Scientists recommend alternate route for proposed Serengeti Highway

by Kraig Becker on

Back in July we posted a story about how the Tanzanian government had approved the construction of a new highway that would cut directly through the Serengeti National Park, which is home to a spectacular array of animal life. Officials explained how the new road was necessary in order to facilitate trade and continue economic development in the region, and that they expected the highway to have little impact on the Serengeti ecosystem. Unfortunately, the 290 scientists, from 32 different countries, who signed a recent petition, disagree with that sentiment.

Those scientists, who represent more than 50 different universities worldwide, are recommending that Tanzania find an alternate route around the Serengeti or face severe, negative, and irreversible damage to the environment there. Of most concern is how the increased traffic would impact the annual migration that takes place on the Serengeti plains during which time, millions of wildebeests, zebras, antelopes, and other animals travel across the region, playing an important role in helping the ecosystem to not only survive, but thrive. The fear is that if the migration is disrupted, it could lead to a complete collapse of that ecosystem.

The petition includes a survey of those same scientists in which they give their thoughts on a variety of topics in regards to the road. For instance, 85% of those surveyed said that they felt that it was either inevitable or very likely that the new highway would become a disruption or obstruction of the migration. Furthermore, 91% answered the same way when asked if they thought it would introduce invasive plants, animals, and diseases to the region.

The scientists join conservationists, international organizations, and the travel industry in condemning the plans to build the road. While all parties involved respect Tanzania’s desire to expand its economy, they also recognize that the Serengeti is a natural resource that is fragile and could easily be altered beyond repair.

While the local government is planning to move ahead with construction plans, the Save the Serengeti organization is still hoping to find an alternative solution. Personally, I hope they can too.

New report says Amazon reveals one new species every three days

by Kraig Becker on

2010 has been declared the International Year of Biodiversity to help raise awareness of the vast numbers of species that exist on our planet and the challenges that now threaten many of them with extinction. There is no place on the planet that exemplifies the concept of biodiversity like the Amazon jungle, which is home to thousands of different animal species and tens of thousands of plants. But as striking as those numbers are, a new report indicates that we’re still discovering new species at a surprising rate.

The World Wildlife Fund recently released a comprehensive study entitled Amazon Alive: A Decade of Discoveries 1999-2009 which details some of the amazing plants and animals that have been found in the rainforest over the past ten years. During that time frame, a total of 637 plants, 257 fish, 216 amphibians, 55 reptiles, 16 birds and 39 mammals have been discovered in the Amazon basin. Those numbers represent one new species of plant or animal has been found every three days for the bast decade!

Amongst the new species that were discovered between 1999 and 2009 are a breed of pink river dolphin that exist only in Bolivia and a new species of anaconda that stretches four meters in length and is a master at hiding amongst the trees. Biologists have also found a bald species of parrot that is spectacularly colored and a large, blue-fanged spider that preys on birds.

In the report the WWF also emphasizes how important it is to protect these species and the rainforest in general. The Amazon plays an important role in our planets ecosystem, and in recent years it has come under threat from massive deforestation efforts.

With a new species found every three days, this is just the tip of the iceberg for what has been uncovered in the Amazon over the past ten years. These kinds of reports are a great reminder about how amazing our planet is, and how much we still have to learn about it. It is also a good reminder of why we should take good care of it as well.

[Photo credit: Chris Funk]

Ancient Egyptian tomb discovered

by Sean McLachlan on


A priest’s tomb that’s more than 4,000 years old has been discovered near the pyramids of Giza, Egypt. Egyptian archaeologists say the tomb belonged to a priest named Rwd-ka from the Fifth Dynasty (2494-2345 BC), a time in the Old Kingdom when religion was undergoing major changes, including the elevation in importance of the sun god Ra, and the development of the Pyramid Texts, which later developed into the Egyptian Book of the Dead. Rwd-ka would have been at the forefront of these changes, since one of his duties was to say prayers for the dead pharaohs.

Not much is known about Rwd-ka. His tomb contains rich carvings of countryside scenes as well as the priest and his wife before a table of offerings to the gods, perhaps similar to the scene above from a tomb at Saqqara.

The discovery was part of ongoing excavations in the area and just the latest in a string of recent successes for Egyptologists.

[Photo courtesy the Egypt Archive]

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Travel writing tips: Four seeds from the garden of Susan Orlean

by Don George on
Earlier this month I had the exhilarating opportunity to interview Susan Orlean on stage as part of the National Geographic Traveler Conversations series. I’ve been a fan of her work in The New Yorker and elsewhere for many years, but had never met her until early this year when we were on a panel together, so I was thrilled by this chance for a prolonged conversation.

