LEARNING ABOUT JAPANESE CULTURE ONE HANDICRAFT AT A TIME

Asia, Business, Culture, Travel

You’ll probably eat miso on a trip to Japan, but what if you could also learn how to make the fermented soybean paste? What insight might you gain into wabi-sabi, the Japanese appreciation for the imperfection and impermanence of life, if you learned how to restore  broken ceramics using a centuries-old technique called kintsugi? Not only do these experiences afford deep dives into Japanese culture, but they also provide personal connections to the history, techniques, and philosophy behind centuries of Japanese crafts and cuisine.

Searching For Santa Claus? Then Head for Southern Indiana Where Elves Keep His Spirit Alive

America, Business, Culture, Religion, Travel

By Steffy McCourt Untouched by the glaciers that leveled the northern part of the state, Southern Indiana swells and ebbs against an unending sky, forested hills, and ancient farms. On its winding two-lane roads, it unfolds like a good story… slow turns, familiar scenes, a feeling that you’ve been here before, even if you haven’t.…

Profitable Cuban Cigar Industry Loves Going Up In Smoke

Business, Culture, North America

In the valley of Viñales, the smoke from Cuban cigars mingles in an atmosphere rich in history and contradiction. Join writer and photographer Robert Holmes as he explores how this humble agricultural region in Cuba has become the heart of a luxury export trade, and the exotic visage that masks the reality of rural hardship, outdated infrastructure, and the heavy weight of a global reputation.

Gaia

Valhalla On Ice

Culture, Europe, History

It was a foggy June day in the year 793 A.D. when several longboats with dragon’s-head prows silently appeared out of the fog bound for the Lindisfarne monastery off the Northumbria coast. Howling like wolves, the Vikings methodically set about the business of slaughter. Some monks were killed midway through their prayers. Others were felled trying to defend their hand-lettered vellum books. Those who failed to die quickly suffered “the blood eagle,” a terminal torture in which a man’s lungs were ripped from his chest and allowed to flap like crimson wings until the screams subsided. And then, just as quickly as they had come, the Vikings disappeared into the cold gray mist of the North Sea, taking with them golden chalices, silk tapestries and intricately carved triptychs while leaving behind a legacy of fear. For the next 300 years, nobles and clergy alike ended their nightly prayers with the whispered supplication: A furore Normannorum libra nos, Domine – “From the fury of the Northmen deliver us, Oh Lord.”