The Times’ embroilment with the Kazakh government’s anti-Borat agenda continued yesterday with a pair of front-page headlines, one announcing the US visit of Kazakh President Nazarbayev, followed by another further down the column for an Arts section article on the Borat phenomenon.

While the Grey Lady’s ad department and Business section seem to have no problems playing patsy to the Kazakh government’s economic interests, the news desk directed a bunch of vitriol at continuing problems with political corruption and authoritarianism, and the U.S.’ dubious interest such an oil-rich region. Meanwhile, the Arts section ran their story with the headline: “Kazakhs Shrug at ‘Borat’ While the State Fumes.” Basically, some citizens are perplexed by Sacha Baron Cohen’s culturally garbled schtick, other find it funny, but no one cares as much as the government does. Don’t they realize that by being so dour about comedy they’re only amping up the possibilities for satire?

The most recent development, according to the cross-pond Times, is that Kazakhstan is investing $40 million in a super-serious epic called Nomad intended to combat Borat. Sez the Times: “Set in the 18th century, Nomad tells the story of Mansur, a handsome warrior born to unite the Kazakh tribes and free them from the Jungar occupiers of western Mongolia.” In sum: a humorless drama about obscure Central Asian tribes, seasoned with a splash of Soviet nation-building myth. Sounds like a recipe for comedy-crushing box office success to me.

Elsewhere:
- BORAT VS NOMAD!!! Kazakh Revenge Is Calling!! (Ain’t It Cool News)
- See Kazakhstan’s Anti-Borat Propaganda (Cinema Blend)
- It’s Braveheart of the steppes versus Borat (The Scotsman)

Previously:
- New York Times Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

Toothy mega-mogul Richard Branson is not one for small gestures, in fact, it seems he’s incapable of doing anything that doesn’t reach a Bond-movie level of grandiosity. Despite having recently donated all future proceeds from his air and rail companies to help protect the atmosphere through alternative energy research, he’s decided that the time is ripe to start punching some holes in it. Determined to be the first to offer commercial space flight, Branson unveiled two prototypes of rockets for his planned Virgin Galactic service at the Javits convention center in New York yesterday. Flights launched from a planned “Spaceport America” in New Mexico could be in operation as early as 2009. Each rocket would ferry six passengers on a sub-orbital trip for a paltry $190,000 a head.

Elsewhere:
- “Virgin Galactic: The logical next step” (BBC)
- “Virgin Galactic to Offer Public Space Flights” (Space.com)

Google is currently testing yet another feature to add to the panoply of options for Google Maps. Locking on to both Mapquest and HopStop’s target markets, Google Transit plans not only driving directions, but provides an alternate route via public transit and walking that will deliver you to the same point, for any specified time during the day. Not only that, it generates a handy little comparison table that shows bus/train schedules, mileage, time, and how much money you can save by not driving. Initially rolled out for Portland, OR last year, Google Transit added 5 more cities yesterday: Eugene, OR, Honolulu, Seattle, Pittsburgh and Tampa. While not exactly the most likely or useful cities for the majority of travelers, they were probably chosen for their small size and the relative ease of getting functional maps up and running. The functionality is definitely there, so, hopefully, positive response and feedback on those burgs will encourage the developers to get cracking on cities with both gnarly traffic problems and extensive transit networks, like D.C., Chicago and New York.

The NYT is doing their damnedest of late to help Kazakhstan overcome their Borat Sagdiyev-induced image problems, before his little movie opens in November. First, there was an article in the Business section touting Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty, as a destination for oil dollars, which contained the immortal advice:

“Locals like to overwhelm foreigners with vodka and meat, especially from horses. While visitors are often told it is impolite to decline the gorging, feel free to do so. But if you are given the full honor treatment — a sheep’s head served with marshmallowy eyeballs intact — saying no is not an option.”

and

“Central Asia is a land of funny hats, and the traditional Kazakh costume mandates a funnel for women that looks like a witch’s hat. Business attire in Almaty is no different from New York.”

Apparently that didn’t go far enough towards making Kazakhstan seem like a modern, forward-looking nation, so, today, the Times’ first section featured a four-page ad from the Kazakh government, titled “Kazakhstan in the 21st century” and dressed up with a faux-newspaper layout.

The proceedings kick off with a big photo of Presidents Nazarbayev and Bush sharing a handshake, and such thrilling headlines as: “Through diversification, steady growth and increased competitiveness.” Following that are a bunch of pictures of Kazakh politicos, extensive bland column inches about Kazakhstan’s “prominence among the Central Asian Republics” and another piece about Almaty as a hot business destination: ”’The general trend now is business travelers taking a few extra days to see the sights and enjoy the city,’ says David Berghof, a German travel agent. ‘The trend for combining work and play is up, but you can’t go anywhere but up when you start from zero.’”

