Illyrian Elysium (10/14/2006)

Viola: "What country, friends, is this?"
Captain: "This is Illyria, lady."
Viola: "And what should I do in Illyria? My brother he is in Elysium"
- Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, I.ii.

Every year, thespians at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival perform Shakespeare at Lovrjenac Fortress, a medieval bastion which overlooks Old Town and the Adriatic. The performances -- in the open air within walls that pre-date the Bard -- are a true spectacle, punctuating days of Renaissance revelry for locals and tourists. While the repertoire changes, a constant is "Hamlet." This can't be coincidence: After all, some argue, Lovrjenac is more authentically medieval than Elsinore, Denmark -- and since no document explicity states that Shakespeare didn't wander south during his "dark years," he may, in fact, have based Hamlet on a lost foray to Dubrovnik. Thus, there is no evidence that the Denmark isn't a thinly disguised Dalmatia.

Except this: Nothing is rotten in the state of Dubrovnik.

Keep your towers, your cathedrals, your museums, and your main drags with names you rip out of foreign mythology. Dalmatia's pearl lacks the groovitude of London, the wandering alleys of medieval Prague; it holds no candles to Berlin's nightlife, can't boast the pulse of New York or flaunt Nobel Prize Winners a la Cape Town. It fans on the modern awesomeness of my beloved Wellington, hasn't the tangible history of Vienna, and lives without the wide allees of grand dame Paris.

But Lady Dubrovnik takes them all.

Dubrovnik is the Europe we dream of -- a city whose limestone streets echo antiquity, and whose medieval walls are lapped by the tranquil Adriatic. The city shines in the sun and glistens in the rain. It survived communism but doesn't reek of it; it was shelled less than 15 years ago, and rebuilt itself as it was -- not in bland, eyebrowless, uberefficient apartment blocks. It has the luxuries of a modern town, but hides them well -- find what you will, but you're better off getting lost in the Renaissance alleyways. When you stroll the streets at night, drunk tourists and "human doings" aren't spilling or spewing in front of you. If you're lucky -- you read that correctly -- to have a dousing of rain, the empty alleys shimmer in the full moon.

The city delights throngs of tourists without whoring itself to the corporate dollar. Medieval towns north of the Alps -- that's you, Rothenburg -- flaunt the Golden Arches, while Dubrovnik rejected them. There is one, count 'em one, western hotel in town (outside the walls), and the majority of visitors only stay for a day and depart on their cruise ships. It's far enough from the main tourist route to deter Eurailing students and Japanese throngs, but accessible enough for an easy holiday.

And then, the environs. The daytripping opportunities are nonpareil -- take a ferry to Mljet National Park (which Odysseus fancied), drive to the world's newest country (Montenegro) or the regional hotbed (Bosnia), sail along miles of untouched coastline, or bottle wine and brandy amateur cellars.

It's got the history, too. Croatia has the second largest Roman amphitheatre outside the Coliseum and the second-longest wall after China. It also gave the world the necktie (cravat), the fountain and ballpoint pens, Marco Polo ("Mark The Chicken"), and who knows, maybe "Hamlet."

Not that it needs it, though, since it plays host to "Twelfth Night" just fine -- and it should flaunt the sure thing rather than claim a tragedy. The play is enough of a marketing piece: after all, Viola does discover plenty to do in Illyria. She falls in love, cross-dresses, watches hilarity ensue, and finds her brother. Though she was, in fact, right about his whereabouts all along.

Matt

Silhouettes and Minarets (10/6/2006)

Hi Everyone:

The call to prayer was echoing througout Mostar as Julie, Christie, and I ascended a minaret -- the tightest-wound staircase I've seen -- partly with no lamp or window illumination. Out of darkness into light, if you will.

No European country evokes a bloodier image than Bosnia -- one which descended into torpid war following independence, and one whose name still evokes more fear than awe. (I can vouch for this, having received a few "you're nuts"es when I told people I'd be hanging in the Balkans). But with war a full decade in the past, the danger is gone, but the scars remain. And perhaps there is no better microcosm than Mostar.

In 1993, when a united Muslim and Christian force beat back the occupying Serbs, Mostarites turned on each other -- they fought for two years, ultimately ending with the Croat Christians leveling the Muslim West Bank and shipping the inhabitants to detention camps (Yay religion!). War historians said the only comparable destruction of the last century was Dresden. So it goes.Ten years on, Mostar has rebounded remarkably well. The wounds are still fresh: we passed a de-mining truck on the way in, and repeatedly remarked on the cannonball and bulletholes in the stone walls. Many buildings, even along the tourist route, are still uninhabitable. Part of me hopes the holes are patched soon -- the city is too charming to live with its scars -- but another part hopes they stay. After all, as Dr. Lecter mused, our scars remind us that the past is real.

