September 6, 2009
The only reason North Korea grants visas to Americans — with the exception of diplomats and exceptional guests like the New York Philharmonic — is to witness the Mass Games. The problem is, nobody knows exactly how long the Mass Games will run. They might be cancelled or extended at the last minute, and if they’re cancelled, […]
August 29, 2009
The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) may seem like an odd name for one of the most militarized places on the face of the earth. Just 30 miles north of Seoul, and 80 miles south of Pyongyang, it was the armistice line at the end of the Korean War: its winding contours stretching across the peninsula, 155 miles from east to west, mark […]
August 25, 2009
When you arrive in North Korea, there’s a sense of unreality about it. I suspect even Bill Clinton, when he climbed out his private jet onto the tarmac at Pyongyang, must have wondered to himself, “Is this really happening? Am I actually here?” For most of us, North Korea seems to occupy the same imaginary […]
May 10, 2010
May 10, 2010 A friend of mine recently sent me an old article of mine she happened to find. I wrote it many years ago, just after Mother Theresa passed away in September 1997. Due to a submission mix-up, it was never published. But it remains as relevant today as it was then, and I hope you don’t mind me […]
August 13, 2009
From August 13, 2009 It’s with a heavy heart that I read a report by Time’s correspondents that Chinese authorities have nearly completed bulldozing the ancient quarter of Kashgar, an oasis on the Silk Road in the far western province of Xinjiang. Old Kashgar and its famed Sunday market (which I’ve heard has also been shut down) […]
August 23, 2009
From August 23, 2009 In October 2008, I traveled to North Korea. Before our departure, our group was informed that we marked roughly the 1,000th U.S. citizen to visit North Korea since the Korean War, over 58 years ago. In the wake of former President Clinton’s surprise visit to Pyongyang, to retrieve two imprisoned U.S. journalists, many people have […]
January 17, 2017
On my last day in Chile, I decided to leave Santiago and drive as high into the nearby Andes Mountains as I could, to the border with Argentina. Passing through the town of Los Andes, Chile, on the way to … the Andes. The road kept going higher and higher into the Andes, but at […]
September 20, 2019
From September 20, 2019: Status: Currently escaping from Colditz Castle. Will let you know how it goes. If you’ve ever played and enjoyed “Castle Wolfenstein”, this post is for you. During WW2, Colditz Castle, about an hour southeast of Leipzig, served a top-security prison for Allied POWs, most of them officers. The Allied prisoners sent […]
September 26, 2019
From September 26, 2019: Over the weekend, I had the chance to visit Tempelhof, Berlin’s original airport and a very important site in the city’s history. Even before there was a terminal, Tempelhof Field, located south of Berlin’s city center, was witness to some of the earliest steps in aviation – including a demonstration, in […]
June 13, 2018
From June 13, 2018: Today I went exploring in the extensive catacombs underneath the city of Odessa, Ukraine – one entrance to which you can see in the picture below, in the city outskirts. Most of Odessa’s catacombs were originally underground quarries for the stone used to build the city. But they became a vital […]