Travel meets journalism at Roads and Kingdoms

by Meg Nesterov on
Last month, writers Nathan Thornburgh (a contributing editor to TIME and recent guest of Fox News) and Matt Goulding (food & culture writer and author behind the Eat This, Not That! book series) launched a new website with the intriguing tagline: “Journalism, travel, food, murder, music. First stop: Burma.” Combining on-the-spot reporting on current events and politics with in-depth cultural observations, rich photography, and engrossing narratives, Roads and Kingdoms feels like a travel blog we all want to write: a bit daring, occasionally foolhardy, and often inspiring. Fresh home from their first major trip and recovering from Burma belly, Gadling talked to co-founder Nathan about Roads and Kingdoms.

How would you describe your blog in one sentence?
Travel meets journalism.

How did it come about? How has your background in news helped (or hindered) your travels?
Matt and I felt like our work – he writes about food, I’m a foreign correspondent – actually had a lot in common. As writers on assignment, we found that the best parts of being on the road – the amazing meal on the street corner, the back-alley bar with the great live jams, the sweaty tuk tuk ride through the outskirts of the city – are left out of the final product. It’s those parts that we want to provide a home for. It’s a different kind of travel mindset, whether you’re going to London or Lagos. Journalism is all about being curious, which is a quality great travelers have as well.

It’s not meant to remain a blog: we’ll be launching our full site soon, which won’t just be our travels, but a variety of dispatches in the Roads and Kingdoms style, from writers and photographers and videographers around the world.
Why did you choose Burma as a first destination?
First off, we think Burma is going to be a huge tourist destination in the years to come, if the country continues to open up. It’s an amazingly vivid and warm country, and has a lot of the traditional rhythms of life that Thailand, for example, has lost.

Burma also had the perfect combination of stories for us to launch Roads and Kingdoms with. We were able to report on the killer hiphop scene in the south, up-and-coming graffiti artists in Rangoon, and of course, the amazing (and all but undiscovered) Burmese cuisine. Then Matt went to Bagan, this breathtaking valley of temples that will become a big part of Burma’s tourist boom. While he took in the temples, I visited the heart of the war-torn north, where I was able to hang out with gold miners and Kachin refugees and see a part of Burma that not a lot of people get to see.

What do you hope to inspire in readers?
We’d love to inspire readers to travel the way we do: with a sense of wonder and a big appetite, with curiosity and an awareness of the backstory behind the destinations.

Flashback, Burma Day One: Bad Crab from Roads and Kingdoms on Vimeo.

Roads and Kingdoms did not get detained in Myanmar for being journalists entering on a tourist visa. But Nathan still hit an unexpected roadblock on the first day in Burma: a plate of chili-slathered, rancid crab.

What are the challenges in blogging somewhere like Burma?

We were fortunate that our trip coincided with Hillary Clinton’s historic visit to Burma. The government didn’t want to create any problems that week, so we were incredibly free as journalists there; much more so than I could have ever imagined the first time I went in 2003. I was followed and watched when I visited the north, but they didn’t interfere with my work. However: Internet access still sucks. You can’t blog if you can’t connect, and that’s a huge problem in Burma.

How is social media adding to the blog?
Social media is huge for us. We’re starting out as a Tumblr, for example, not just because it’s great for articles/photos/videos, but because it’s so shareable. We want people to get involved, not just as passive consumers, but as advisers and compañeros along the way.

Where are you going next?
We have a short list, and we actually want readers to help us decide. London? Moscow? Lima? It’s a big world out there!

Follow the adventures at RoadsandKingdoms.com and connect with Nathan and Matt (and assorted interns) on Twitter @RoadsKingdoms and Facebook.