I loved Mostar. The bazaars, cobblestone streets, new Old Bridge, minarets which illuminate at nightfall, pristine food, and evervescent Turkish delight evoke an Ottoman past unheard of in Croatia. While the tourists abounded, the city is far enough off the route to the busloads. And of course, the odd begging Gypsy reminded us that -- Ottoman shmottoman -- we hadn't left Eastern Europe.And then there's Medjugorje. A mere 20 miles -- and loads of Catholic bucks -- away, the otherwise obscure town is a poster for religious kitsch. Overlooking the "town center" is the hill where, 25 years ago, the Virgin Mary appeared to six teenagers, three of whom still claim to have a daily dialogue with her. Today, the town is bombarded with pilgrims hoping for the same priviledge. While many undoubtedly go home sans BVM sighting, they can at least take a glow-in-the-dark Mary or a Jesus pencil case -- proving, Weber be damned, that the Catholics can evoke that spirit of capitalism too.

So, while Bosnia will need decades to shed its dangerous reputation, its pockmarked alleys can teach you volumes. Just don't tell anyone -- it'll leave more for the rest of us.

Matt

No Harm, No Vowel: Crna Gora (10/5/2006)

Hi.

In May, I was sitting in a stuffy Montreal conference room doing "SEVIS" cheers with overenthusiastic study-abroad officers. My neighbor, of whose name I remember nothing save the "-ova", was constantly checking exit polls on her cell phone. Not ours, mind you, but her own: as we toiled, her compatriots were dropping their divorce papers in the ballot box.

Welcome to Montenegro (Crna Gora), who recently unhitched the yolk of Serbian doormatdom and became the world's newest nation. (Score: now I needn't visit East Timor!) How it's going survive its growing pains remains to be seen -- but let time sort out the details.Our day-trip destination, Kotor, is Montenegro's calling card now that the country has quit being "Serbia and". The city, a tiny town of 5,600 at the tail end of Kotor Fjord -- the largest in southern Europe, and one whose protection from the open Adriatic gives it a constant tranquility. Thank you, glaciers.If New Zealand evokes "Lord of the Rings" and old Montreal "Les Miserables," then Kotor is clearly "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins."**

Enter its medieval gates (epee and plume in tow, tibi volente), and wander its tiny streets -- it's too small to get lost in, and too pretty not to gawk at. It's what we travelers have always wanted from Central Europe; indeed, it's ironic that the continent's best Central European specimen is closer to Greece and Italy than Prague or Budapest.

Of course, no excursion would be whole without a 1500-step hike up to Kotor Fortress, a medieval bastion which hangs Great-Wallishly over the city. In addition to crafting your thighs a la Auckland, the fortress tests your "Choose your own adventure book" wits. If you choose wisely, you are rewarded with steep, unmarked, untended "staircases." If you choose unwisely, you are either stonewalled by ancient fortifications or are staring over hundred-foot cliffs. If you really choose unwisely, you are staring over hundred-foot cliffs while toe-tapping around world-record deposits of goat dung.

As Julie, Christie, and I (Omar Sharif) stood at the summit, the newly-independent Montenegrin flag whipped proudly above us. While this five-month-old baby is too young to poetically deem "a mighty fine country altogether," it is spunky and vivacious -- which, if you're going to be independent, is probably a good first step.

Take that, Serbia.
Matt

** PS: If you never read "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins," by Dr. Seuss, you were clearly literarily repressed as a child.

Dervishes and Dyevushkas (6/25/2006)

I was ready for hell in Tajikistan. The poorest Soviet republic, one that decended into bloody civil war almost the day after secession from Moscow, and one so hard to reach that globalization doesn't bother (take that, Friedman), I had mentally written this travelogue before I arrived. The intro to Les Mis - the greatest prologue in literary history, by the way - was my first paragraph, and I was ready to rant about how you can take a republic out of communism, but not vise-versa.

Pleasantly, Dushanbe surprised me. Not that I would recommend it for a holiday -- indeed, there is next to nothing to do downtown, each day is about 99 degrees with no breeze, and there is virtually no infrastructure to cater to tourists. But therein lies the charm. Glance beyond the hassles: the lack of customer service; the ain't-going-away Soviet bureaucracy; and the hot, stagnant air; and you get a purely "local" experience -- free of the fabrications of the great world capitals.

