All in Uncensored Travel

Nightmare on Craig’s List

Judith Fein
Life Lessons, Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Judith Fein

 

I love Craig’s List. I really do. It has transformed the way we advertise, buy, sell and think about transactions. It’s beautiful. It’s free. I have used it so many times that I refer to the founder as Craigie. But, like the little girl with the curl, when the list is good, it is very very good, and when it is bad…well, you know.

My Craigie episode started a few months ago when my husband and I decided we desperately needed a vacation. Truth be told, I am not sure we’ve ever taken a vacation. As travel journalists and photographers, we’re always writing, shooting, taking notes and stumbling over stories, even when we don’t mean to.

But this time it was different. We were burned out from having our eyeballs glued to our computers l5 hours a day, meeting deadlines, emailing, researching. We looked at each other, and, in that silent way we sometimes communicate when we are not yakking or yukking, we knew we had to stop. For a full month.

I went to Craigie, of course, and typed in the name of a beach community in California.

There it was: the little bungalow that was waiting for us, half a block from the ocean.

It was, according to the owner, small, clean, with a spacious backyard where we could hang, escape the winter, and drink margaritas. For me, it was a done deal.

It took several weeks to get a contract. Turns out the dude who advertised with Craigie wasn’t the owner, but the renter, and this was a sublease. Fine. Also, he was doing some mysterious work or traveling in Asia and was hard to contact. Okay. His friend was handling the rental. Fine. When you have the prospect of being half a block from the ocean, you’re willing to put up with a lot. At least I am.

Noises Off!

Eric Lucas
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Eric Lucas

“Quiet, please.”

Who needs ice at 3 in the morning?

No one. But that didn’t stop the ice machine out in the hall from heroically performing its appointed rounds, manufacturing fresh delectable ice in a steady, cacophonous landslide for all those hotel guests who simply have to have martinis at vampire time. It was 3:12am. The relentless clatter of cubes into basin sounded like the dwarves of Moria hammering orc swords. Clack. Thwark. Thunk.

That’s what it seemed like to me, jet-lagged and testy after flying into San Francisco from Vienna. It’s a long way. You cross nine time zones, and when you arrive your “day” has stretched nine extra hours.

All I wanted was a quiet room. Peaceful sleep.

Quiet is the ultimate travel luxury, the almost unattainable Holy Grail of journeying through the 21st century. In airports you will listen to CNN or Kenny G whether you want to or not; if you do find a corner that has escaped Orwellian electronic coverage, that’s where Nadia Sulaiman is changing the diapers on all eight of her brood. On the plane, unless you’re in first class, Dennis the Menace is practicing soccer on your seatback; if you are in first class, you’re right behind two robber barons gobbling Bloody Marys at 8am and planning a leveraged take-down of Amalgamated First Second National Global Savings & Loan. If you buy noise-canceling headphones, you discover that they cancel only ambient noise, thus magnifying conversation.

They paved paradise and put up an all-inclusive resort

Allen Cox
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Allen Cox

When a mangrove falls and there's no one there to hear, does it make a splash? You'd think the answer would be a resounding “yes.” But when nearly an entire coastline of mangroves fell along the Mexican Caribbean from north of Cancun to Tulum, business interests turned a deaf ear and environmentalists wept.

Of course, the trees didn't fall all at once with a single tsunami-inducing splash. Instead, it was one little splash after another over the course of four decades. One tree after another. Splash. One grove after another. These mangroves, as well as the dune plants and the jungle beyond, were standing in the way of progress. Now, they are not standing at all.

H i s t o r e c t o m y

Paul Ross
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Paul Ross

Remember when you were a kid and some relative dragged you, with the best of intentions, to an historical “re-creation” because it was fun AND educational!? You don’t remember what you learned -- so much for education. And it was only slightly more fun for you than for the poor souls who suffered through the real thing ... because they were so miserable, they didn’t mind dying at age 19 from enlarged pores while semi-skilled barbers attached leeches to their appendages.