10 reasons to travel to Ljubljana

by Meg Nesterov on


When I found cheap airfare from Istanbul to Ljubljana, I didn’t find many other travelers who’d been there or even say for sure which country it’s in. The tiny of country of Slovenia is slightly smaller than New Jersey and its capital city isn’t known for much other than being difficult to spell and pronounce (say “lyoob-lyAH-nah”). After spending a few days there last month, I quickly fell madly in love with the city, and recommend to everyone to add to their travel list.

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Here are some reasons to love Ljubljana:

1. It’s Prague without the tourists – Ljubljana has been called the next Prague for at least the last 10 years, but the comparison is still apt. Architect Jože Plečnik is known for his work at Prague Castle, but he was born in Ljubljana and is responsible for much of the architecture in the old downtown and the Triple Bridge that practically defines the city. While Prague is a lovely place to visit, it’s overrun in summer with backpackers and tourists. In Ljubljana, the only English I heard was spoken with a Slovenian accent, and there were no lines at any of the city’s attractions.

2. Affordable Europe – While not as cheap as say, Bulgaria, Ljubljana is a lot easier on the wallet than other European capital cities and cheaper than most of its neighbors. I stayed in a perfect room above the cafe Macek in an ideal location for 65 euro a night. A huge three-course dinner for one with drinks at Lunch cafe was 20 euro, and a liter of local wine in the supermarket is around 3-4 euro. I paid 6 euro for entrance into 4 art museums for the Biennial, and the same for all of the castle, including the excellent Slovene history museum, and the funicular ride there and back.3. Everyone speaks English – Sharing borders with Italy, Austria, Hungary and Croatia, Slovenia is multi-cultural and multi-lingual. Everyone I met in Ljubljana spoke at least a few foreign languages including English; one supermarket cashier I met spoke six languages! While a language barrier shouldn’t prevent you from enjoying a foreign country, it’s great when communication is seamless and you can get recommendations from nearly every local you meet.

4. A delicious melting pot – Slovenia’s location also means a tasty diversity of food; think Italian pastas and pizzas, Austrian meats, and Croatian fish. One waiter I spoke to bemoaned the fact that he could never get a decent meal in ITALY like he can in Slovenia. While I’d never doubt the wonders of Italian food, I did have several meals in Ljubljana so good I wanted to eat them all over again as soon as I finished. Standout spots include Lunch Cafe (aka Marley & Me) and it’s next-door neighbor Julija.

5. Great wine – Slovenia has a thriving wine culture, but most of their best stuff stays in the country. A glass of house wine at most cafes is sure to be tasty, and cost only a euro or two. Ljubljana has many wine bars and tasting rooms that are approachable, affordable, and unpretentious. Dvorni Wine Bar has an extensive list, and on a Tuesday afternoon, there were several other mothers with babies, businesspeople, and tourists having lunch. I’m already scheming when to book a stay in a vineyard cottage, with local wine on tap.

6. Al-fresco isn’t just for summer – During my visit in early November, temperatures were in the 50s but outdoor cafes along the river were still lined with people. Like here in Istanbul, most cafes put out heating lamps and blankets to keep diners warm, and like the Turks, Slovenians also enjoy their smoking, which may account for the increase in outdoor seating (smoking was banned indoors a few years ago). The city’s large and leafy Tivoli Park is beautiful year-round, with several good museums to duck into if you need refuge from the elements.

7. Boutique shopping – The biggest surprise of Ljubljana for me was how many lovely shops I found. From international chains like Mandarina Duck (fabulous luggage) and Camper (Spanish hipster shoes) to local boutiques like La Chocolate for, uh, chocolate and charming design shop Sisi, there was hardly a single shop I didn’t want to go into, and that was just around the Stari Trg, more shops are to be found around the river and out of the city center.

8. Easy airport – This may not be first on your list when choosing a destination, but it makes travel a lot easier. Arriving at Ljubljana’s airport, you’ll find little more than a snack bar and an ATM outside, but it’s simple to grab a local bus into town or a shared shuttle for a few euro more. Departing from Slovenia, security took only a few minutes to get through, wi-fi is free, and there’s a good selection of local goodies at Duty Free if you forgot to buy gifts. LJU has flights from much of western Europe, including EasyJet from Paris and London.