Tajikistan is the former USSR's oddball, a Persian race dwarfed by Turkic neighbors. It lacks Kazakhstan's oil, Kyrgyzstan's "don't worry be happy"ness, Uzbekistan's historical allure, and Turkmenistan's "North Korea of Central Asia" draw. Its borders are artifically concocted - one of Stalin's greatest hits - and to this day pit rival clans against each other. Gotta give Joe credit, though, he did a helluva job -- mines along the Tajik-Uzbek border increase daily.(Interesting addendum here: Joe also renamed the city "Stalinabad" in a typical fit of self-flattery. But when Khrushchev publicly proclaimed "Stalin: a bad", The Party re-christened the city "Dushanbe" ... which is simply the local word for "Monday". No one ever accused the Bolsheviks of being creative.)

The lack of globalization is due to a number of factors, most noticably the civil war that tore through the country immediately after the Fall. Most of the Russian colonists (and their "1917" chant) pulled out, leaving the communist infrastructure with a Persian facade. Perhaps the lack of material goods makes the city charming -- it is far cleaner than any other Soviet city I've visited, and it doesn't drown in the haze of industrial waste.

Tajikistan is resoundingly Muslim, though Soviet Islam differs distinctly from Sunni and Shi'a. While those schools bicker over Caliph authorities, Tajiks are too busy swigging vodka and simmering pork. I only saw two mosques in town, and the calls to prayer that echo throughout the rest of the Middle East are resoundingly absent. That said, most women are covered in shoulder-to-ankle, single-piece dresses, with the occasional few covering their head as well. When it's culture and not oppression, though, the decor lends an air of timelessness -- after all, if the Soviets couldn't enforce a dress code, perhaps no one will.

A last word on Dushanbe. Although the city is banal, strolling around can be quite pleasant. The number of trees is staggering -- most streets have two full rows on each side (which, when it's 98 and dry, how do the trees survive? Perhaps that's where the Aral Sea went...), and large parks stretch through downtown. The mountains aren't far away, and escapes into alpine air are quite refreshing after baking downtown. Of course, when you return to your hotel tired and hot, ready to shower the city away, you can't be surprised if the water or power aren't there to meet you. So it goes.

So no, Dushanbe is far from hell. But come unprepared, and you'll wind up with far more than another case of the Mondays.

Suprême ombre, suprême aurore (5/24/2006)

"Oh Canada, we stand on God for thee."
- Best mis-heard song lyric ever. Really.

Thumbing through my high-school yearbook, I noticed that several classmates claimed "Montreal '98" as an extracurricular activity. This is hardly a surprise: to many New England teenagers, Maisonneuve's city is the promised land -- a Jericho that they storm each April in search of "milk" (beer) and "honey" (figure it out). Five hours from Boston, and voila, let the Molson flow.My memories of Montreal differed. Not one for underaged barhopping, I always looked upon the city with disdain -- you waste your money getting hammered, I'll go to Europe, thank you very much. Plus, my two previous trips had been in the dead of winter. Yeah, fun. So when my office decided to send me to an educators' conference, I was admittedly skeptical. But it's free, so no complaining.

Les Quebecois slapped me back to reality. Fresh off its mid-nineties obsession with separatism, the city has revived itself as a commercial and cultural hub -- Canada's second-largest city and the soul of French Canada (Quebec City is the heart. Sorry.). The Rue Sainte-Catherine has morphed from a pre-Giuliani Times Square to a quasi-Magnificent Mile. The locals are friendly and bubbly, and it doesn't hurt when you needn't fight through -30 temperatures to talk to them. Especially about hockey. Just don't mention Les Canadiens bowing out to a sub-Mason Dixon Line team, or Les Nordiques moving to Colorado.

Montreal's ironies amused me, though. Their Metro plasters advertisements for "Where's Waldo?" books under the moniker "Ou est Charlie?", perhaps a backhanded, Vietnam-era slap. On my first night there, I turned on the TV only to stumble on "South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut," which for the unindoctrinated, features a U.S. war on Canada (against whom, in real life, we are 0-2).

Quirks aside, most fascinating was the Quebecois identity -- French Canadian, damnit, and that's not quite French and not exactly Canadian (discuss.) The provincial flag - perhaps my favorite in the world - flies on masts even with the maple leaf (if the national flag shows up at all). The banner thrusts Quebecois roots right at you -- the cross (duh), a blue background (the Virgin Mary), and four white fleur-de-lis (which either harken back to the French kings or hint that all Quebecois are privy to the lost secrets of the Priory of Scion.)