If the Kazakh government really wants to challenge Sacha Baron Cohen’s portrayal of the backwards, bigoted Kazakh TV-reporter Borat, (who is mostly a foil to show how backwards and bigoted a lot of Americans are) they’re going to have to best this:



Call me crazy, but I think that just maybe the funny is going to stick with people better than “Transforming the mixed blessing of a nuclear legacy.”

Advantage: Borat.

UK paper the Guardian is devoting part of their Travelog feature to a week-long series of posts on air travel’s contribution to the global climate problem, and what can be done to change it. Two posts are up so far, with correspondents from Climate Care and Responsible Travel weighing whether or not carbon-offset programs are merely “greenwashing” our environmentally costly travel habits without forcing us to alter them, and discussing possible steps that could be taken to effect real change, from personal choices to government initiatives. This feature couldn’t be more timely, as it follows so closely on the heels of showboat airline mogul Richard Branson’s recent announcement that he will be donating all future profits from his Virgin Air and rail ventures to renewable energy research, to the tune of $3 billion over the next 10 years. (via World Hum)

Good news today for business travelers and others who loathe the idea of arriving at their destination without all-important toiletries: small quantities of liquids, pastes and gels will again be permitted through security checkpoints if they’re in amounts of three ounces or less per product, and carried in a one-quart clear plastic ziploc bag. The FBI has determined that in such small amounts, your lipgloss and deodorant pose no threat to the well-being of your fellow fliers. Also, products of any size purchased after the checkpoint are allowed. An article in USA Today has a rundown of the new rules:

• Liquid and gel toiletries in 3-ounce containers or smaller are allowed if they are in a clear plastic, quart-size ziplocked bag.

• Up to 4 ounces of some items are permitted in carry-on bags: eye drops, saline solution, non-prescription medicine and personal lubricants.

• Larger bottles of liquids and gels from outside including shampoo, suntan lotion, creams and toothpaste are allowed only in checked baggage.

• Drinks, liquids and gels purchased in airport stores inside the security checkpoints can be carried into passenger cabins.

• Baby formula and medications are allowed but will be inspected.

• Lighters are banned in carry-on bags and in checked luggage, unless they don’t have fuel or are in a case approved by the Transportation Department.

• Laptops, cellphones, pagers and personal data assistants are allowed.

The NYT went on a veritable shopping spree of travel coverage this weekend, with a T Style Magazine issue devoted to tasteful globetrotting, in addition to their regular Sunday section. The T cover went to a feature tied to Sofia Coppola’s upcoming Marie Antoinette biopic, with the director’s musts for shopping in the couture capital. Other articles sized up showplace architecture in second cities as a lure for tourists, focusing on the American Midwest, and Fukuoka in Japan. Also on offer: a feature on design in Bangkok, a style survival guide to LA for New Yorkers, and a review of design darling Ron Arad’s new hotel in Rimini (verdict: not really worth the wait, or the $13 million price tag.)

The other American papers took a decidedly less cosmopolitan stance, with lots of stories about quintessentially American travel, e.g. exploring the Great Basin, luxe camping in the Sierras, the Texas State Fair, and special section on New Mexico from the SF Chronicle.

Thoughtful YouTuber extremeextreme posted a sizable chunk of the Peru episode from season two of No Reservations today. Watch Bourdain doing his charmingly crass schtick while getting toasted on chicha with the locals, and then narrating his take on visiting Machu Picchu over some fantastic footage of the site.

World attention has been focused on Budapest since demonstrations, including occasional rioting, broke out on Monday in response to the revelation that Hungary’s Prime Minister, Ferenc Gyurcsány, had repeatedly lied to the public about the state of the economy in order to win reelection. Major media outlets have, of course, been playing up the more violent aspects of recent events, but the NY Times is now running a video report stating that the protesters have been largely peaceful, with the exception of a few bands of right wing nutjobs and soccer hooligans.



Also today, Gridskipper has an interview with Erik D’Amato, the editor of Budapest-expat blog Pestiside, who pooh-poohs the idea that the country is in the grip of chaos: “No. It’s no big deal. 5 cars burned compared to like 1,700 in one night in Paris. Even if you adjust for population, it’s like 50 to 1. The headlines should read: COME SEE A REVOLUTION WITHOUT THE UNPLEASANT DEADLY SIDE-EFFECTS.”

Pestiside’s coverage of events is definitely worth a look for their local (and thoroughly jaded) view on things, for example yesterday’s point-for-point comparison of this week’s demonstrations with the 1956 uprising against the Soviets, or their mid-week roundup of events which was tagged with the headline: “Your Uprising is, Like, So Two Nights Ago.”

