world_hum

My World Hum Q&A on Thailand protests and traveling here

April 21, 2009

If you’re wondering about traveling in Thailand following the recent political unrest here, you might be interested in this Q&A I did with World’s Hum’s Julia Ross yesterday. Julia asked me about the current atmosphere in Bangkok, what impact the turmoil is likely to have on Thailand’s tourism industry, and what advice I have for those considering a trip to Thailand.

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The new World Hum — and the top 40 travel songs of all time

December 15, 2008

One of my favorite Web sites1, World Hum — tag line: travel dispatches from a shrinking planet — has just launched a re-designed site. World Hum’s Jim Benning, Mike Yessis, and Valerie Conners discuss the re-vamping in this video.

New features include videos, bigger photos, and a column by Tom Swick2 There’s also a piece by Anthony Bourdain called “Subcontinental Homesick Blues,” about “why music can make a travel moment.”

The site also contains a new feature: “World Hum’s Top 40 Travel Songs of All Time.” The songs were voted on by World Hum contributors, and each song has a corresponding YouTube video. (You can see the entire list on one page here.)

I contributed a list of my top ten songs3 and then, once the voting was complete, I wrote a few sentences about Neil Young’s 1976 tune, “Long May You Run.” That song is at number 16 on the list. You can find what I wrote here (scroll down a bit).

  1. Back in 2001, the site ran an essay of mine called Soup to Nuts, about a funny experience I had here in Bangkok, long before I moved to Thailand. [↩]
  2. A few years back, Swick wrote a good story about Cuenca, Ecuador — where I lived for a year — for the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. [↩]
  3. For the record, my top ten songs were:
    1. “Born to Run,” by Bruce Springsteen
    2. “This Must Be the Place,” by Talking Heads
    3. “Range Life,” by Pavement
    4. “Long May You Run,” by Neil Young
    5. “Just Like Honey,” by Jesus and Mary Chain
    6. “American Girl,” by Tom Petty
    7. “Love Shack,” by the B-52s
    8. “Passenger Side,” by Wilco
    9. “Float On,” by Modest Mouse
    10. “Good to Be on the Road Back Home,” by Cornershop. [↩]

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