Perhaps you’d like to know what happened after I was robbed at Bangkok Airport security last month. Well, the saga continued with more “investigations” and a mysterious wire transfer. Transparency is not the first word that comes to mind. Continue Reading »

So there we were: Audrey was sketching an amorphous menagerie – a sheep, a cow, and a chicken – along with a simple carrot, all on small pad of paper, while Dan offered a few charades and barnyard audio cues - a chicken dance, a moo, and a hearty “baaah” – to help bring the animal farm to life. (Thankfully, charading a carrot was beyond Dan’s abilities.)

Had the Chinese wine we consumed turned on us? Continue Reading »

You have a virtual stack of geotagged photos. So now what?

Share them with the world, and share where in the world you’ve been.

This third (and final…save the tears) segment of our geotagging case study is intended to help you upload your geotagged photos and share them with the world by integrating them with websites that support Google Maps or Yahoo Maps. Continue Reading »

If I were ever tortured, my captors would break me by playing the morning music from the elementary school next door.

– Dan, after the fifth straight day of waking up at 7:15 AM to enjoy a 45-minute syrupy Thai musical loop resembling “It’s a Small World After All” followed by a live, 15-minute booming drum and bass cadence used to drive a herd of students to their seats. Continue Reading »

The title sounds like a daunting little geekfest, doesn’t it? Not at all - even Audrey has managed to figure it out. Continue Reading »

When we missed the last direct train of the season from Urumqi to Dunhuang, China, we didn’t realize that lady luck was actually smiling on us. We skipped the Buddhist cave paintings of Dunhuang, but landed smack in the middle of a crowd of Tibetan pilgrims visiting the Labrang Monastery for a cham (Tibetan monastic opera) in the town of Xiahe.

This was just the visual stimulation we were looking for! Continue Reading »

15 Months, 16 countries, and 1000s of photos taken on the road - from boats, trains and buses, and on horseback - all of them geotagged and many displayed with GoogleMaps. How do we do it all?

We’re going to tell you in a three-part series - starting now. Continue Reading »

After reflecting on the challenges faced by Myanmar (Burma) yesterday, we wanted to leave you with a more pleasant image of the country for the weekend.

News stories take on increased significance when we’ve actually visited the place being covered. For example, we’ve recently been reading more about the effects of a harsh winter on the lives of ordinary people in both Tajikistan and China. As we read these stories, images of the people we’ve met become superimposed on a piece of news that we might otherwise regard with detachment.

We now follow Myanmar (Burma) more closely, as well. Just a few days ago, the junta (military government) there made news by announcing another “road map to democracy” and elections in 2010. Continue Reading »

We realize that we may confuse our readers occasionally. One day we’re writing about Tajikistan and the next day about Myanmar, all while traveling through Thailand.

Why so much bouncing around? Continue Reading »