Glass of red wine in hand, I’m now in La Concha, one of central Barcelona’s last surviving dive bars. On Carrer Guardia in the old Barri Xino, it features peeling wallpaper, overflowing ashtrays, and a clientele who look anything but “hip and cool.”
It’s a jungle out there. A jungle of macaques, proboscis monkeys, pygmy elephants, and the mouse deer, which is a little bigger than a rabbit. Pythons, hornbills, bee-eaters, carnivorous pitcher plants. Lazy brown rivers and crocodiles. Hundreds of orchid species. And the “People of the Forest.”
If you’ve been to Ecuador, you probably know about Otavalo’s textiles, Cotacachi’s leatherworkers, and San Antonio’s woodcarvers. But did you investigate Chordeleg’s silversmiths?
It’s 7 o’clock on a summer’s evening. I’m seven rows from the front at Barcelona’s El Monumental, on a stone seat in the arena’s less expensive sunny half. I wish I had a white hanky to wave, too. Like fellow fans, I’m applauding Diego Ventura’s skill at killing his first bull cleanly.
A moonless night at the Mercat Cross on Edinburgh's Royal Mile-and it's Ghost Busters gone mad. Thirty people are following a black-cloaked witch down Advocate's Close. From the screeches, something nasty is happening in the City Chambers porticoes…maybe it's to do with the body-snatcher now racing down High Street. And here comes a vampire, chivvying his charges behind St. Giles High Kirk. There'll soon be more screams if the trailing brown-cowled monk is a "jumper-oot."
Everyone loves bargains. But despite the economic downturn, you might think the romance of living in a restored mill in the South of France costs quite a bit more than $230,000. As for a chateau for less than $450,000…surely that’s pure fantasy?
I’m spellbound. Tiny Boracay truly is one of the world’s most magical islands. So magical that even confirmed beach skeptics like me can’t help but fall in love with its laidback lifestyle.
Cascades of silver lights twinkle from trees...red lanterns bob in celebration of Chinese New Year, the Year of the Ox. I love dining on Jalan Alor street, but should it be Fu Xi’s again? Enough for two, his spiced clams are only $3.35.
Can you picture yourself snorkeling in the Sulu Sea or having a jungle encounter with orangutans? I can, and it’s worrying. My next trip is to Malaysia, the Philippines, and Borneo. All those headhunters, strangling vines, and hairy primates—and who knows what horrors lurk in the ocean?
Ablaze in bonfire colors, Parc Woluwe’s trees rustle messages that Brussels is tilting into winter. Christmas markets, squares transformed into ice rinks, roasted chestnuts and steamy windows.