Step 1: Set camera’s self-timer for 2 seconds. Step 2: Push button. Step 3: Run away.

by Aaron Hotfelder on


“The rules are simple,” writes a photographer who goes by muggezifter (roughly “nit-picker”). “I put the self-timer on 2 seconds, push the button and try to get as far from the camera as I can.”

Over at the aptly-named blog Running from Camera, muggezifter has collected dozens of photos, mostly taken in his adopted hometown of Rotterdam, where he follows just this rule. Check out his excellent Flickr set here.
As I conducted a very modest amount of research for this post, I discovered that this idea has actually been done before. Photographer John Divola released a book in 2007 called As Far as I Could Get, which appears to be the inspiration for muggezifter‘s blog. (He links to Divola’s work prominently.) The major difference is that in Divola’s book, the photographer sets the camera’s self-timer for 10 seconds before taking off.

For any of you aspiring photographers out there in Blog-land, I know a sure-fire way to get your photo featured as Gadling’s Photo of the Day. Step 1: Set camera’s self-timer for two seconds. Step 2: Push button. Step 3: Run away. [Step 4: Don’t forget to upload your photo to the Gadling Flickr pool.]

How to prepare for reverse culture shock

by Gadling Staff on

You’re planning your return from an extended vacation. Or, you’re coming back to live in an old, familiar place after a long stint working abroad. Either way, you’ll need to prepare mentally for your return home.

Although you may have grown up in this old familiar place, returning home can be a real jolt to the system. After all, you’ve grown accustomed to the lifestyle, attitudes, and perspective of some new culture. Now, this new culture is in your blood; you’re a new person now. Remember how different the new culture felt when you first arrived — the “culture shock” you experienced? Believe it or not, returning to your old stomping grounds can be just as rattling. This is known as “reverse culture shock.”

For weeks — maybe months! — you’ll be experiencing your home base with fresh perspective; seeing old friends who may not understand what you’ve seen and done; and navigating a (potentially) unfamiliar culture of consumerism. It can be stressful. Here are some tips for making the adjustment and learning to love your new, old home again.

Don’t expect your friends and family to want all the delicious details of your trip.
More often than not, they’ll ask, “Did you have a good time?” or “Was it what you’d hoped it would be?”. They’ll smile and nod and be happy to hear you reply, “Yes!” And … that’s it. No more.

So don’t plan the two-hour slide show, and make peace with the fact that even your closest friends and family may just not care about the time you found yourself on horseback roping cattle with Mexican cowboys or schmoozing on the Jungfrau ski slopes with Swiss business clients. You may have had a life-changing experience abroad, but back home, people were living their lives and enduring the same ol’ same ol’ you got to escape. So don’t rub it in. (To be fair, it may not be that they don’t care. It may be that, at home in their normal lives, they just can’t understand the massive, life-changing experience you enjoyed.)

Find some friends who can share your new, wider world perspective.
Seek out expats living in your area, or reach out to others who have also spent significant time in other cultures. There’s a good chance those folks will want to hear your stories — and they might even agree to look at your photos.

Get on Facebook.
Find your friends from abroad. Seeing photos and daily updates of friends you’ve left behind will help you feel connected to the life you left behind.

Get off Facebook.
However, resist the urge to simply hang on the Internet. Make plans that involve face-to-face contact, actual food, and real experiences. The best way to re-kindle the flame for the culture you left behind is to embrace it. Give it a hug. So make a dinner reservation, buy a movie ticket, and leave the house.

Make shopping lists.
Rediscovering a developed nation’s shopping experience can leave a person breathless. Nowhere in the world are there as many choices, stores, and products. After buying at local boutiques, green grocers, butchers, and bakeries, a developed nation’s mega-retailer or grocery store may feel overwhelming. The Halloween costumes for cats may be captivating, but you’ll never get out of there if you don’t stay focused and buy what you came for.


Keep up your language skills.
Get the foreign language channels on your cable service and watch Sponge Bob in Spanish. Don’t select English when you watch your DVDs. Call friends, speak to shopkeepers, read foreign magazines. Unless you make the effort to use your language skills, you’ll lose them. And down the road, you’ll feel really bad about that.

Incorporate foreign customs into your lifestyle.
Since most Western holidays have become consumer-driven events, many holiday traditions of foreign cultures can feel like a breath of fresh air.

Instead of spending an arm and a leg on artificial amputated arms and legs for Halloween, why not create a “Day of the Dead Altar” with fruits and flowers, and photos of relatives who’ve passed on? Alternatively, make a Dragon head costume and have dim sum for New Year’s Eve.

Get involved with a cause.
Westerners can be among the most generous and proactive members of the social and environmental activism movements. There’s no better way to feel good about your country than to be a part of an effort that makes the world a better place — for animals or for human beings, even for rivers, mountains, and forests.

Make plans to visit the country you left behind.
Investigate house swap websites or invite friends to trade your apartment or house so you can more easily afford to travel. If you know you have plans for a visit, coming back home may not feel so final.

Be careful what you eat.
In the Western world, high fructose corn syrup is in soft drinks, spaghetti sauces, and even sandwich breads. It’s easy to gain a few pounds after being away for so long, unless you check labels and look for hidden calories. And, while your first stop after the airport may be McDonald’s to eat some french fries, you don’t really need to “super size it.”

If you’ve learned anything by living in a foreign country, its that you can get by eating and buying and having less. Remember how happy you were with less. Less is more.

