Writing a book has many joys to go with the challenges, and one of the joys in writing Vagabonding was that it gave me the opportunity to meet Pico Iyer, whose writing I have long admired. Pico was kind of enough to agree to an interview, and I’m featuring him in the January 2003 edition of my Writer Profiles at RolfPotts.com. To get an early peek at the interview, click here.

As usual, Pico was full of insight. Here’s an outtake:

“Travel has woken me up, in many ways. It’s taught me how provincial I and my assumptions are. It’s expanded my sense of what is possible among human beings and in terms of human kindness (and at times its opposite). And it has shown me a whole other way to live, without a steady prop, not hemmed in by familiarity, and living according to the principles and challenges I most respect. Best of all, it’s helped me see all of life as a travel, and as an occasion for writing (in order to make sense of it). A few years ago my house burned down, and I lost everything I owned; all my notes, all the books I hadn’t yet completed, all my photos and hopes and letters. And yet traveling helped me see this as a liberation: to live more at home as if I were on the road, to savor the freedom from a past and from possessions, and to think back on all the people I had met, in Tibet and Morocco and Bolivia, who would still have thought of my life as luxurious. Most of the people one meets while traveling deal with more traumas every day than the privileged among us meet in a lifetime. That’s how traveling humbles and inspires.”

“When I was very young a big financier once asked me what I would like to do, and I said, “To travel.” “Ah,” he said, “it is very expensive; one must have a lot of money to do that.” He was wrong. For there are two kinds of travelers; the Comfortable Voyager, round whom a cloud of voracious expenses hums all the time, and the man who shifts for himself and enjoys little discomforts as a change from life’s routine. Both kinds may enjoy themselves equally, but the latter probably sees much more of the country and its people, and has the added pleasure of going where lack of comfort excludes the former.”
–Ralph Bagnold, Libyan Sands (1935)

Outpost magazine is using an excerpt from Vagabonding as the lead story in their annual Global Travel Guide issue, which is on newsstands now. The excerpt, entitled “A Vagabonding Manifesto”, comes from Chapter 2 (“Earn Your Freedom”). A Chapter 1 excerpt, “Declare Your Independence“, is available online at Vagabonding.net.

“I see narrow orders, limited tightness, but will / not run to that easy victory: / still around the looser, wider forces at work: / I will try / to fasten into order enlarging grasps of disorder, widening / scope, but enjoying the freedom that / Scope eludes my grasp, that there is no finality of vision, / that I have perceived nothing completely, / that tomorrow a new walk is a new walk.”
–A.R. Ammons, “Corson’s Inlet” (1965)

“Purchasing a package vacation to find a simpler life is kind of like using a mirror to see what you look like when you aren

After 71,000 flight kilometers, 61,000 kilometers of land travel, 55 border crossings, 44 countries, 4 continents, 50 World Heritage sites, 44 countries, and 98 email updates, vagabonder WeeCheng Tan has finally made it back to Singapore! A full online archive of WeeCheng adventures is here.

I haven’t seen it yet (and thus I don’t even know the official title of the article), but my story on adventure travel in Laos is featured in the January 2003 edition of Conde Nast Traveler. The story documents a late 2000 expedition that journeyed into the Khammouan Biodiversity Conservation Area in the mountains of central Laos. I’ll comment more on this article when I actually get the chance to see the published edit (likely mid-January, when I return to the United States), but for now, here’s my old Laos Gallery of amateur photos that I took during the trip. The photos that accompany the Conde Nast story were taken by the renowned Norwegian photographer Knut Bry (I hear they turned out great, but I’m curious to see for myself!).

This year, the web-search engine Google has included the Top Ten Destinations of 2002 as part of its annual Year-End Zetigeist. Here’s the rundown:

1. Paris
2. Canada
3. New York
4. India
5. Las Vegas
6. Australia
7. Hawaii
8. Japan
9. Cuba
10. London

The only surprises I see here are Canada and India (which came in ahead of tourist favorites such as Las Vegas, London and Rome) — as well as Cuba, which no doubt will see lots more search exposure in the future. I notice that African and South American destinations are missing (which probably means that destinations there hold lots of promise for “off-the-beaten-path” seekers).

As for the Google Zeitgeist, it tracks “the year’s hottest trends based on more than 55 billion searches conducted over the past year by Google users from around the world,” and includes categories such as celebrities, brands, athletes, music, movies, news, video games, retailers, and television.

“The pleasure of traveling consists in the obstacles, the fatigue, and even the danger. What charm can any one find in an excursion, when he is always sure of reaching his destination, of having horses ready waiting for him, a soft bed, an excellent supper, and all the eases and comfort he can enjoy in his own home! One of the great misfortunes of modern life is the want of any sudden surprise, and the absence of all adventures.”
–Theophile Gautier, Wanderings in Spain (1851)

Of the many writers whose work I’m showcasing on Vagabonding.net, perhaps my favorite is Kelly Sobczak, who traveled through Ethiopia, Yemen, Iran and Pakistan (among other places) during the tumultuous fall of 2001. This week I’m featuring her Teheran story, “Anger Against America“, wherein Sobczak plays tourist and reporter at an anti-America rally.

“Very few citizens of the Great Satan make it to Iran,” she writes, “but those who do await a surprisingly warm welcome. While their intense hatred for Uncle Sam goes unmasked, Iranians are quick to point out that they have no problems with the American people. Upon hearing that I hail from the homeland of the enemy, people shake my hands, tell me about their relatives who have made it to America, pay for my bus tickets, and invite me for tea and even into their homes. And they all express sorrow and outrage about the devastating terrorism attacks on America. Never have I felt more welcomed and loved during my trip around the world than I have in the Islamic Republic. That is why it is even more shocking to see the anti-American slogans painted on the brick walls that surround what was once the embassy.”

Sobczak’s honest, straightforward account of the experience is consistently engrossing. “There I am,” she writes, “with banners, burning flags and angry Iranians surrounding me, and for an instant I close my eyes because I want to remember this moment forever, my first demonstration. The fact that it is against my country and in Tehran, well, that just makes it more memorable