one August morning, Rich and I felt lucky…
A friend tries Kim’s Barber Shop, San Francisco There comes a moment in every long journey when you look in the mirror and face the fact that you’re overdue for a haircut. Perhaps a soupçon of gray is showing where it shouldn’t. Possibly your faux hawk is beginning to flop, your bob is becoming a…
“You’re getting a Christmas tree ?” Spanish friends used to say, with such incredulity that I might as well have announced we were building an igloo in our living room. “A live tree? Really?” “Where are you getting a tree?” expat friends would ask, eyeing us a trifle suspiciously, as if we had a direct…
Kids, this is what cameras looked like in the 50s. When I was little, my mother took some phenomenally bad photos because she never learned how to close one eye, which you had to do to see through the tiny viewfinders on pre-digital cameras. As a result, her pictures showed miles of background – often…
CELEBRATING GOOD NEIGHBORS These days I’m writing about Good Neighbors, exploring how the people around me are working to help each other get through these challenging times. My weekly posts appear on Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on my travel and research schedule.
THIS BLOG IS A PROMOTION-FREE ZONE. As my regular readers know, I never get free or discounted goods or services for mentioning anything on this blog (or anywhere else). I only write about things I find interesting and/or useful.