Photo Slide Show by Paul Ross

These glossed-over, sanitized, falsely nostalgic, contemporarily cosmetic pseudo-experiences invariably celebrate a time of exploitation. And the POV romantically, religiously and ideologically chosen is from the lowest rung of the social ladder. The idea may be noble, but you are not.

American ambassadors in Arab lands

Judith Fein
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

 by Judith Fein

Photo Slide Show by Paul Ross

View in Photo Gallery

 

“What country you from?” two young men shouted at me from the stalls where they sold clothing.

“United States,” I answered.

“America! We love America!” they replied, grinning broadly.

The stalls were in the souk in Aleppo, and Aleppo, which has been inhabited by our species since the llth century B.C., is in northern Syria. Yes, an Arab country. Where cautious Americans are not supposed to go.

In Damascus, the capital, I was picking food from a sumptuous buffet and piling it on my china plate when the restaurant owner approached me.

“Where do you come from?” he asked.

“The United States,” I said. “And it’s my birthday today. This is my celebration.”

“Your birthday? Come with me, please.”

I followed him over to a large, standing, locked glass showcase which displayed jewelry and antiquities. He unlocked the case and withdrew a stone.

“Here, for you,” he said. “It’s a rock from the moon. May you have a wonderful day.”

Slumdog Millionaire – The story Hollywood left behind

Shelley Seale
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Shelly Seale

By now everyone has seen, or at least knows about, the movie Slumdog Millionaire and its astounding sweep of the Oscars, the Golden Globes, and millions of movie-watchers' hearts worldwide. For good reason – the film is affecting without being affected, has great multi-dimensional characters, and gives us phenomenal cinematography with brilliant India as its backdrop.

Now available for purchase in TheTrip Shop!This tale of life and love in the slums of Mumbai alternates between heartbreak and triumph. The story follows two brothers who live in an underworld of abject poverty, far removed from the country’s glitzy upper class or technology and business boom. Their lives become even more brutal after they are orphaned.

Following them throughout their childhood and into early adulthood – along with their friend Latika – we see them fight against exploiters, brothel owners, child abusers, and even each other, in their struggle to survive.

Slumdog Millionaire is a fictional movie ending with a bizarre twist of fate. However, the reality of the story is that for millions of children in India, the life portrayed in the movie is a a world away from the rags-to-riches ending of the film. Today there are 25 million Indian children living without parents, on the streets or in orphanages or other institutional homes – some good, and some bad or corrupt like the one portrayed in the movie. They live in orphanages, slums, railway stations or on the streets, where they are highly vulnerable to abuse, harassment, HIV/AIDS, and being trafficked into child labor if they're lucky - brothels if they're not.

Slumdog Millionaire shows us a side of India, and a way of life, that hundreds of thousands of children in Mumbai alone struggle to survive every day.

You Cruise, You Lose

Paul Ross
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Paul Ross

A vacation on a large cruise ship is a lot of things: convenient, easy, hassle-free (unpack once!), planned and scheduled, largely affordable, entertaining and unchallenging. You’ll know when, where, with whom and pretty much what you’re going to eat, who won the knobby-knees contest at the aft deck pool between the disco and life raft station zebra and exactly how long the “endless night soiree” will last. What’s not to like? At times, and on specially-themed outings, there are even opportunities to learn something. But, mostly, there is relaxation--especially during those long “days at sea.” Yes, vacation cruising can be many things. But it is not travel.illustration © Paul Ross

Travel can include difficulty, surprise, expense (both monetary and personal), challenge and always a chance of the unknown, which necessitates awareness. There are “lessons” aplenty but they’re rarely pre-digested and aren’t spoon-fed. You not only learn about the places and people you visit, but also about yourself.

You’ll have to find eateries on your own and they may be native and weird. Or, as an adult, you might even enjoy a brand new taste sensation. There may be a schedule--which can vanish in the instant it takes to get a blown out tire, be caught in a storm, or meet an unexpected situation or person of interest. Cruising is Disneyland afloat. Travel is what happens behind the scenes, beyond the gates and out in the world. The challenge is real but so are the adventures, discoveries, revelations and delights.

Air Travel Madness

Air Travel Madness

Eric Lucas
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

We have rules, people.

