By Nicole Solis  February 19th, 2010 3:29 pm  |  Comments (1)

Today, Afar’s cofounder, Joe Diaz, appeared on a travel-themed episode of The Martha Stewart Show. In addition to being the doyenne of beautiful living, Martha is also an exceptionally well-traveled lady. She chose Afar as one of her daily Finds for “its focus on travel as a way to explore and connect with other cultures.”

Joe and Martha chatted about their favorite trips—China and the Galapagos for Martha, India (the birthplace of Afar) and Argentina for Joe—and of course, one of the best ways to truly get inside a culture: its food.

The other guests joining Joe and Martha were best-selling author and Afar contributor Susan Orlean, environmental advocate Alexandra Cousteau, and Flight 001 cofounder Brad John.

By Nicole Solis  January 5th, 2010 9:45 am  |  Comments (13)

Bonnier's Mag+ protoype shows some of the possibilities of a digital magazine.

The tech and publishing media are working themselves into a frenzy about the possible launch of Apple’s much-anticipated tablet computer later this month. If that is the new product they’re revealing, then the company has once again proved its ability to tap into the zeitgeist.

Just a few weeks ago, this demo video of an interactive Sports Illustrated started making the rounds, tantalizing faithful print readers as well as those of us who work in publishing with the possibilities of our digital future. Bonnier, publisher of Popular Science and many other magazines, is even working on its own platform.

In his column in last Sunday’s New York Times, David Carr took all this one step further, saying that the iSlate (or whatever it may be called) and an iTunes-like model for magazine or other content subscriptions could save publishing.

So, my question to Afar readers is what would you like to see in a digital version of our magazine? Personally, I’d love to see links to translation and location-specific GPS smartphone apps or maybe RSS feeds with the most recent content from blogs written by locals. Most important to me, I want to be able to easily access the content from my home and work computers and my iPhone. I hate it when I get on the train in the morning and realize I’ve forgotten to bring something to read.

What else? What content would you like to see? What features would you want it to have? What frustrates you about reading onscreen now? What frustrates you about print now? What aspects of print would you like to keep? Let us know!

[Post updated by author at 11:20 am with Mag+ image.]

Mag+ image courtesy of Bonnier.

By Nicole Solis  January 4th, 2010 9:51 am  |  Comments (3)

The Afar staff returned back from our holiday break to find this fun item from Boston.com about New Year’s traditions around the world. The only recurring theme I noticed was fire and explosions–everything from sparklers to fireworks to carbide-shooting. Everyone seems to like to start the new year (or end the old one) with a bang.

If you spent New Year’s (or any other recent holidays) abroad, what traditions did you see or experience?

By Nicole Solis  December 14th, 2009 8:23 am  |  Comments (2)

Lost in translation.

In our December/January 2010 issue, Tim Moynihan reviews three iPhone phrasebook apps that can help you talk like a local in the places you visit. But what if you want to learn more than just the basics? There’s an almost intimidating quantity of books, CDs, podcasts, websites, and, yes, smartphone apps that can try to teach you a language. Here are a few resources to start with, as you look for the right method.

• The Telegraph’s round-up of various French instruction CDs. Cassandra Jardine organizes her favorite instructional CDs into helpful categories like Best Quick-Fix and Most Comphrehensive, so you can choose the method that fits your interest and, let’s be honest, degree of procrastination. Many of these companies offer the same method in a variety of languages, so choose the approach that suits you best, then see if your language is available.
• iTunes podcasts. In addition to the apps we reviewed, the iTunes store has a wide variety of free instructional podcasts in many different languages and for many different levels. In the iTunes store, go to Podcasts, Education, and then Language Course. Two good ones to try are Daily FrenchPod (or French for Beginners, if you don’t already speak French) or PukkaGerman. (Note: These links will take you to the iTunes store.)
  Read through the reviews to see if the podcast is right for your learning style and language level.
  
• BBC Languages. The Beeb’s extensive online language section has 12-week beginning language online courses, audio and video instruction, phrases of the day, articles on cultural traditions in various countries, and other resources. If you want to put your newfound language skills to use, follow the links to foreign-language television and online video.

Photo by eatatmarks, CC 2.0.

By Nicole Solis  November 30th, 2009 12:17 pm  |  Comments (2)

Inspired by a trip to the Middle East in 1865, Swiss chocolatier Philippe Suchard added minarets to his home in Neuchatel.

Switzerland’s voters recently passed a ban on the construction of minarets. On the political blog 538, founder Nate Silver and Geneva-based correspondent Renard Sexton look into how religious identity, language spoken, and the foreign population affected how each canton, or Swiss province, voted on the initiative.

Silver kicks off the discussion, finding that the more religious the canton, the more likely it was to vote for the ban. In his follow-up, Sexton examines the role of xenophobia in the decision. He points out that since many multinational corporations and organizations are based in Switzerland, about 22 percent of Switzerland’s population are foreigners. As he says, this means two things:

First, the cultural clash in many Swiss cantons between traditional agriculturally-driven, conservative lifestyle and the “international” culture of more urban areas, who are dominated by the UN, banks and globalized companies, has become very pronounced.

And second, and perhaps more importantly, foreigners can’t vote.

Through their analyses, Silver and Sexton reveal some interesting insights about Swiss culture, especially in the age of globalization. As Sexton wrote, “the politics of culture in a country that is multi-cultural/lingual, yet insular…and isolated are very complicated politics indeed.”

Photo by Tambako the Jaguar. CC 2.0.

