Jails, Homeless Shelters, & Soup Kitchens Turned Hotels

Call it coincidence, but in this month’s edition of concierge.com they’ve listed 10 hotels across the globe with a spooky past. (Coughs, can we say perfect timing for Halloween, hmm?) After going through each one, I noticed the history of some were creepier than others depending on what you tend to get spooked by. Shack up in a past crime den, nun’s cell, jail or my personal favorite an old soup kitchen. From the photos featured one might not ever know that these places have a tale to tell, but don’t let the looks deceive you. When you’re at rest in bed the howling you hear isn’t coming from the outside. It’s the cry of the mentally unhinged resident that stayed there before you. (Insert: horror laughter.) I’m only kidding – sort of.

Check out the Poor House: Hopper Hotel Et Cetera in Cologne, Germany which now sits as a cheap-chic boutique hotel, but was once a homeless shelter and soup kitchen. Heading to Puerto Rico? Stay at the old Carmelite convent, now one of San Juans’ most luxurious hotels was once home to 11 nuns that moved out in 1903. If you’re in need of prison time look at their picks out of Turkey and the U.K., just don’t say I didn’t try to warn you of their bone-chilling ambience.

Word for the Travel Wise (10/11/06)

With it being the Islamic holiday of Ramadan this month I figured this word should come-in-handy if you aren’t already familiar with the term. To learn more about the holiday and the religious practice of fasting and what it means check out this Wikipedia piece. For all those celebrating – Have a happy Ramadan! (I think that’s safe to say?)

Today’s word is a Turkish word used in Turkey:

ezan – the Muslim call to prayer

Prepare ahead of time by visiting this Turkish Class site. Membership is free and you’ll get a lot more than some of the basics they already have listed. Online Turkish is good too, but you’ll have to register and pay to get anything more than hello, how are you and I love you. Stick to the first site and check out this Turkish vocabulary list of body parts. Wiki has an excellent starters piece on background, history and a short list of words. Scope out phrasebooks from Rough Guides, Lonely Planet or grab both.

Past Turkish words: merhaba, iyi volculuklar, sabirsiz, lokanta

The Doctor is Out

Thailand used to be a destination for exotic travel, perhaps even for sex travel. Now, it is a well-established member of the ever-increasing ranks of surgery destinations. Yes, travel is not just for the well or even the well-heeled, now it’s for the wellness-seeking. too. It’s not just cosmetic surgery, either. While cosmetic surgery comprises about 80% of the travel, laser eye surgery and fertility treatments make up reasons to travel, too.

A while back, our own Erik Olsen blogged about a crazy offer to get extra frequent flyer miles to get your eyes done, and also posted an article by Casey Kittrell about medical tourism. Then, earlier this year, I wrote an article about growing cosmetic surgery tourism to the Czech Republic. Since then, the pace of this traffic has exploded, and the places have gotten even more exotic. So much so, it’s worth revisiting this issue: according to the National Coalition on Health Care, over half a million Americans left the country last year for medical or dental work. A recent article even noted a man sent by his North Carolina company to New Delhi, for gall bladder and rotator cuff surgery, to save $50,000!

Tired of travelocity? A host of surgery-tourism companies have set up shop all over the internet. Costmeticsurgerytravel.com squatted on a good web address, offering “medical travel concierge” service, as well as assurance that the doctors in foreign lands are “appropriate for your procedure or treatment.” Prague a little to run-of-the-mill for you? Try Tunisia, for example, through Cosmeticatravel.com. Or Turkey or El Salvador, through Medretreat.com. Or Brazil, through Medicaltourism.com. A quick google search turns up a page-topping, paid ad for medical tourism to “Bumrungrad” hospital. Is that where you get that hemorrhoid treatment done?

Follow up: The NY Times just posted an article on the same topic.

Disappointing Troy

A few years ago I was within an hour of visiting the famous town of Troy before being talked out of it by a disappointed tourist who had just come from there.

Troy is one of the most famous cities in history, its legendary siege made famous by Homer’s Iliad. It disappeared for many years, as besieged towns tended to do over time, but was eventually unearthed by a crazy German who bulldozed his way through the strata of artifacts instead of gingerly picking away with a toothbrush.

The end result, from a tourist perspective, is that there is really not too much to see. Robert Crew, writing for The Star, recently returned from Turkey (site of the Troy remains) and agrees. The village of Hisarlik (30 minutes from Canakkale, Turkey) sports a recreated Trojan Horse (apparently very hokey) and not much else.

The true joy, it appears, is looking across the landscape and imagining what had happened on that very spot so many years ago.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, the Brad Pitt movie Troy was filmed in Mexico and Malta so if you venture this far, don’t expect things to look like they did in the film.

Word for the Travel Wise (08/30/06)

So today I’m out and headed for Tajikistan by way of Istanbul. I can’t tell you how very excited I am after weeks of waiting. As always I will do my best to report from the road, but you can assure I’ll provide full detail afterwards. In the meantime I’m hoping to make good use of my long layover in Istanbul. Hmm, a hamam perhaps? Or maybe just a bite to eat somewhere… I’ll be sure to let you know.

Today’s word is a Turkish word used in Turkey:

lokanta – restaurant

Prepare ahead of time by visiting this Turkish Class site. Membership is free and you’ll get a lot more than some of the basics they already have listed. Online Turkish is good too, but you’ll have to register and pay to get anything more than hello, how are you and I love you. Stick to the first site and check out this Turkish vocabulary list of body parts. Wiki has an excellent starters piece on background, history and a short list of words. Scope out phrasebooks from Rough Guides, Lonely Planet or grab both.

Past Turkish words: merhaba, iyi volculuklar, sabirsiz