Asia

Sailing over the Myanmar’s Plains of Bagan

Bagan Archaeological Zone More than 2,200 eleventh to thirteenth century temples and stupas pepper the forty square miles of Myanmar's plains of Bagan. Why are so many of these graceful, exotic structures clustered in this Southeast Asian country once known as Burma?...

Hoi An, Vietnamese Hand Embroidery

It was a boiling day in Hoi An when I was exploring the tourist attractions in the charming ancient town. After visiting a couple of them, I just wanted to get into an air-conditioning enclosure to escape the scorching heat. Even my shades and sun hat had not been...

My Day in Kaohsiung, Taiwan

In my third month as a Covid refugee sheltering in Taiwan, I finally had an opportunity to venture down south from rainy Taipei to sunny and warm Kaohsiung, the second largest city in Taiwan. In between two other destinations, I could unfortunately only fit in one...

Just Before WWII – an Australian Girl’s Gap Year…

In 1937 Australians didn't take 'gap years' - least of all girls. So it was a big deal when my grandmother, June Gray, deferred her first year of university to travel Asia, the US, Canada and Europe. While I didn't find out about this until a decade after her death,...

Reunited in Turkey – Love Overcomes the Pandemic

I gripped my fiancé's hand tightly as we took our first tentative steps across the smooth wet crystallised rock. Our bare feet on the carbonate mineral generated by thermal spring water, and the scorching September sunshine in the aesthetically-aethereal Aegean area...

Travels in Armenia

Armenia in Video From Armenia with love I know I rarely write "as the Editor" and this needs to change. Mostly, because ITKT has been doing building a number of big projects for the new year. Still, in the midst of it all, I try to cut a video and do a little writing...

Golden Temple at Amritsar, India

My Visit to the Golden Temple I've wanted to visit the Golden Temple ever since I read about it in my history books. It was the last summer when I finally got the chance to visit the holy city of Amritsar with my father. We visited the temple in the night to avoid the...

Baba: Video Night on the Ganges

I hope I still have some of his hair on my headphones. They got tangled when he put them on to watch the video. His hair was wispy and dry as tinder: the sort of hair that would burn fast in a riverside cremation. His face was lined with age but boyishly handsome. It...

Chitwan National Park, Nepal
Searching for the One-horned Rhino

As a traveler, I often hear terrible things about wildlife decline so I was thrilled about going to find rhinos in Chitwan National Park. This elation was because I knew I stood a real chance of seeing one due to the country's strict zero-tolerance policy on poaching....

The Famous Hanoi Train Street

I visited the energetic city of Hanoi, one of the most popular holiday destinations, last summer. Hanoi Train Street is one place that will never disappear from my travel memories. I had put Train Street at the top of the list of to-do attractions while planning the...

Osaka: Discover the Best of the Japanese Metropolis

On an hour-long train ride from Nara to Osaka, the once peaceful landscape turns into a genuine bliss of neon lights. Osaka is clearly a denser city than Nara and Kyoto. On top of that, I made the mistake of coming here during a Chinese holiday, a week to be precise....

Hanging with the Falafel Boys

"People here don't seem particularly friendly," my wife Mardena said. I didn't really want to hear it, but I couldn't disagree; I'd been thinking the same thing. It seemed like a lot of people we'd met in Israel most, admittedly, in travel related services like...