New York Times runs an interesting story worth reading if you’ve ever visited such World Heritage sites as the Statue of Liberty, Angkor Wat, the Jiuzhaigou Valley or any of the other 800 plus cities and landmarks. At one time in 1978 there were only 12 sites listed and as the list continues to grow and grow folks are starting to wonder if the program’s meaning is beginning to get lost. Once making the World Heritage list several places are using the opportunity to increase tourism, which can often damage the cultural and natural sites of “outstanding universal value,” the list was designed to protect. A good handful of people are also starting to suspect the list is doing more harm than preservation. Enormous hotels soon get constructed, admission prices shoot up and a sea of camera toting and flash snapping tourists are certainly changing the look of the places, but what is one to do? Curiosity of the named sites would certainly drive me to visit places like the Takht-e Soleyman (Iran), Bahla Fort (Oman), or the Simien National Park (Ethiopia), but I’m sure concern comes for some of the more popular destinations like the ones mentioned in Mexico.
South America
Travel through South America by country:
Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, Venezuela
Travel through South America by popular city:
Bogota, Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro
Travel through South America by popular things to do:
Adventures in the Amazon, Falkland Islands, Iguazu Falls, Tierra del Fuego
Word for the Travel Wise (01/07/06)
Since Kelly recently announced her first stop on her big trip coming up, I figured I dedicate the word of the day to her. Maybe not dedicate, but throw a suggestion out there. Perhaps you could even call it a Plan B type of word. For one I couldn’t imagine using it over some of the more appropriate ways to inquire about the location of the nearest restroom facility, but it could certainly come in handy if your mind suddenly goes numb while holding your bladder and thumbing through your Brazilian Portuguese phrasebook. Who knows?
Today’s word is a Portuguese word from Brazil:
xixi – pee (slang)
Okay, so maybe this word isn’t even recognizable in Portugal. Maybe it is a slang unique only to Brazil, used to describe which bodily function is to be performed behind closed doors. My reasons for picking the chosen word are many. For starters I wanted to toss this one out there to any speakers from either Portugal or Brazil to enlighten me if the word is used in both countries. Second, I find words that start with an ‘X’ interesting. There never seems to be enough of them. (Especially when playing a close game of Scrabble.) Lastly, it would be pretty cool to pool some words together that may be useful for Kelly and anyone on their future travels to either of the countries.
Easy Portuguese online offers a small dictionary of useful words, useful phrases, and a couple of short lessons to get you started. Most have audio clips including our word for the day found here. Portuguese Language dot net has excellent historical info on the language and numerous tools to help you get motivated and be successful at learning the 6th most spoken language. Those interested in classroom study abroad can click here for more info at Franco Americano.
Geography Name Game
Last week Terry Riley at Tripso posted this creative bit about vocation vacations. His list of locations and matching vocations is catchy and fun, inspired by Site 59’s work-themed travel packages.
As Labor Day comes to a close and many of us prepare to head back to work tomorrow, I decided to try and find just a few more places with vocation-like names, this time venturing outside the states to see what I could find that matched up with English language words for certain jobs. Some of these are a stretch, I’ll admit, but it’s as creative as I could get on my day off! If you think of any more, please add them in the comments below.
R&B Musician – Seoul, S. Korea
Soap Maker – Ivory Coast
Wine Maker – Cork, Ireland
Doctor or Nurse – Medicine Hat, Canada
Sandwich Maker – Delhi, India
Cheese Maker – Munster, Germany or Cheddar, England
Map Maker – Atlas Mountains (Africa)
Chef – Cook Islands, New Zealand
Travel Agent – Tours, France
Diver – Plunge, Lithuania
Hair Dresser – Perm, Russia
Gymnast – Split, Croatia
Body Builder – Pecs, Hungary
Worldview Widget
Mac users who have the new Tiger OS installed are probably aware of one of the new OS’s great new features: Dashboard, which lets you keep a series of little apps called Widgets right up front for immediate use. Upon installation, some of the widgets are installed as defaults, like a clock, a calculator (very useful) and a stock ticker.
But at the Apple site you can also download various widgets to enhance your collection and improve productivity. For travelers and folks who are just generally interested in the rest of the world, there is an interesting widget called the WORLDview widget that I just installed. It is quite useful for me, as I try to find information about various countries I might be blogging about. The widget displays all the countries in the world, and gives you the country map, the national flag, country coordinates, the capital and the continent. It’s pretty cool, if a bit limited. I’d love to see them incorporate news links for each country, so that if you click on, say Finland, you might get a quick dose of news about the country. But even as is, it is quite cool.
Books on Travel Health
Are you heading out to some distant, exotic locale in the near future? Wndering if you’ve done all you need to immunize yourself again the nasty illnesses that await you? Well, consider taking along a book on staying healthy. Here are a couple of suggestions.
Probably one of the best is the Travel Health Clinic Pocket Guide to Healthy Travel by Dr. Lawrence Bryson. It’s an older book, but Dr. Bryson practices one of the newest disciplines in medicine. He is a member of the International Society of Travel Medicine, and his clinic in San Francisco is one of the leaders in the prevention and diagnosis of travel-related medical problems.
Dr. Bryson divides the nations of the world into three different degrees of health risk: Risk Level I nations enjoy health standards comparable like the United States. They include Canada, Northern Europe, France, Australia, New Zealand and the urban parts of Japan. “Risk Level II,” says Dr. Bryson, “are those with health standards which are satisfactory but not equal to those of the United States. These include the European countries bordering the Mediterranean (except for France), the nations of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, the Caribbean islands (except for Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Israel, South Africa and rural Japan.” Health risks are high and standards of sanitation and hygiene are poor or unpredictable in Risk Level III countries. This group includes all of Central America and tropical South America, Mexico, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and all the nations of Asia and Africa except for Japan, Israel and South Africa.
On top of all this is some useful discussio of the types of diseases you need to concern yourself with, and how and when to deal with immunizations. You can’t prepare yourself for everything, and you can’t guarantee that you will not get sick, but picking up a book like this can be a way help educate yourself about the various problems you might face.
The Rough Guide has a handy guide to keeping healthy while overseas and it look slike you can get one pretty cheap on Amazon. And for those traveling to Africa, you might consider the Lonely Planet Guide to health safety.