“Today the campfire is called a computer or a television … Drama goes back to the beginning of civilization around the campfire, where the tribe comes together, and they say, “My God, did you see what blah blah did with that mountain lion today?” And the other guy says, “I’ll tell you one better than that.” … [W}e tell stories that unite the tribe. We reinforce our tribal unity. We say, this is how we do things here.” David Mamet, MasterClass.com

“Once the travel bug bites there is no known antidote and I know that I shall be happily infected until the end of my life” – Michael Palin

“All I know is that I want to live somewhere I’ll have to relearn everything: how to cross the street, how to order coffee, how to deal with people whose modes of thinking are utterly, intriguingly foreign to my own. I want to be uncomfortable, to be an outsider not just in my own mind but in the eyes of everyone who glances at my awkward, bumbling self. I want to figure it out all over again, to savor the […]

“As I have said, it is hard to be a snob and a tourist at the same time. A way to combine both roles is to become an anti-tourist. Despite the suffering he undergoes, the anti-tourist is not to be confused with the traveler: his motive is not inquiry but self-protection and vanity. Dean MacCannell, author of the anthropological study The Tourist, remembers a resident of an island like Nantucket who remonstrated when, arriving, MacCannell offered to start the car […]

“Flying from one capital city to another is not travel to me. Travel, especially in Africa, must be overland and must involve the crossing of borders — negotiating on land, usually on foot, the national frontier. That experience teaches a great deal about the state of the country. Of course, it’s sometimes dangerous and always time-consuming. Anyone who has traveled in Africa and not crossed a national frontier has truly missed the necessary misery and splendor of the journey. Crossing […]