A trio of dazzling hamlets–one a hillside studded with pagodas, the next an ancient settlement with its very own “leaning tower” and the third a monastic base with an eponymous, ramshackle bridge–awaits you just an hour outside Mandalay.
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Machismo, Gold and Grit
The swanky Las Vegas hotel which apparently lifts its name from Mandalay will be the furthest thing from your mind as your vehicle pulls in.
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Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda
Around 500 years before a certain Messianic baby was born somewhere in the Middle East, legend has it that two Burmese merchants visited India, gave the Buddha honey cakes and took a few of his hairs back with them. Their reward? A 30-story, solid gold pagoda.
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Is Pattaya More Than Its Seedy Reputation?
As a 60-something tourist explains, “All tourists spend money and get exactly what they want in return. I just happen to come to Pattaya to fuck.”
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Renegade Piece
“Usually,” Bianca said, “Swiss people sit as far away from others as they can. The train is completely full now, so that’s really not possible.”
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How I Learned To Write About Love
An old Middle Eastern woman named Rabeeha told me everything I needed to know about romantic writing when I met her in Amman, Jordan in 2010.
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China’s Spring Airlines
A humorous account of my June 18, 2010 flight on Spring Airways, China’s first (and, thankfully, only) low-cost carrier, from Xi’an to Shanghai.
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