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Category / Don’t Be A Tourist

Decline of the ‘Dirty Dancing’ Dream

We’ve made a few trips to explore the abandoned resorts of the Borscht Belt of New York. Once places like Grossinger’s, the Concord, Kutscher’s and the Pines, were the epitome of a swanky summer holiday for New Yorkers. All through the Catskills were dozens of all-inclusive resorts, glitzy enough to entice the mostly Jewish, upper-middle…

Overnight at Harry Potter University

If you ever find yourself in Oxford, England in search of a bed for the night, you might consider booking a room at the student dorm accommodation of Christ Church College, University of Oxford for a real-life Harry Potter experience. The university not only provides accommodation over the summer months, but your stay comes with an all…

Let’s Take a Tea Break at Beatrix Potter’s Cottage

It’s time for a little breather, don’t you think? So today, we’re popping over to Beatrix Potter’s old village, in the calm of England’s Lake District. We’ll stop by Buckle Yeat for a cup of tea, and stroll through the garden where so many of her children’s book characters — namely, Peter Rabbit — got…

The Haunting ‘Human Zoo’ of Paris

In the furthest corner of the Vincennes woods of Paris, lies the remains of what was once a public exhibition to promote French colonialism over 100 years ago and what we can only refer to today as the equivalent of a human zoo. In 1907, six different villages were built in the Jardin d’Agronomie Tropicale, representing all…

The Little Shop that Cared & other Tales

– When I was a little girl, I used to play ‘shop’. I set up my own make-shift retail space, carefully displaying my own clothes and toys around my bedroom and for hours on end I happily traded with imaginary customers. I borrowed the colored bills from our Monopoly game and used a real receipt-printing…

SWIMMING POOLS TO SALIVATE OVER

This is a little inconsiderate of me. Posting an article on the world’s most alluring swimming pools right smack in the middle of a summer heatwave. While that little drop of sweat rolls down your forehead and plops onto your work desk. Not terribly kind of Nessy is it? Well tough. I’ve been hibernating inside…

THE PARIS SYNDROME

A London friend emailed me an article this morning about tourists visiting the French capital, specifically Japanese, who fall prey to what is known as the ‘Paris syndrome’. Around a million Japanese travel here every year (yeesh), many expecting the fairytale vacation they once saw in a Woody Allen movie. But an average of up…

Shshshsh! Private Parties in Paris….

When I first moved to Paris, I quickly found out that the real nightlife was not in the bars or in the clubs but in the Parisian apartments. House parties. House parties galore. I wasn’t sure at first how I was going to get invited to one, but sure enough, if you break away from…

Mexico’s Haunting Underwater Sculptures: Art With A Purpose

I‘ve come across an artist called Jason DeCaires Taylor, whose work has pretty much blown out of the water (pun intended) anything that I saw exhibiting at the Paris FIAC Art Fair last week. The sculptor and scuba diver who grew up in Europe and Asia to an English father and a Guyanese mother, has…

I’m a Bit of a Loner in Paris but That’s Ok With Me.

“How is Paris?” I’ve been asked by friends back home since my recent move here. “Oh Fashion Week is a blast”. The reality is, as it stands, to gain access to the inside of a fashion show here, I would have to somehow tunnel my way in. Paris, let alone Paris Fashion Week has no…

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