The Buddha, a two-hour documentary for PBS by award-winning filmmaker David Grubin and narrated by Richard Gere, tells the story of the Buddha’s life, a journey especially relevant to our own bewildering times of violent change and spiritual confusion. The program was produced in conjunction with the exhibition Pilgrimage and Buddhist Art, organized by Asia Society Museum, New York, opening in March 2010. The companion website for The Buddha, launching in early 2010, will feature the work of some of the world’s greatest artists and sculptors, who across two millennia, have depicted the Buddha’s life in art rich in beauty and complexity. Hear insights into the ancient narrative by contemporary Buddhists — including Pulitzer Prize winning poet W.S. Merwin and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Join the conversation and learn more about meditation, the history of Buddhism, and how to incorporate the Buddha’s teachings on compassion and mindfulness into daily life.
Premiering April 7, 2010 at 8 p.m. EST on PBS stations nationwide
The Los Angeles Times featured an article on modern architectural delights in the ancient city of Chiang Mai as reported by Susan Spano
“About 30 years ago, the gods of style looked down from design heaven on a town in central New Mexico. It was dusty and small, but they thought it had potential, so they nodded and turned it into Santa Fe…
They’re at it again in Chiang Mai, the old northern capital of Thailand, founded at 4 a.m. on the eighth day of the waxing moon in the month of Visakha and the Year of the Monkey, or 1296, a date dictated by Indian cosmology. More than 700 years later, a construction boom has given Chiang Mai some of the most stylish hotels and restaurants in Southeast Asia. Galleries and design stores have opened, showcasing a trove of textiles, ceramics, furniture, antiques and architectural salvage…
Builders have sought inspiration from the gilded temples and traditional teakwood houses. Designers and buyers come for the arts and crafts, which add an elegant Asian echo to contemporary minimalism…”
To read the complete article, visit LATimes.com
Visit our site for information on group travel to Thailand or creating a custom private trip to Thailand for just you and your family or friends.
Travel Research Online published an article on Turkey – Tea with the Locals by Richard Earls.
“Yes, the British and the Japanese have their tea customs and rituals, and I wouldn’t want to take away from the special nature of either of those cultures. But if I had to choose where I would most like to have a cup of tea with the locals, it would be Turkey. Tea shops are a focal point for street level Turkish culture and most good things happen in the presence of a cup of fine Turkish tea. The Turkish people prefer the black tea (or Cay in Turkish) and it is at the center of daily life there, offered everywhere as a gesture of hospitality both before and after meals…
Tea is a good place to begin understanding how to visit Turkey. This is a land of relationships, where time sits still to permit you to go about getting to know your surroundings. Here, travelers are welcomed and greeted with both respect and curiosity. The antiquities, thermal pools, coastline and Turkish baths are all there waiting to be explored, but it is in the marketplace with the people that Turkey is best experienced, because it is there that the warmth and culture of this ancient civilization is authentically expressed…
Turkey is not a destination to hurry through. Experience it slowly, like a fine cup of hot, black Turkish tea.”
To read the complete article, visit travelresearchonline.com
Visit our site for information on group travel to Turkey or creating a custom private trip to Turkey for just you and your family or friends.
Taksang Monastery
Notes from Paro, Bhutan from Kirsten Louy Nasty, Asia Transpacific Journeys’ Operations Manager
We awoke early to a cool, still morning. The sun had not yet peered from behind the mountains. After basic morning ablutions, we headed to the dining area where we had requested an early breakfast and more importantly, an early coffee. We picked up a picnic lunch consisting of cheese momos, emma datse (cheese and chilies sauce) with rice and vegetables, grilled chicken and hot tea, from a local restaurant. After parking our Land Cruiser at a monastery just above Paro town, we adjusted our pack straps, tightened our hiking shoes, checked our belongings and remembered to dab on sunscreen before the rays began to cut through the thin mountain air onto our skin.
Our posse of 5 intrepid hikers followed a windy one-lane hiking trail up, up, up through brush, branches and moss-covered trees. We quickly rose above the layers of incense and wood fire smoke from below, and above the townspeople preparing for their busy day in the fields, at the market or business. We could not hear them; the air was quiet. We ascended above daily life on a pilgrimage; a mission to find the famous Taksang Monastery (Tiger’s Nest) by a path less traveled, swooping in from behind and sneaking up on it, as if on the back of our very own winged tigress.
After ascending 3,000 ft in 3 hours we came upon a high meadow with views of the Himalayan peaks and the valleys below; the layers of valleys extending far beyond. Our picnic lunch was our body’s fuel and the breathtaking view, our soul’s reward. We paused to take it all in. The furry-faced yaks with clanking neck bells turned to watch us. Then onward down, down, down we continued until a turned corner revealed a gem of a structure clinging to the side of a cliff wrapped, as if a precious gift, in bands and strings of colorful prayer flags. Its gold paint glimmered in the morning light. A Tiger’s Nest it was, and we had landed. It looked as if a strong wind or one move from the mountain and earth could hurtle it into the crevice below, but for over 300 years the monastery has strongly held its precarious position on the side of the mountain; a testament to the faith and vision of those who built it.
Our small group witnessed that day of the beauty of friendship, of the land, of humanity and of history. We stopped to say hi to the inquisitive yaks, to spin prayer wheels and to let peace soak in. We walked on the earth and shared stories while breathing the air deep into our lungs. We enjoyed food and drink together and we viewed an awe inspiring structure which continues to sacredly store spiritual stories and, which conveyed to us, the meaning of Bhutan.
