Trying to imagine how Vijaya looked during its heyday is difficult when you see what it’s like in the present. The day after we went…
A Slice of Taiwan in Semarang
Kota Lama. That charming part of my hometown Semarang seems to know how to keep me visiting whenever I’m in town. Despite the haphazard “revitalization” done by…
A Slice of Kowloon
For its relatively small size, Hong Kong has so much to offer. From some of the tallest skyscrapers in Asia to verdant hills towering over…
Angkor Wat: Built to Impress
It was a cloudy afternoon on our third day in Siem Reap and we were on our way to a massive 12th-century temple in a forest-studded setting.…
Vestiges of Semarang’s Ethnic Quarters
Jalan Pandanaran is a busy four-lane street in downtown Semarang, a city of 1.6 million people that is also the capital of Indonesia’s Central Java…
Banteay Srei: Poetry in Stone
Over the course of history, we have read and seen how with the rise of great kingdoms and empires these opposing sides of what human…
Wadi Rum: Where Imagination Runs Wild
It is remote and barren. It is a land of scorching heat. Yet, here we are, in Wadi Rum, a large valley in the southern…
Kota Lama: Between Restoration and Reinvention
Only time will tell. This cliché has been proven over and over again. We’ll never know what the future has in store, and despite our…
Prambanan: The One that Keeps Calling
Do you have a special place that, for whatever reason, keeps calling you to return even though you’ve been there many times? I do. Those…
Madaba’s Marvelous Mosaics
Humans and art are inseparable. Thanks to the discoveries of cave paintings around the globe from France to Indonesia, dating back more than 40,000 years…