Orlean enlivened the night with numerous anecdotes and tips, but four in particular took root in my mind. Here they are:

Resourcefulness and perseverance are all: Well, not really all, but Orlean’s tales demonstrated in two ways just how important these qualities are. The first is how she advanced in her career as a journalist: She was working on a small newspaper in Oregon when a religious cult began to build a commune in a rural part of the state. She recognized that this had the makings of a big piece, called the Village Voice in faraway New York, and convinced the editor that this was a story the Voice would want to publish. This kind of pluck, vision and determination propelled her from Oregon to Boston, where she wrote for the Phoenix and the Globe, and then to New York, where she landed her dream job writing for The New Yorker – about which she said, “I had been writing stories for The New Yorker for a long time; they just didn’t realize it.”
Resourcefulness and perseverance are key to her stories as well: When she went to Spain to interview the first female matador, Orlean recalled, everything fell apart: The man who had represented himself as the matador’s agent turned out to be a fraud; the interview she thought she had arduously set up had evaporated. This matador was such a hot property that no media person could get close to her. So what did Orlean do? She tracked down the matador’s mother and spilled out her woeful tale. Eventually she got her interview – and her story, “The Bullfighter Checks Her Make-Up.”

I’ve heard this kind of story over and over from successful journalists. Talent is part of the equation, but finding a way to get your story – whatever obstacles the world throws in your path – is an equally important part. It’s happened time and again in my own life, too. When I arrived in Siena late at night and every hotel and hostel was “completo,” I ended up sleeping on the third-storey stoop of a stony apartment building – and wrote a piece about the unexpected revelations that adventure conferred. When my evening flight from Dulles to San Francisco got canceled and I was suddenly spending the night in Leesburg, Va., I wrote a piece about that. When you know where you want to go, find a way to get there. And when your bus breaks down, look around: Stories abound.

Look for your connection to a place and follow that thread: Orlean talked about how she approaches a place by looking for something quirky or idiosyncratic that connects her to that place and becomes her point of entry. When she wrote about Morocco, for example, she approached it through the unlikely portal of donkeys. She began by analyzing the essential role donkeys play in the daily life of the medina of Fez, whose ancient alleys are too narrow to accommodate motor vehicles. That focus led her to an extraordinary institution called the American Fondouk, a free veterinary clinic in Fez that was founded and funded in 1927 by a wealthy American woman who had been distressed by the condition of the donkeys. Orlean met the Canadian currently in charge of the Fondouk and through that connection, found a guide to take her to “the epicenter of the donkey universe in Morocco,” the grand donkey market at Khemis-des Zemamra. When she wrote her article, “Where Donkeys Deliver,” these connection-stones paved a poignant pathway into the heart of Morocco that I had never read before.

Orlean’s words reminded me of the advice I pass on in my Travel Writing book: Look for your passion point. It may be puppets in Paris, potatoes in Peru, or hula in Hawaii – whatever connects your passion to the local culture, that’s your entryway. Pursue it and see where it takes you. A great example of this notion is the article “Mexico: Guitar Central,” by Los Angeles Times writer Chris Reynolds. In this wonderful piece, the quest to track down and buy the perfect handmade guitar reveals the quintessential qualities of a Mexican mountain town and its high, homespun art. Pursue your passion point, and my bet is it will open up a place and its culture to you in a way that they’ve never been seen — and written about — before.

Be in the moment: One of the most piquant points Orlean made is that she doesn’t really like taking notes on the spot. “I like to spend a fair amount of time not worrying about note-taking,” she said. “I like to have time to get the feel of a place before I’m scribbling.” Later, she elaborated, “I don’t take exhaustive, extensive notes, but I do indeed take notes on the spot — I have my notebook with me always, and jot when I need to — and I definitely use notes when it comes to quotes. But I care more about paying attention and absorbing where I am. I count on my memory as much as I count on my notes.”

I absolutely agree about wanting to be in the moment, and this has been an ongoing frustration in my career as a travel writer. The moment you take out pen and notebook, you detach yourself from the scene you’re seeking to describe. Over the years I’ve tried to modulate this detachment so that I’m constantly plugging and unplugging into the experience I’m describing – hopefully so fast that I don’t lose the electrical connection to the flow of the experience itself. On the other hand, I’ve always found that the notes I take on the spot are my best, most vivid portals right back into that experience, so that I can recall it, surround myself in it, three weeks or three months after the trip ends. I expressed this to Orlean and she agreed, “Notes taken on the spot are sharp and instant, and are very important; memory is not sufficient.”

So: Immerse yourself as much as you can in the moment – but take enough notes so that memory can find its way back long after that moment has passed.

Surprise me: One last delightful point Orlean made was the value of surprise. Almost invariably her stories begin, she said, with something that surprises her. The Taxidermy World Championships, for example: “What’s that all about?” she thought when she first heard about the competition, and the quest to understand that obsession led to her acclaimed 2003 piece “Lifelike.”

The same process applied to “The Orchid Thief.” The genesis of the book was a short newspaper story about a convoluted case of orchid theft in Florida. At first Orlean just didn’t understand all the fuss: How could people be so passionate about a flower? As she tried to answer this question, the journey took her deeper and deeper into the orchid’s musky, mysterious, maddening swamp.

