TIWOHO, INDONESIA — One thing that strikes me about science, and the way we frame our discoveries, is that we’re no better than our metaphors. We observe a process of nature, and explain how it works by comparing to our own technology. For some of those processes, we have pretty good metaphors: the “holographic” theory […]
Stakeholders in the Indian healthcare system contend that the government has been drawing foreign tourists to India for medical procedures at the expense of adequately funding the public health system. In an article published in the British Medical Journal in November, a doctor and an activist wrote that India is among the top 20 countries […]
The ruling military junta of Burma is moving the country’s governing headquarters to a remote compound in the northern jungle. Media reports in mid-November confirmed that civil servants in the capital city, Yangon (Rangoon), are rapidly being transferred to a site called Pyinmanaa that permits limited unsupervised communication with or from the outside world. The […]
TIRTA GANGGA, BALI — Bali is all about water. Ponds alive with lotuses and frogs; streams pitching from the ambrosial urns of stone goddesses; waterfalls down stone walls covered with butterflies and fronds. It’s the rainy season here; fat drops fall from the palm trees overhanging the road, and off the thatched eaves above temple […]
BUNAKEN NATIONAL PARK, INDONESIA — In the 1950s, Alfred Hitchcock made a thriller called Rope, starring Jimmy Stewart. The title was a double entendre; not only was a rope involved in the crime, but Hitchcock made it appear that the whole film was shot in a single, unspliced, 80-minute take. In the bath-warm waters of […]
MANADO, INDONESIA — Without a tsunami or volcanic eruption in progress, there’s very little drama on your average island. Sulawesi has its share of woes — ethnic conflict between the northern Christians and the central and southern Muslims has been a flashpoint for years — but in this tiny region around Sulawesi’s northern tip, tensions […]
Botswana’s government recently initiated a new round of forced evictions and human rights violations against the Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert, according to Survival International (SI), a London-based NGO that advocates for indigenous rights. The Bushmen have lived in the Kalahari for thousands of years. During the 1980s, the Botswana government designated part of their […]
Logging and the development of an ecotourism resort threaten Australia’s Recherche Bay, where one of the earliest known meetings between Tasmania’s Aboriginal people and European explorers took place. According to historians, archaeologists and ethnologists, Recherche Bay has significant cultural and historical value. French expeditions landed there in 1792 and again in 1793, staying several weeks […]
A sense of purpose makes a world of difference when travelling. I chose a purpose for this trip that was distinct from those I had during other trips. Travelling for research and fun in Europe and Mexico gave me opportunities to enjoy soaking in other ways of life while exploring the context of my world. […]