By Nicole Solis  October 27th, 2009 11:34 am  |  Comments (0)

A double-cloth wool blanket by Eleanor Pritchard

British textile designer Eleanor Pritchard finds inspiration in limitations. That’s one reason she’s so drawn to dobby weaving, a simple weaving technique that uses a limited number of colors and small repeated patterns.

Within these parameters, the bold geometric patterns and vivid colors of her double-cloth wool blankets and cushions are free to pop. Though her designs are modern, the textiles are produced using traditional weaving techniques by a Welsh woolen mill.

If you’re in London, see Pritchard’s work at these upcoming shows:

• November 15: Midcentury Modern, Dulwich, London
• December 4–6: Christmas Open Studios, Deptford, London

[Hat tip to Tea for Joy for reminding me of Pritchard's lovely work!]

By Nicole Solis  October 20th, 2009 10:42 am  |  Comments (4)

Tuna roja, a recent fruit of the day on Ultra Fine Food.

These days, travel blogs seem almost as common as traveling. My favorite travel blogs are about big trips, in which someone challenges him- or herself with travel, and sometimes challenges the whole concept of travel.

Over the past few months, I’ve discovered quite a few big-trip blogs that provide some fun armchair (or desk chair, maybe) travel. Here are a few that seem particularly Afar-ish. What travel blogs do you like to read? Let us know in the comments.

• Ultra Fine Flair/Ultra Fine Food. After spending six months living in Buenos Aires, Gillian and her boyfriend are now traveling through Peru and chronicling their adventures on Ultra Fine Flair. Subscribe to the RSS feed of her her Ultra Fine Food to get the semi-regular Fruit of the Day posts, all about the wonderful produce she’s discovering in South America.
• Year of No Flying. Anirvan Chatterjee is embarking on a year-long climate change trip, avoiding air travel and talking to people all over the world about climate change and the environment. He just arrived in Japan by container ship (check out his post about the voyage and the surprisingly comfortable, though cramped, accommodations) and is now immersing himself in Japan’s farming crisis.
• Need2Walk. Two twenty-something Swedes, Rami and Alexandra, recently embarked on an ambitious six-year trek from Fuengirola, Spain, to the Cook Islands–on foot. Though they haven’t gotten terribly far on their trip (or on the blog), this could really be a great trip to watch.

Photo by kittylaroux.

By Nicole Solis  September 30th, 2009 2:57 pm  |  Comments (0)

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989

With the anniversaries of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the founding of the People’s Republic of China approaching in October and November, Jeffrey Wasserstrom examines how communism’s biggest defeat helped strengthen China’s Communist Party in an article for Foreign Policy.

Toward the end of the piece, Wasserstrom looks at two key lessons China learned from the end of communism in Eastern Europe:

1. Patriotism is a winning strategy, but it only works for one side.

By capitalizing on national pride, Eastern Europeans were able to unify citizens within each country against Communism, positioning it as a regime imposed on the country from outside forces. Taking control of this powerful tool, the Chinese Communist Party “placed renewed emphasis on patriotic education, stressing the party’s pre-1949 role in chasing out foreign invaders,” Wasserstrom writes.

2. Class divides give rise to dissent, so give people opportunities to bridge those divides.

East Berliners had to merely look over the wall to see how capitalism afforded their West Berlin counterparts a higher standard of living. Within Eastern European countries, Wasserstrom writes, “The only meaningful social divide was between a small privileged coterie of corrupt officials and the rest. And the rest was pretty much everyone.”

China avoided similar problems by encouraging a consumer revolution over the past two decades. As more working Chinese entered the middle class, there was less of a divide between the average Chinese worker and not only the party faithful but also middle-class workers in capitalist Taiwan.

Read the full article here.

Photo by unknown author, released by permission of the Senate of Berlin. CC 3.0.

By Nicole Solis  September 24th, 2009 10:07 am  |  Comments (0)

Amsterdam tulip market

Every possible passion seems to have a travel trend associated with it. So why not econotourism, for people who are interested in how the economy affects a local culture?

Nobel Prize–winning economist Paul Krugman recently used the term in a post about Dundee, Scotland’s Verdant Works, a museum devoted to the jute industry. The rise (and fall) of the jute industry in the late 19th-century deeply affected Dundee society:

According to the museum, it also created a troubled society in Dundee. The factories mainly employed women and children; many of the city’s men were “kettle-boilers,” stay-at-home dads. Many volunteered in World War I, because it was the first job offer they’d ever had.

But if you want to travel to the Eiffel Tower of economic bubbles, you need to go to Amsterdam. The Amsterdam Tulip Museum helpfully has a Tulipomania video on its website, explaining how wild speculation over the price of tulip bulbs crashed the domestic Dutch tulip market in 1637.

Many Dutch were financially devastated by the crash, but oddly enough, the event helped build the Dutch tulip export market because so many people in other countries wanted to see the flower that created such a fuss. Today Holland is the largest exporter of flowers and plants.

Photo by ethanlindsey, CC 2.0.

By Nicole Solis  September 8th, 2009 10:11 am  |  Comments (0)

The Economist just launched “Doing Business in London,” the first of 30 new guides for business travelers. Covering key business etiquette (such as whether your colleagues will be wearing ties, how to shake hands, and the importance of being on time) and the quick  things travelers can do while frantically trying to get a taste of a new city between meetings.

But it doesn’t take a great deal of time to see a more authentic London. Check out “A Local’s Take on London,” with some great restaurant recommendations and even a spot to “hot-desk” (the Britishism for working remotely or from a temporary space).

Photo by henrybloomfield, CC 2.0.