Visit our site for information on group travel to Bhutan or creating a custom private trip to Bhutan for just you and your family or friends.
The Daily Telegraph featured an article Istanbul being the European Capital of Culture for 2010 reported by James Bedding
Istanbul may be European Capital of Culture for 2010, but it by no means needs special events to be worth a visit. Its sublime Ottoman mosques and Byzantine churches, its sprawling palaces and bazaars, and its spectacular location overlooking the waters of the Golden Horn and the Bosporus are without parallel. Add the fact that Turkey is currently very affordable and the locals famously welcoming, and you have all the ingredients for an unforgettable city break whenever you go.
This year, celebrations highlight everything that makes the city special. First as Constantinople and later as Istanbul, this has been the capital of two great empires. Straddling two continents, the city has been the gateway through which Eastern influences have reached Europe, as well as the West’s window on the Orient, Asia and the Islamic world.
To read the complete article, visit telegraph.co.uk
Visit our site for information on group travel to Turkey or creating a custom private trip to Turkey for just you and your family or friends.
Travel + Leisure magazine featured an article on Laos becoming Asia’s new hot spot, as reported by Guy Trebay.
…Luang Prabang is a rare place in Asia—a calm and somnolent city, a town of narrow lanes and polychrome temples and worn timber houses and scabbed colonial colonnades, all set along a peninsular thumb that juts toward a bend in the Mekong River and is surrounded by mountains that are like palisades shutting out the wider world.
There are other protections as well. Since 1995, when UNESCO inscribed Luang Prabang on its list of World Cultural Heritage sites, designating it “the best-preserved city in Southeast Asia,” teams of architects and planners, mostly French, have labored to hold back the inevitable tide of development, retarding if not altogether halting the changes that often spell doom when some lovely and untouched backwater becomes the next destination. And Luang Prabang is surely that place…
The city I found was dozy and small enough to cover on foot in a day or two but best experienced over the course of a week. Like the mandalas some Buddhists use as aids to meditation, Luang Prabang turns out to be a city of recurrent patterns, of images and motifs explored and repeated, refined across centuries and with the clear-cut goal of hastening enlightenment. It was for centuries a royal city, but just as important was its role as a monastic center. Even now the temple complexes are active centers of worship and learning. The saffron-robed monks you see everywhere are more than local color. They are the animating force of the city, the engine whose sound is the always-audible hum of their prayers.
To read the complete article, visit Travel and Leisure.com
Visit our site for information on group travel to Laos or creating a custom private trip to Laos for just you and your family or friends.
We just asked our fellow travelers why they travel to Asia, and the responses were inspiring. There were quite a few repeating sentiments, which got us thinking, “Which words were used most often?” We ran all the responses through tag cloud generator wordle.net for a visual overview of your thoughts. Or read all the responses in their entirety.
The New York Times featured an article on Bali’s roadside stands, as reported by Gisela Williams.
There are two kinds of culinary travelers who end up on Bali: ones who don’t flinch at spending hundreds of dollars for a bottle of Rioja at a trendy Asian-French fusion restaurant, and those who are obsessive about going as local as possible…
While guidebooks and hotel concierges may warn you that eating at a warung is a little like playing Russian roulette with your stomach, they are probably being overly cautious. The truth is that the street food in tourist-friendly Bali is as sanitary as what you’d find in most American cities, if not more so.
Besides, if you heed their warning, you’ll miss some of the best food the island has to offer…
Thanks to the ravings on foodie blogs like Eating Asia, and an episode of “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations,” where the host declared its babi guling, or roast pig, the best that he’s ever had, Ibu Oka has become a tourist magnet…
To read the complete article, visit NYTimes.com
Visit our site for information on group travel to Bali or creating a custom private trip to Indonesia to include a cooking school or culinary focus for just you and your family or friends.
© Elissa Poma/WWF-US
Elissa Poma from WWF shares her passion for the dance traditions of Yap.
The art of dancing holds such an esteemed placed in all cultures, throughout all of time. That’s especially true of the Yapese — traditional dance remains a strong part of their identity. Every Yapese person, regardless of his or her place in society, is expected to know how to dance — in fact, as soon as a child is old enough to pay attention and follow instructions, his parents begin teaching him. They’re performed during special occasions, such as big feasts and marriages.
I appreciated that the traditional stick dance these teenage boys were performing is still alive in their culture and not just for tourists. And the precision with which they performed one evening during sunset was masterful and hypnotizing.
Visit our site for information on group travel to Micronesia with WWF or creating a custom private trip to Micronesia for just you and your family or friends.
The New York Times featured an article on the silk-weaving tradition of Laos, as reported by Sandra Ballentine.
For many years the ancient silk-weaving tradition of Laos was stifled under the Communist regime that took over the country in 1975… Today, however, with the government amenable to entrepreneurship and tourism, affluent and educated Lao expats, as well as conservation-minded foreigners, have revived this once-endangered art.
The first stop on any silk route should be Vientiane, Laos’s capital, which is usually overlooked for the more picturesque town of Luang Prabang. But it is in Vientiane where you find couture-quality textiles rather than the cheaper fabrics aimed at the tourist trade.
Not far from Luang Prabang is the tiny weaving village of Phonesay. You have to cross a rickety, suspended wooden bridge and then dodge chickens on a dirt road to reach it, but here you can see weaving at its most traditional. As they have for hundreds of years, the women mind the children and weave in their bamboo-and-thatch houses all day while the men fish the Mekong River.
To read the complete article, visit NYTimes.com
Visit our site for information on group travel to Indochina or creating a custom private trip to Laos for just you and your family or friends.