Every one of her pieces, Orlean intimated, unfolds as a journey for her to explore and understand something that has surprised her and kept her attention. Happily for us, Orlean’s extraordinary skills as a reporter and writer transform those journeys into odysseys of enlightenment for her readers as well.

[Photo credit/Flickr user Jonrawlinson]

Five tips to reduce your health risk while eating street food

by Laurel Miller on

It was the 18th century food writer and gastronome Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin who famously said, “Tell me what you eat, and I’ll tell you what you are.” For certain cultures, street food is more than just a cheap, tasty, easy way to fuel the body. It’s part of a daily ritual, a way to catch up on neighborhood or community gossip, a means of eking out a living to provide for one’s family. By eating foreign street food, you get a sense of the social fabric and gender roles of a community or culture, but what about the health risks?

Some travelers equate a love of street food with a latent wish to sightsee whilst wearing an adult diaper. They steer clear of anything sold from a vendor, or resembling fruit, vegetable, or beverage not from a bottle (although when it comes to drinking water, you should always err on the side of caution, and there is something to be said about peeling or washing produce to avoid pesticide residue, since many developing nations use chemicals banned in the U.S.). What these folks may not realize is that foodborne illnesses such as E.coli, salmonella, and listeria don’t discriminate. FDA statistics show you’re more likely to get sick from preparing food at home than from dining in a domestic restaurant.

Is street food inherently more risky than eating in a restaurant when you travel? Sometimes, and it depends. Children, the elderly, and those with compromised immune systems are certainly more at risk of getting ill, and may be best off avoiding street eats. But there are certain precautionary measures healthy travelers can take before scarfing their tacos or mystery-meat kebabs that will minimize the chances of bringing home more than just a suitcase full of sweatshop-made tchotchkes as souvenirs. Read on.

1. Is there a crowd? Just like at home, go where the locals go, as they obviously know where to find the good stuff. But high volume also means that food is being prepared fresh, rather than sitting around attracting flies and turning into something useful for waging biological warfare.

2. Are basic hygiene practices being implemented by the vendor(s)? In Mexico, I’ve frequently observed street vendors slipping clean plastic bags over plates. With every order, a new bag is used, then discarded at the end of the meal. It’s an eco-nightmare, but it’s a lot more sanitary than dunking a plate in a bucket of dingy water doubling as a petri dish. Also bear in mind that in many parts of the world, the left hand performs double-duty as toilet paper. I can’t say it enough: Look at the sanitation practices before ordering.

You’ll often find co-workers whose sole responsibility is to handle money, to avoid cross-contaminating food (this isn’t always the case, however, so sometimes you’ll just have to–literally–suck it up). Once, when I accidentally handed my money to the wrong guy, he turned his hand upside-down to avoid contact with my filthy coins.

3. Is the stand or cart clean and well-maintained? Is hot food kept hot or cooked to order, and is cold food cold? Is purified water or ice used for beverages and frozen treats?

4. Are the ingredients fresh? If you’ve got eyes, a nose, and some tastebuds, you can figure this out for yourself. I look at the condiments and garnishes to determine if I want to eat at a given stand or cart. If I see crusty bowls of salsa, dessicated limes, slimy herbs, or flies congregated on any raw foods I might potentially eat, I’m out of there.

Stick to local specialties. One of the greatest joys of travel is eating regional ingredients or dishes. It also stands to reason that ordering seafood in an inland desert is a calculated risk. Raw protein products (egg, meat, poultry, fish, fresh cheeses) in general are to be avoided in the Third World. What about dishes like ceviche, where the acid in the citrus juice denatures (breaks down proteins, killing some potential pathogens in the process) the fish? It’s still risky, because technically it’s an uncooked food, and only application of heat over 145 degrees can totally annihilate anything potentially deadly lurking in fish. Again, use good judgment based on freshness of ingredients and basic sanitation, but remember that you can’t eliminate all risk.

If you’re in a coastal region, it pays to do a bit of homework on the cleanliness of the local fresh and ocean water supplies; algae blooms or cholera outbreaks will be widely reported. Try to avoid eating raw river fish or seafood, or river fish/seafood from just offshore; remember that many developing island nations and coastal regions use high tide as their toilet. If you’re eating pork in the Third World, always make sure it’s well-cooked. While trichinosis has effectively been eradicated from our domestic industrial pork supply, the disease is prevalent in other parts of the world. And not to get too graphic, but you’ll often find pigs in rural parts of the developing world lurking around latrines, searching for a snack.

Fresh ingredients don’t necessarily mean great food, but it helps. Delicious street food is ulimately a reflection of the loving care that goes into its preparation. Are the carnitas slightly crispy on the outside, with an interior succulent with greasy goodness? Is the masa in the tamales moist, with a sweet, earthy corn flavor? Are the noodles slightly toothsome, the herbs fresh and bright-tasting, the broth fragrant and piping hot? These things matter.

5. Use hand sanitizer before eating, take probiotics with live active cultures prophylactically, and pack a broad-spectrum gastrointestinal antibiotic and Imodium, just in case. I’m just sayin’.

For more information on food safety, go to this page on the USDA website.