Lonely Planet writer admits he never visited country he wrote about

by Aaron Hotfelder on

Most people who have taken guidebooks on the road realize that they’re bound to contain a few inaccuracies. But did you ever consider that the guidebook’s author had never even been to the place he wrote about?

An Australian newspaper reported this weekend that a Lonely Planet guidebook writer named Thomas Kohnstamm has admitted to fabricating large parts of his books. The writer even copped to not having actually visited Colombia, a country he covered for the well-known guidebook publisher.

So how did Kohnstamm write the Colombia guidebook without visiting the country first? “I got the information from a chick I was dating– an intern at the Colombian consulate,” says Kohnstamm. “They didn’t pay me enough to go to Colombia. I wrote the book in San Francisco.”

Kohnstamm also confesses that he plagiarized large parts of the guidebooks, and accepted free meals and lodging on the road, a clear violation of LP policy.

The author covered a number of countries for Lonely Planet, including Brazil, Venezuela, Chile, the Caribbean, and Colombia. Well, maybe not Colombia. The big-wigs over at Lonely Planet say they’re scrutinizing everything Kohnstamm has written for them, but have not yet found any mistakes.

No mistakes? Hmm, that does sound fishy.

(Thanks, Neil!)

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More Gadling writers sound off on the Lonely Planet problem:

Are soccer players from violent countries more likely to get yellow cards?

by Aaron Hotfelder on

A new study [pdf] by three researchers purports to show that soccer players in European leagues who come from countries with histories of civil war are more likely to play violently on the field, as measured by their tendency to get yellow and red cards. Check out the chart here— and notice that the two countries nearly off the grid are Colombia and Israel.

So does growing up in a violent country mean you’ll be a dirtier soccer player? Well, not necessarily. There are, of course, a couple problems with the study:

  • As any Stat 101 student knows, correlation does not imply causality. Perhaps the soccer played in certain countries– Colombia, Israel, Ivory Coast, Georgia– is just more physical than the soccer in Europe.
  • Maybe the referees are biased.
  • Maybe the players are getting yellow cards for diving rather than hard tackles.
  • Maybe a lot of things.

Despite these apparent problems, I find the study ingenious and fascinating. As the study says: “Beyond providing a novel real-world measure of individuals’ willingness to commit acts of violence, this finding indicates that some aspects of national culture are persistent even when individuals are far from home in a different institutional setting, here, a professional sports league.”

More here.

Independence days and elephants

by Jamie Rhein on

I’ve whipped out my International Calendar to see what might be left to tell about November before it slips away from Eastern Standard Time in a few hours. What I see is a whole lot of independence days and a slew of other politically geared occasions.

  • Nov. 1–Antigua-Barbuda gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1980.
  • Nov. 3–Dominica gained independence from the UK in 1978. Panama gained Independence from Colombia in 1903 and Micronesia gained independence from the U.S. in 1980.
  • Nov. 9–Cambodia gained independence from France in 1953.
  • Nov. 11–Poland gained independence in 1918; Angola gained independence from Portugal in 1975.
  • Nov. 18–Latvia gained independence from Russia in 1918; Morocco from France in 1956.
  • Nov. 25–Suriname gained independence
  • Nov. 28–Mauritania gained Independence from France in 1968 and Albania gained Independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1912, Panama gained independence from Spain in 1821 and East Timor gained independence from Portugal in 1975.
  • Nov. 30-Barbados gained independence from the U.K. in 1966

Other than these, Tonga has had Constitution Day (Nov. 4); Russia, Revolution Day (Nov. 7); Brazil, Republic Day (Nov. 15); and Vanuatu has had National Unity Day, (Nov. 29)

My favorite happening of the bunch of events that occurred this month, though, is the Surin Elephant Round-Up in Thailand.

Runway in Sao Paulo Too Short? Too Wet?

by Iva Skoch on

Almost 200 passengers are suspected dead after the TAM airlines Airbus-320 (en route to Sao Paulo from Porto Alegre in southern Brazil) skidded on the rain-slicked runway in Sao Paulo and slammed into a gas station and TAM building yesterday, USA Today reports.

This is apparently the second major airline disaster in Brazil within a year. In September, 154 died when a Gol Aerolinhas Inteligentes SA Boeing 737 and an executive jet collided over the Amazon rain forest.

There have been questions about the country’s underfunded air traffic control systems, deficient radar system and the airlines’ ability to cope with a surge in travelers. Also, the length of the runway at Sao Paulo’s airport has been repeatedly criticized for being too short (it is 6,365 feet, compared with a 7,003-foot runway at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, which accommodates similar planes) and two planes slipped off it in rainy weather just a day earlier, though no one was injured in either incident.

Plus, yesterday in Colombia, a passenger plane skidded off a wet runway and into the Caribbean Sea.

Seriously, if a wet runway is all it takes, I am worried.

Photo of the Day (06/18/07)

by Iva Skoch on

Three more days and summer is officially here. I don’t care this photo might be staged and is borderline kitschy…after all that’s what summer is all about. (I even like that the guy is holding his own foot.)

Taken in Cartagena, Colombia by Christoher Kirk.