The Quebecois joie de vivre also manifests itself in the few square blocks of old Montreal. Despite what tour books claim, you won't find Paris du Nord, but a centuries-old town that remained relatively untouched while a metropolis swelled around it. With no Louis Napoleon to build unbarricadable boulevards, perhaps the cobblestone streets harken are more indicative of Paris primeval than anything you'll find in the French capital herself. Hell, I wouldn't have been surprised if I found myself staring down Enjolras or Marius as I swung a wrong turn.

And so, Montreal, you're forgiven. You're far more than an enterprise that hoards cash from New England's juveniles, greater than a -30 hellhole where your citizens can't walk outside, and even better than other towns that have failed to keep their professional baseball teams.

Tres bien, mon ami. Tres bien.

The Canterbury Tales (1/5/2006)

Hi Everyone:

And just like that, it ended. Twenty-three days and 4500 kilometers after touching down in Auckland, and nearly three years after launching our initial plans, we head 17 timezones into the past with 2000 photos and enough stories to numb your collective crania. And here we stand, tired and exhilarated, accomplished and eager to plan second trips.

The slide back into the West begins with a few days in Christchurch, hub of the Canterbury region and perhaps the world's most British city outside the Isles. Punts glide along the Avon River, and fin-de-ciecle trams loop around the main streets. The town even has a resident wizard and town crier, the latter of whom ends his daily announcements by proclaiming "God Save the Queen". (And no, yesterday we resisted the irony and did not punt on the 4th.)

Although Christchurch has a strong Kiwi flair behind its English facade, it far from typifies New Zealand. The NZ is experience is one of sweeping wildnerness, one that defies logic to pack so much into two tiny islands. Simply put, NZ resets your standards - it doesn't just assault your senses, it razes them to the ground and sows salt on the remains. In a day, you can drive from golden, tranquil beaches to violent surf pounding limestone cliffs (as we did on 12/24), and in another drive from windswept, rolling, rocky hills, through pine forests, across flat plains and arrive at jade mountain lakes (last Tuesday). Add to that, the weather is so unpredictable that you may have a baking overcast day or see rain out of a pale blue sky.

But alas, it's over. Three years of anticipation, ten countries visited since to dub "Nice, but not New Zealand", and we are heading home utterly satisfied. If I thought my original standard was too lofty, the Kiwis saw it, said thanks, and blew it right out of the Tasman Sea.

Thanks to all of you who put up with my inane blabber about this mystical Garden of Eden that I hadn't even visited. And now that I have, brace yourself, since it's only going to get worse.

And thank you, New Zealand.

Do Not Pass Otago (1/2/2006)

Hi Everyone:

All wasn't quiet on New Year's Day. Or Eve, for that matter. In perhaps the sauciest of Commonwealth celebrations, Chuck and I rang out 2005 with the Commonwealth's most esteemed sporting pastime, one which would likely cause wars were its participants all not subjects of Her Esteemed Majesty.

Black Caps vs. Sri Lanka. You got it: cricket.

And we understood everything. Here we were, two Yanks (yes, we suck) that get cricket. Never thought I'd be able to say that.

The 7-hour affair, a shortie even for one-day standards (most test matches stretch over 2-3 days), was thoroughly engaging. Even as the sun scorched us, the Caps and Ceylonites bowled, batted, ran, stood idly, screamed to umpires, and took the requisite tea break. And there we sat, enraptured. Cherrio, blokes.

Queenstown is NZ's party depot, a tiny town that goes positively bonkers for any occasion (I presume even Guy Fawkes Day). Since NZ is the first country to greet the new year (meaning, technically, my 2006 will be longer than yours), the Kiwis have a particular affection for the holiday. And so, on the beaches of Lake Wakatipu, with fireworks so close that ash fell on our shoulders, we rang in 2K6 Kiwi-style, slept, and THEN watched all the subsequent celebrations in Europe, Australia, and North America. Been there, done that, old news.

Before Queenstown, we explored the southwestern South Island thoroughly, and area whose luscious greenery is protected by UN dollars (meaning, technically, you're paying for it.) We took a morning cruise in the pristine Milford Sound; peered into kettle lakes that reflected mountains towering above them; pausted to stare at long, white carpets sweeping down glacial valleys; chilled with sea lions in forgotten coves; witnessed parts of a manhunt for asylum-seekers; and chatted nights away with numerous Kiwis and other worldly folk.

So today, it's back to the Southern Alps, skirting the mountains until the plains of Canterbury and Christchurch, our last hurrah in NZ. As always, the road goes ever on and on.

Matt