Returning home after a long experience abroad can be jarring initially. However, with a little patience, you’ll feel comfortable in your new, old home again — and richer for having explored other cultures.

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Smithsonian draws more people, brings in extra cash

by Tom Johansmeyer on

Last year wasn’t bad for everyone. The Smithsonian Institution returned to past glory, logging more than 30 million visits. Action at the Smithsonian hasn’t been this high since before the 9/11-related travel market slump. The 18 museums and galleries — and the zoo — saw an up-tick of 19.4 percent in 2009, up from 25.15 million visits the year before. The fact it’s free to visit probably helped. A difficult economy, magnified for the travel market, left those actually taking to the road to find ways to cut costs. Free attractions take a big item out of a trip’s budget (and one that can sneak up on you in size). And, extended hours over the summer brought in more bodies.

Because of the increase in traffic, revenue at museum stores, theaters and restaurants actually increased from 2008, a rarity in the travel any industry last year. At least some of the credit belongs to locals, since hotel occupancy rates stayed flat from 2008 to 2009. The American History Museum was the star of the Smithsonian collection, drawing 1.4 million more people than it did in 2005, the last full year before its recent renovation began. The National Museum of Natural History added 450,000 visitors, bringing the 2009 total to 7.4 million, making it tops in the Smithsonian. Only the National Air and Space Museum and National Museum of the American Indian experienced declines.

[Photo by mp_eds via Flickr]

Five art exhibitions you must see this year

by Sean McLachlan on

Art lovers, take note, 2010 is shaping up to be a great year for exhibitions. Here are five of the best, but there are plenty more than these!

Tokyo
It’s hard to beat Japanese art for sheer naturalistic beauty, and the Tokyo National Museum has an extensive collection of the best. See the work of one of the great Japanese masters in Hasegawa Tohaku: 400th Memorial Retrospective. This painter, who died in 1610, specialized in nature and Buddhist subjects, and you can see an example of his work in this post. The delicacy and ethereal quality of Japanese landscapes always gives me goosebumps. The exhibition runs from February 23 to March 22.

Madrid
Spain’s famous Museo Nacional del Prado is hosting The Art of Power: Arms, Armour and Paintings from the Spanish Court. This is a collection of weapons and armor from Spain’s Golden Age, along with paintings by important Spanish artists emphasizing Spain’s military might at a time when the country ruled most of the New World. Many of the suits or armor were the personal property of important kings such as Philip II. The show will be on from March 8 to May 16.

London
From March 4-June 6 the British Museum will have Kingdom of Ife: Sculptures from West Africa. Ife was an important kingdom from the 12th to the 15th centuries in what is now Nigeria. Its artists specialized in creating human sculptures in brass, terracotta, and stone. I caught this when it was in Madrid last year and it was amazed at the level of artistic achievement in a civilization I’m ashamed to say I knew almost nothing about. The thing that most impressed me was how lifelike the sculptures were. I felt like I was staring into the faces of priests and kings who have been dead for five hundred years. My kid preferred the statue of the crocodile god.Paris
For something a bit more grim, go to the Musée d’Orsay between March 15 and June 27 for Crime and Punishment: 1791-1981. The dates refer to the year of the first call in France to abolish the death penalty and the year it was actually abolished. The exhibition is a series of paintings with crime as their theme, by famous artists such as Picasso, Goya, and Magritte. There are also paintings of capital punishment, showing that crime does not pay, at least some of the time. This show is disturbing enough that it comes with a warning label, a bit like the Eros exhibit of ancient erotic art in Athens, which you can still catch until April 5.

New York City
If you want to see something right now, The Museum of Modern Art is showcasing the work of director Tim Burton until April 26. It’s a collection of more than seven hundred drawings, storyboards, puppets, and other items from his films. There’s also a large collection of his personal artwork that even most of his fans have never seen. They’re showing his movies too!

India opens remote trekking and mountaineering routes

by Kraig Becker on

Adventure travelers were given even more incentive to travel to India recently when it was announced that the government would begin allowing access to previously restricted areas in the remote Jammu and Kashmir provinces. The move has both economic and political motivations that officials hope will provide benefits for the country in years to come, but trekkers and mountaineers will begin receiving benefits of their own beginning this summer.

In all, 104 new mountain peaks have been removed from the restricted list, and opened up to climbers for the first time. Most fall in the Leh and Ladakh regions, along India’s border with both China and Pakistan. Because of their close proximity to the disputed Kashmir region, only ten previous mountaineering expeditions, primarily made up of Indian climbers, have made their way into the region. This means that the vast majority of those mountains have not yet been climbed. Climbers looking to claim a first ascent will find plenty of altitude to challenge them. Many of the peaks top out above 22,000 feet, including Saser Kangri I, II, and III, which stand 24,327 feet, 24,649 feet, and 24,590 feet respectively.

Backpackers will find plenty to love in this remote and stunningly beautiful region as well. High altitude passes and trails that have previously been off limits are now open to foreign travelers, including a route that leads to the village of Turtuk in the Nubra Valley. The village played a historically important role in the region in centuries past when caravans traveling the Silk Road passed through the high altitude settlement, ferrying goods from East to West.

This move by the Indian government comes following a recommendation from the Ministry of Defense. The region has been a source of conflict for years between India and Pakistan, but tensions have now eased in the area, and this will signal a return to normalcy. The influx of climbers, trekkers, and other adventure travelers is likely to help the local economy as well.