Vladimir Putin: Fake tourist?

by Aaron Hotfelder on

It was a well-known tactic of the KGB, the Soviet Secret Police organization, to disguise their agents as tourists who would ask probing and embarrassing questions of visiting heads of state. But a new photo has just surfaced that purports to show Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who was once a member of the KGB, dressed as a tourist during Ronald Reagan’s 1988 visit to the Soviet Union.

Pete Souza, the man who took the photo above, says the US Secret Service was not fooled by the undercover KGB agents. According to Souza (now the official White House presidential photographer), Reagan reportedly said, “I can’t believe these tourists in the Soviet Union are asking these pointed questions.” A nearby Secret Service agent replied, “Oh, these are all KGB families.”

So is the dorky tourist in the photo above really Vladimir Putin, as Souza claims? Not according to Russian political analyst Andrey Piontkovsky. “Vladimir Putin was a major serving in Dresden and he wasn’t important enough at that time to be brought to Moscow,” he said.

More here.

Germans still traveling to U.S.

by Tom Johansmeyer on

You’ll find plenty of German tourists at just about any major destination in the world, and this is unlikely to change. As of October/November 2008, German tour operators are reporting a 4 percent to 9 percent increase in tour bookings.

Trips to the United States were up 5 percent for the first 11 months of 2008 compared to the same period in 2007. Seventy-nine percent of the tour operators surveyed believe that bookings to the United States will be up for the last quarter of last year. Major cities are on the agenda, so look out, New York! The Germans are coming!

At the time of the survey, German bookings to the United States were up 10 percent to 15 percent average for the fourth quarter – and that’s over 2007’s 15 percent gains from the fourth quarter of 2006.

And, the trend is expected to continue this year. Sixty-four percent of German tour operators project a 4 percent to 9 percent increase in the first quarter of 2009 (relative to the first quarter of 2009.

Postwar Iraq gets its “first” tourist

by Jeremy Kressmann on

It’s been over five years since the invasion of Iraq, and the country seems to be slowly emerging from the ruins of five years of conflict. Yet despite the progress, most would agree there’s a long way to go before the country is ready to again welcome “Western” tourism. Random violence remains a real threat and many cities do not have the infrastructure of guest hotels, restaurants and transportation upon which any visitor would depend.

None of this seems to have dissuaded Luca Marchio, an Italian tourist whose random visit to the Iraqi city of Falluja was recently chronicled in the New York Times. The Iraqi police discovered Marchio on a public minibus, without a translator or guide, heading for the notoriously dangerous city of Falluja. The police, fearing for the man’s safety, offered Luca a short tour and then shepherded him back towards the “safer” confines of Baghdad.

When asked of his motivation for visiting the country by the Times, Marchio replied, “I want to see and understand the reality because I have never been here before, and I think every country in the world must be seen.”

Although truer words have never been spoken by a traveler, you have to question Marchio’s timing for his visit. The decision to travel to a formerly war-torn nation is a delicate one, a choice dictated as much by the willingness of that country’s citizens to receive visitors as it is by our willingness travel there. Does that make Marchio an outlier? Or is he a symbolic of a coming tourism boom as Iraq returns to relative peace and prosperity? Only the citizens of Iraq can answer this second question – let’s all hope the answer is eventually “yes.”

Naive Travelers Pay $200 for Snack in India

by Josh Lew on

It’s one of those tricks you learn in “How to Rip off Travelers 101”: act friendly, provide food or a service and then reveal that you are charging an exorbitant price. The traveler is at a disadvantage because they have already used the service or eaten the food. In general, they will pay all, or at least a major portion, of the price you are asking.

This is what happened to a Dutch couple recently in the Indian state of Bihar. They enjoyed some samosas (spicy, fried dumpling-like snacks), which usually cost well under $1 ($1=49 rupees). When they were finished, the proprietor of the market stall demanded payment of 10,000 rupees (just over $200). He claimed that the samosas were made with rare herbs that were natural aphrodisiacs. After arguing, the couple paid. It was an expensive but valuable lesson, right? Except that the couple went to the local police station and complained. The police made the samosa-maker return the money, except for 10 rupees, the actually price of the snacks.

[Via Reuters]

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Deadly Everest Airplane Crash

by Josh Lew on

A Yeti Airlines Twin-Otter plane carrying sixteen passengers and three crew members crashed at a remote airstrip in Nepal yesterday morning, local time. The plane’s wheel became entangled in a security fence as it was landing at the trekking base of Lukla, about 30 miles from Mount Everest. 18 people, including a group of 12 German trekkers, were killed. Only the pilot survived, though he remains in critical condition at an area hospital. Passengers waiting for other planes were first on the scene, but they were ill-equipped to fight the fire that had broken out on impact. By the time it was finally extinguished, everyone in the passenger cabin was beyond help.

The crash was initially blamed on poor visibility. It was quite foggy at the time of the crash, though two similar planes had already landed at the airstrip that morning. The government has promised a full investigation. The team looking into the disaster will be headed by the country’s attorney general. The airport is located at 2500 meters above sea level and many people say it is ill-equipped to handle the heavy traffic it sees during trekking and climbing season.

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