9. Access to other parts of country – While Ljubljana has plenty to do for a few days, the country is compact enough to make a change of scenery easy and fast. Skiers can hop a bus from the airport to Kranj in the Slovenian Alps, and postcard-pretty Lake Bled is under 2 hours from the capital. In the summer, it’s possible to avoid traffic going to the seaside and take a train to a spa resort or beach. There are also frequent international connections; there are 7 trains a day to Croatia’s capital Zagreb, and Venice is just over 3 hours by bus.

10. Help planning your visit – When I first began planning my trip, I sent a message to the Ljubljana tourism board, and got a quick response with a list of family-friendly hotels and apartments. Next I downloaded the always-excellent In Your Pocket guide, which not only has a free guide and app, it also has a very active Facebook community with up-to-the-minute event info, restaurant recommendations, deals, and more. On Twitter, you can get many questions answered by TakeMe2Slovenia and VisitLjubljana.

Does Online Sharing Diminish Real Life Experiences?

by Mike Barish on


When we travel, we love to share our experiences. Whether via blog posts, tweets, Facebook status updates or photo sharing apps, broadcasting experiences – particularly those involving travel and food – has become as much a part of life as, well, life itself. But is that a good thing? Does constantly live-sharing experiences diminish the experiences themselves? Watching this video for the new Evernote Food app left me feeling a bit overwhelmed by social media.

Don’t get me wrong; I share photos of my meals and tweet about my travels as much, if not more, than the next guy. I’m guilty of this. But something about this video – and the app itself – has me feeling that we might have reached a tipping point in social media.

We already run the risk of seeing our trips through viewfinders rather than our own eyes. Now we seem to be sacrificing conversations and interaction with the people around us for popularity online. When meals are placed on tables across the world, servers are ignored, dining companions are told not to touch anything and smartphones emerge to document the food from all angles. Only after the appropriate number of glamour shots have been posted to Instagram, Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and now, apparently, Food, can people actually, you know, eat.

At some point, we all need to remember that the urge to document and share our experiences is born from the fact that the experiences are enjoyable to us first. In order for our online social networks to live vicariously through us, we first need to do some living. If you’re only doing activities for the stories or clout (or worse, Klout), are you really doing anything at all?

So, maybe we should put down the smartphones and cameras for a bit, take a break from sharing everything online and enjoy the company of the people sitting right next to us. Savor ours meal for our own sake. If we don’t, it’s a slippery slope to this becoming a reality:

Let’s create memories that live more vividly and richly in our minds than they ever could in a status update. Life was in HD long before our cameras were.

Photo by Flickr user adactio.

Lonely Planet launches Wenzani travel app for iPhone and iPod touch

by McLean Robbins on

Travel guide favorite Lonely Planet has joined the app game with the launch today of Wenzani, a free app for for the iPhone and iPod touch. Wenzani – a Zulu greeting which means “what are you doing?”- brings together recommendations from Lonely Planet and other top travel publishers along with local experts, and users’ social networks.

“It’s creating a personalized guide on-the-go,” said Jenny Fielding, Wenzani’s CEO. “Wenzani is designed for the social generation, allowing users to tap into leading content from multiple expert sources with socially curated recommendations.”

The app contains three main features. The first? Recommendations drawn from Lonely Planet, Frommer’s Travel and DK Eyewitness, along with other expert sources including BBC Travel, Time Out, and Hearst. It’s the first time we’ve seen competitors come together to form one broad-based app, something we’re excited to explore. Wenzani also promises “content according to context and relevancy, taking into consideration the user’s location and their social network, so that the information is constantly updated while on the go.” Soon, Wenzani will filter by other factors such as weather, time of day, and whether the user is a local or visitor, so it becomes even more tailored and relevant to the users’ needs in real time.