Yahoo and Al Gore’s Current TV have partnered up for a new broadband channel within Yahoo Video – Yahoo Current Traveler. Traveler follows the same model as the cable channel, showing user-generated “pods” of a few-minutes’ length, intro-ed by young, telegenic hosts (witness the preternaturally bubbly Kinga Philipps). At the moment there are only 58 clips in rotation, some of them repurposed from content that was already on Yahoo Video, like the Kathmandu taxi video from TravelVlog that I posted back in June, and videos from Scourist and the RAD Blog’s Jon Rawlinson – another Travelistic favorite. There is some new dedicated content, though: a series called called Traveler Buzz, with episodes on Dubai and Peru, and a series shot by Bono on tour with U2, to add some celebrity heft. Among the top rated clips thus far are this video of the downright hallucinatory Mass Games held in North Korea every year:



and a slightly more terrifying piece about the reality of flying in the Congo (pay no attention to the smoke flowing from the air vents!)




Elsewhere
- “Yahoo, Gore Team Up for Yahoo Current TV” (Adweek)

As you might have read, Thailand’s embattled Prime Minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, was ousted yesterday by the Thai military in what is thus far a bloodless coup. Martial law has been instated across the country, and political protest has been curtailed to gatherings of no more than five people, but the coalition responsible for the coup has vowed to hand-over control in two weeks to a “neutral” stand-in Prime Minister who will oversee the government and the re-writing of the Thai constitution until new elections can be held, most likely in October of 2007. The coup leaders, who declare that they aim to keep the peace and put Thailand on a path towards true democracy, have the support of the King, Bhumibol Adulyadej, and of the citizens of Bangkok, who reportedly turned out en masse to show their support to incoming troops with yellow flowers (yellow being the color of royalty and loyalty to the monarchy.) Thai political life has been in upheaval for months over the subject of Thaksin, who, despite being elected by a wide margin in the last two elections, has recently been brought to task “over allegations of corruption, abuse of power and a bungling response to a Muslim insurgency,” according to the Washington Post. The coup doesn’t seem to be having any effect on travel to Thailand; the U.S. Embassy there is recommending that both expats and travelers monitor the political situation closely, but hasn’t advised that anyone leave the country or cancel their trip. USA Today reported that the backpacker train on Kao San road is still rolling right along, and Bangkok’s very large and shiny new airport, Suvarnabhumi, will open as scheduled on September 28.

Elsewhere:
- Thais Demonstrate Support for Military (Washington Post)
- Thai army chief pushes back elections (USA Today)
- Leader of Coup in Thailand Sets Timetable (NYT)
- Thais Demonstrate Support for Military (Washington Post)
- Coup unlikely to dent Thai tourism (USA Today)

Many people have heard of laughably tiny, but UN-recognized “countries” and city-states such as Andorra (181 sq. miles), Liechtenstein (62 sq. miles), and Tuvalu (10 sq. miles), but what about the republic of Molossia (6.3 acres of Nevada), the Conch Republic (Key West), or the sovereign nation of Lovely (an East End flat in London)? These and other experiments in declaring your own state are covered in a new Lonely Planet guide, Micronations, published this month. Each “nation” gets a write-up of their government, local customs, passport and visa requirements and things to see and do in the vicinity. The Kingdom of North Dumpling on an island off of Connecticut, for example, seceded from the State of New York led by Segway inventor Dean Kamen, who declared himself Lord Dumpling and instituted a new government including a ministry of nepotism and a ministry of brunch. Lovely, the creation of British comedian Danny Wallace, lacks territory, but currently has 58,000 Web-recruited “citizens,” a flag, currency (the I.O.U) and a national motto: “Die dulci freure�? (Have a nice day). Getting official recognition of their endeavors is understandably difficult for many of these self-declared presidents and monarchs, but being listed in a major guidebook series has got to be a start. (via World Hum)

Elsewhere:
- “‘Home-made nations’ guide launched (Guardian)
- “Born to rule” (The Australian)

Back in January, two brits, Ben Keene and Mark James, had the idea to lease part of a barely populated Fijian island, and in a very Web 2.0 twist, create a low-impact South Seas escape there using the membership fees of “tribe members” recruited through their website Tribewanted. Their stated goal is to have a maximum of 5,000 tribe members stay on Vorovoro Island for one-to-three weeks, for fees of $220 -$660, over the next three years. Subscription levels are designated “Nomad,” “Warrior” or “Hunter,” and there are 955 members thus far. The first batch landed this month, accompanied by a USA Today reporter, and kicked things off with a kava ceremony with the members of the local tribe that’s leasing Vorovoro. Said the nephew of the local chief: ””A lot of people here don’t understand why people who live overseas would pay money to come and live in a shed.” No sheds so far, though; the amenities consist of a giant communal thatched hut, somewhat leaky eco-toilets, bucket showers, and food prepared by the locals until the kitchen facilities are completed. Other than that, visitors get to play castaway, with nowhere to sleep but their own tent or the dirt, and a whole island to explore, complete with a nigh-inaccessible “secret beach.” Of course, USA Today’s piece summons up the obligatory paradise-lost specters of The Beach and Lord of the Flies. Survivor, though, is a more likely , bloodbath-free referent for the future of the Tribewanted bunch, with their pseudo-primitive lingo, all amenities voted on and constructed by tribe members, and the whole thing filmed for broadcast on “Tribal TV.” Also, the real Survivor is apparently filming just a few islands away.

