Our Travel Wishlist: Yemen

This will be a different kind of post. Normally, we describe places we’ve been to, but today we want to tell you about a country we want to visit. Recently, the area where we live saw a boom of Yemeni coffeehouses popping up here and there. These spacious, lavishly decorated […]

Against All Advice: Finding The Perfect Beach Near Istanbul

Planning a trip for just the two of us is now easy, as we know what we like and what kinds of trips bring us joy. But earlier this year, planning a family reunion trip to Istanbul with Victor’s father, brother, sister-in-law, and niece was a whole different story. Victor’s […]

Is Istanbul Now More Expensive Than Dubai for Tourists?

In August, we spent a week in Istanbul meeting with my family, and the city once again left us speechless.  But this time, it was not for the reason you might expect.  I could write about incredible sites or delicious food (of which Istanbul has plenty), but, as a travel […]

What Else Is on the Menu?  Bosnian Edition

Where in the world could you walk into a sweet shop and find a blonde, blue-eyed girl selling Turkish delights to a family from Istanbul? Where could you see Omani tourists admiring “oriental rugs” while a Slavic shopkeeper explains their designs and the centuries-old story of his family business? And […]

Don’t Call It a Burek!

I am a simple person. I see a bakery, I go inside a bakery. Or at the very least, I stare at the goods in the window display like a hungry orphan from a Dickens novel. A cup of coffee and a baked good is our usual go-to lunch while […]

Tombstone Tourism

By Julia / November 11, 2019

A cemetery is not something you travel to another country to see.  Not usually, anyway.   Maybe you stop by for an hour or two to stand at a grave of a long-dead celebrity, pay respect to fallen American soldiers of WWII as we did in Normandy, or explore a beautiful […]

Sardines and Egg Custard Tarts – The Overlooked Cuisine of Portugal

By Victor / October 30, 2019

We are standing in a giant store where every wall is covered with floor-to-ceiling shelves, displaying thousands of cans of sardines. “Is this… a sardines store?” Julia asks no one in particular. Her question echoes off endlessly stacked sardine cans and down the airport hallway. We had arrived on an […]

NSFW Temples or How Victor and I became Temporary Celebrities

By Julia / October 23, 2019

Buckle in, the day has come.  This is our very first NSFW post.  None of this previous “Asian Massage but no Happy Ending” or “Pot Pizza without Any Actual Pot” nonsense.  This post is going to contain the most non-family-friendly pictures so far, at least until we get to posting […]

Familiar and Strange – The Cuisine of Mexico

By Victor / October 17, 2019

Before we ever visited Mexico, one thing we thought we knew about Mexico well was the food.  Tacos, burritos, nachos, and fajitas are our go-to comfort foods.  Imagine our surprise when we found some very different menu offerings south of the border, with most of our favorites conspicuously missing.  It […]

Village Homestay in India – New Year, Goats, and Bootleg Brandy

By Julia / October 10, 2019

Ever since we started seriously traveling, we usually take two weeks either around Thanksgiving or Christmas/New Year for a long trip out of the country.   To date, we have celebrated New Year watching fireworks while wearing white and drinking champagne with locals on a beach in Brazil; lost in a […]

Música Brasileira – The Music of Brazil

By Victor / September 26, 2019

The word “Brazil” means so many different things for me – world-renowned beaches, the national soccer team, and 1980s telenovelas with enough twists and turns to bring the whole of the USSR to a standstill. But above all, Brazil is all about its music – samba, bossa nova, samba-reggae. While […]

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