This is something we’ve always wanted to see- I don’t want to go on a walking tour by the lake if it’s 30 degrees and rainy! The third portion is the social media integration which allows users to connect with their friends and other travelers in order to share their own personal experiences and recommendations. Users can browse their friends’ entries and recommendations, create their own listing to add into the guide, or ask a question to the community (e.g. “Where should I get sushi in midtown Manhattan?”) to get immediate answers pushed onto their mobile device. Wenzani also has a Facebook web app to allow users to integrate recommendations from Facebook into the guide.This seems like it will be the most or least useful portion of the tool, depending on how connected and active your social network is in the area where you’re traveling.

From what we can tell, this app promises to be a powerful addition to the suite of travel tools we already have handy on our iPhones. Apps for Android and other platforms will launch in early 2012.

Introducing Wenzani from Wenzani on Vimeo.

Tracing Twitter to 16th century Rome

by Melanie Renzulli on



The ugliest statue in Rome is not easy to find. Tucked away in an alley off of Piazza Navona, blending in to the unremarkable stone façades of the buildings behind him, Pasquino, a human-shaped stump of marble resting on a pedestal pasted with notes and cartoons, hides in plain sight from most tourists who saunter past on their way to this district’s many renowned restaurants, bars, and cafes. But what is hardly a landmark for travelers is for Italians a symbol of free speech.

I have been thinking about Pasquino a lot lately as I read stories about social media and pseudonyms, the so-called “nym wars.” Social media websites, such as Facebook and Google Plus, have faced criticism for banning users from using pseudonyms on their sites. On the other hand, Twitter has all but embraced anonymity and fake accounts on its service, allowing users to pose as fake politicians, CEOs, and other public figures as a form of satire or a way to air grievances without reprisal. In light of the recent irreverent online reactions to the Italian debt crisis and the resignation of long-time Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, some Italian bloggers have referred to Internet critics as “Pasquino digitali,” a term that can be traced back to that ugly statue and its role as a tool of protest during the 16th century.Pasquino, the most famous of Rome’s “talking statues,” has been sounding off against the church, political leaders, and local affairs, for more than 500 years. Uncovered in 1501 in the Parione district, the 3rd-century B.C statue began to speak in the early 16th century shortly after a cardinal affixed some epigrams to its torso and pedestal on the occasion of St. Mark’s Day (April 25). Not long after, Roman citizens, especially those displeased with the corruption of the papacy, took a cue from the cardinal and began secretly to leave poems and verses on Pasquino decrying the actions – or inaction – of those in power. These verses, written in Latin or Roman dialect, came to be known as pasquinate, or pasquinades in English, after the ancient statue (whose own name is of unknown origin). One of the best known pasquinades ever left on Pasquino was directed at Pope Urban VIII Barberini, who is known for ordering the Pantheon stripped of its bronze tiles, which were subsequently melted down and used by the artist Bernini to create a grand baldaquin for St. Peter’s Basilica:

Quod non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt Barberini
(What the Barbarians didn’t do, the Barberini did.)

Pasquino’s success as a bulletin board for anonymous witticisms prompted more statues in Rome to begin talking. At least five other statues in Rome are known to have engaged in “conversations” with Pasquino. The most famous of these copycat statues was Marforio, who regularly posed questions to Pasquino about current events. When the statues’ conversations proved too satirical for the church, Pope Innocent X had Marforio moved to the Capitoline Museums, where he rests silently today.

Almost 500 years have passed since Romans first posted their handwritten protests on Pasquino. Even in the age of digital media, Pasquino’s base is still covered in anti-government poems, snarky asides about enemies, and complaints about community affairs. Many of these are now collected on the blog pasquinate.it and shared @pasquinateblog. But travelers who are also passionate about Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus would do well to pay Pasquino a visit on their next visit to Rome to see social media in its earliest form.

Photo by zak mc/Flickr