2008 Beijing Olympics
- “To bet or not to bet on Beijing Games” (SF Chronicle)

Chinatown Buses, safe or not?
- “‘Chinatown Buses’: What You Need to Know” (Washington Post)

Dijon, France
- “A Little Dijon on the Side” (Washington Post)

Ethiopia
- “Ethiopia Opens Its Doors, Slowly” (NYT)

New York
- “The healthy side of the Big Apple” (LA Times)

Paros, Greece
- “Paros, Greece, Is a Jam-Packed Island That’s an Open Secret” (NYT)

It may still be September, but starting tomorrow in Munich, it’s Oktoberfest, that annual free-for-all of beer, pretzels and leather shorts. The festivities begin at noon tomorrow, when the Mayor of Munich taps the first keg, and continue until October 3. The city is prepared for a drunken invasion of massive proportions: last year revelers consumed 6.1 million liters of beer, and ate their way through hundreds of thousand of chickens, pork knuckles and sausages during the festival. If you’re flying in, you don’t even have to wait until until you hit one of the 14 behemoth festhallen erected in the city center to get your drink on. Munich’s is the only airport in the world with its own brewery and biergarten, Airbräu, where they’ve pre-stocked 5,400 liters of in-house Oktoberfest brew for the occasion. Visiting Americans will be represented by our very own ambassador of blondness and intoxication, Paris Hilton, who plans to stop by the festival as a PR stunt for a brand of canned prosecco she’s been flogging in Europe. Maybe she can make use of the handy five-language Bavarian dictionary provided by the official Oktoberfest website, which contains such useful terms as: varuafa (adj.) – to have a bad reputation.

*Starting today on Travelistic, in honor of Oktoberfest, look out for episodes from the Thirsty Traveler’s beer-soaked tour of Deutschland.


(Image via PixJK’s photostream)

From the top of YouTube’s featured videos, check out this surreal time-lapse video of last weekend’s balloon race in Reno, NV. Moving at warp speed, all that kitschy technicolor nylon looks more like some really smart digital animation than like anything real.

Condé Nast Traveler is roundup-happy these days, following up their 2006 movie poll with a feature in this month’s issue about music and travel, Around the World in 50 Songs. Based in part on reader feedback, and in part on author Jim Farber’s picks, the list gets a lot of crucial pairings of destination and soundtrack quite right: Iceland and Sigur Rós? Check. Mexico City and Cafe Tacuba? Check. Germany and Kraftwerk? Ja. But some of the choices are slightly dubious – “Volare” for Italy? – if not obvious to the point of camp, e.g. the Zorba the Greek theme for Greece. Still, it makes a good jumping off point for thinking about traveling and music, two of my favorite things, especially when combined.

5 years out from 9/11 and one month from the foiled air-terror plot in the UK, the harsh new realities of air travel were, understandably, tops in the headlines this weekend. Yet travelers seem to be taking the inconvenience and worry in stride: the rest of the weekend’s features were full of highly aspirational trips, some to not necessarily “safe” destinations, including Jordan, Uzbekistan’s silk road, and Rwanda and Uganda’s nature preserves.

Air Travel
- What We’ve Learned (Washington Post)

- Fewer bags overhead! But more staring at the carousel (LA Times)

- El Al’s security a model for airlines (Chicago Tribune)

- What to Do When Bumped From a Flight (Chicago Tribune)

Jordan
- In Historic Petra, Dazzling Sights for a Small Audience (NYT)

Northeast U.S.
- The Magnificent Obsession of the Northern Forest Canoe Trail (NYT)

Rajasthan, India
- Adventure With a Mission (Washington Post)

Rwanda
- Gorillas in our midst (SF Gate)

Uganda
- Gorillas in our midst (SF Gate)

Utah
- Close enough to touch Utah’s sky (LA Times)

Uzbekistan
- Spin your own tales of the Silk Road (Houston Chronicle)

Venice
- How to do Venice like a Venetian (Guardian)

For your pre-weekend entertainment: ostrich riding and racing in Oudtshoorn, South Africa, ostrich capital of the world, courtesy of globe-trotting vlogger Mike Pugh over at Vagabonding.