Sure, I feel sorry for those 47 passengers stuck on a Continental Express plane for nine hours at the Rochester airport, but just because they’re trapped in a device where excess flatulence violates EPA standards doesn’t mean they should be allowed outside the jet.

We can’t let people wander willy-nilly at our airports late at night because, heaven knows, even a blue-haired grandma or a nearsighted professor or a Nintendo-crazed kid might actually be a world-class terrorist who is going to hide in a broom closet until dawn, headlock the pilot of a 747 who’s having a triple latte, put on his uniform and commandeer the plane, take off, fly the jet into the command center at ESPN over in Connecticut, bring down sports broadcasting and cause widespread panic, tempting Vlad Putin to lob a few SS9s our way, starting World War III and causing the collapse of civilization and, not incidentally, indefinitely postponing the start of the NFL season.

Can’t have that. Right?

Keep the Americans out of Cuba

Patricia McGregor
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

by Patricia McGregor

Now that the US ban on Cuba travel seems about to disappear, and hordes of American travelers are poised to save Cuba from itself, I say, keep the ban. It will make very little impact on the average Cuban’s lifestyle and merely serve to line the pockets of the rich.

photo via Flickr by Robyn JayFor periods of time over the last four years I have lived with a musician in Havana. Because of him, my Spanish improves and his friends become my friends. I live like he does. I become Cubana.

Parties and discussions are our entertainment. His friends feel that they have nothing to gain by having American tourists in the country. Tourist money will not filter down to them.

Although there are many hotels, with the current tourist numbers it is often difficult to make a reservation. An influx of Americans (one estimate is 1 million per year) will put pressure on the tourist infrastructure.

Where will they stay? If they bump out tourists already on a Cuban holiday routine, hostility will surely grow.

New hotels will have to be built. Most Cuban hotels, like the Sol chain, are financed by foreign interests. Are these companies stretched to their last euro in this time of financial difficulties? Will they start up dozens of projects only to abandon them half-built? Will American companies be allowed to invest? Construction workers and such might be busy for a while, and then it will be back to the old life. If they are thrifty, they will save the money. There is no unemployment insurance.

I do not love Venice

Vera Marie Badertscher
Uncensored Travel

by Vera Marie Badertscher

Everyone must visit the three sisters of Italy: Rome, the serious one dedicated to preserving the glories of Italy’s Roman heritage. Florence, the studious and artsy one. And lastly Venice, the flashy younger sister who knows how to flaunt her beauty.

photo via Flickr by Brian WallaceSo say the Italy travel experts. At the risk of having the pigeon poop of San Marcos Square dumped on my head, I say: Not Venice, the beautiful darling that everyone falls in love with before they have even set foot in Italy.

Venice? Don't bother.

“But it is so ROMANTIC,” Venice fans sputter.

Ahh, yes, the famous romance. Funny how they have been able to continue that marketing campaign. And right after advocates tell you how romantic Venice is, they say, “You MUST see her at night.”

Well, of course you must if you are looking for romance. Gilbert and Sullivan had that wonderful line in Trial by Jury, “She may very well pass for forty-three in the dusk with a light behind her.” Old hags look so promising by candlelight.

Like everyone else, I thought I would fall in love with Venice. People travel by boat instead of car-- romantic charm! Bridges arch gracefully over canals--aesthetic charm! And history lurks in every doorway, down every cobbled street--historic charm! Oh yes, Venice is lively, too, with residents shopping at open air markets and having a coffee at the neighborhood bar.

Apologize to Vegas? Never'

Apologize to Vegas? Never'

Eric Lucas
Travel Opinion, Uncensored Travel

Pigs thrive on slops. No need to apologize for saying so.

Still, Las Vegas would like President Obama to back down on his recent remark disparaging millionaire bankers and such who party in Vegas using taxpayer money. This should stop, said Obama.

Vegas squealed like, well, a stuck pig.

“I expect him to address it and to correct it,” growled Sin City mayor Oscar Goodman. (‘Good-man’? It’s a joke, right?)

“Mr. President, we need your support more than ever,” whined Vegas Congresswoman Shelley Berkley. “Tourism means jobs.”