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    8 Apr 2016

    Data-Geek Heaven

    Data USA bills itself as “the most comprehensive visualization of U.S. public data.”

    That’s no exaggeration. Check it out.

    Reams and reams of demographic and other data on U.S. cities.

    In case you REALLY want to get to know the city you’re visiting (or your own city).

    Or if you’re like me and just happen to like charts (and cities) … what a combo!

     

    Pasadena, Calif.

    Data USA Pasadena stats

    Source: Data USA  

    Data USA Pasadena occupations

    Source: Data USA  

    (Ok, this site is officially distracting me from my paper that is due next week. Data is fun!)

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    28 Mar 2016

    Guilty as charged … but changing, I hope

    This is a great op-ed by Cuban-American actor/writer/filmmaker Natalie Morales (Lucy on Parks and Recreation, Claire on The Grinder).

    Screen shot of Flood Magazine. Photo by Sean Mennie.

    Screen shot of Flood Magazine. Photo by Sean Mennie.

    Side note — the article caught my attention because I LOVE her as Lucy on Parks and Rec and yeah, I’m just a tad bit obsessed with the show. Anyway …

    First, read her well-written essay (published by Flood Magazine) on her family’s experience in Cuba: Please Stop Saying You Want to Go to Cuba Before It’s Ruined.

    Confession — I’ve said that many times.

    I probably didn’t use the words “before it’s ruined,” but my meaning was close enough.

    I’ve also been guilty in the past of wanting quaint places to stay quaint — as if they exist purely for my own enjoyment, rather than as places where real people live their real lives. My thinking has evolved over the years, and probably could stand to evolve even more.

    Another lament I’ve heard many times among the adventure travel set: “This place just doesn’t feel authentic anymore.” That usually refers to something like a McDonald’s appearing in the heart of a colonial town square. There are likely legitimate gripes about that McDonald’s — especially if its existence is threatening the livelihood of a family-run enterprise that’s been on the corner for generations.

    But who gives me, a visitor, the right to say what’s authentic in someone else’s town?

    And, by the way, that lovely colonial square isn’t authentic, either. It was forced on earlier inhabitants by, duh, the colonists.

    From my experience, these types of remarks are common among us first-world travelers who like to think of ourselves as adventurers. We love the idea of escaping the comforts and commercialism of our worlds.

    That’s why I fantasized about visiting Cuba. It seemed like one of the few remaining places where you would not encounter a McDonald’s. Also, since it’s been illegal for Americans to go, sneaking in and out becomes a point of pride, a sort of proof-of-life-as-an-adventurer.

    (Turns out, I’m not quite the adventurer I like to think I am … my ex-husband and I were this close to jumping on a plane to Cuba from South America when we were spending several months in Ecuador … seemed like an ideal time to hide a trip to Cuba in the non-stamped pages of our passports … but then President Bush threatened to crack down on travel to Cuba and I chickened out.)

    There’s nothing wrong with wanting to escape our own cultures.

    In fact, I would argue it should be a mandatory experience for every citizen.

    But it’s all-too-easy to fall into a mindset that other places need to meet our own expectations of what those other places are supposed to be. And then to feel let down if they’re not. This is not only arrogant, it robs us of experiencing what a place is really like — McDonald’s and all — because we’re too busy looking for what we have decided we’re supposed to see.

    Over the years I’ve mellowed a bit in that regard. I can sometimes catch myself now when I start to compare a place to the fantasies in my head.

    Natalie’s article is another great reminder.

    PS: For a more in-depth discussion of this topic, I recommend my favorite travel book: Vagabonding, by Rolf Potts. To me it’s more life book than travel book — great insights whether or not long-term travel is in your future. To quote Tim Ferriss: “Vagabonding teaches you how to travel (and think), not just for one trip, but for the rest of your life.”

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    14 Mar 2016

    I ♥ the New Pedestrian-Friendly Times Square

    I was just in New York (yay!), so of course I have to talk about the amazing transformation the city has made in its use of public space. (Keep in mind, this is the perspective of a tourist who is totally in love with NYC but really only gets there for a few days every five years or so.)

    20160303_185949

    I’m reading about those changes in a new book called Streetfight: Handbook for an Urban Revolution, by the woman who played a big part in making those changes happen: Janette Sadik-Khan, former NYC Transportation Commissioner under Mayor Bloomberg (Seth Solomonow is co-author of the book).

    The following stats are taken directly from the book’s chapter titled “Battle for a New Times Square”:

    Old Times Square

    • 89 percent of the space belonged to cars, even though 82 percent of the people passing through did so on foot.
    • Since there wasn’t enough room for all the pedestrians on the sidewalks (and since so many people love to stop and pose for pictures, see goofy tourist above), many people just spilled into the streets and into the path of angry, frustrated drivers.

    New Times Square

    They closed off Broadway to cars (through the square) and opened it to pedestrians. By routing vehicles around the non-grid-friendly Broadway (it famously cuts through the city on its own trajectory), they simplified traffic flow by restoring right angles. They made similar changes to nearby Herald Square. The book explains it in much more detail.

    Here are some results (straight from the book):

    • Traffic overall moves 7 percent faster than before Broadway was closed (a move that most people thought would cripple traffic flow).
    • The number of pedestrians injured in car crashes dropped 35 percent.
    • Injuries for everyone–including people in cars–dropped 63 percent.
    • Local businesses benefited from better pedestrian access–so much so that by 2011 (two years after these changes), Cushman & Wakefield named Times Square one of the top 10 retail districts on the planet (for the first time in its rankings).

    What amazes me is they managed to convince a skeptical population to close off a major artery in the most crowded part of town. And it IMPROVED traffic flow.

    Go here for some great before-and-after shots of Times Square and other locations where innovative street design is making cities more people-friendly.

    And they’re not done with Times Square yet.

    Future Times Square looks even more amazing:

    These are renderings provided by Times Square Alliance. The Times Square Alliance collaborated with Snøhetta and the NYC Department of Transportation on the plans for the transformation.

    This is a rendering provided by Times Square Alliance (www.timessquarenyc.org/)

     

    Future Times Square 2

     

    I can’t wait to go back!
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    1 Mar 2016

    More Fun with Maps!

    Check out the link above — Archie Archambault is a designer and inventor who makes maps that are simple and clear.

    Screenshot 2016-03-01 09.13.58

    Photo credit: Archie Archambault

    Go here to purchase the LA map or look at the others.

     

    He’s created nearly 40 maps total. He visits each city, wanders around, and hangs with locals in the know: residents, leaders, and (who better?) real estate agents.

    He’s even got maps of the Milky Way, the Moon, the brain and the gut!

    “New research indicates that GPS’s are hindering our ability to create mental maps of our surroundings. My maps aim to install a “Map from the Mind,” simplifying structures and neighborhoods in the most efficient and beautiful way. The circle, our Universe’s softest shape, is the clearest graphic to convey size and connection.” —Archie Archambault

    This reinforces my instinct to avoid GPS as much as possible, and force myself to navigate with maps, using handwritten directions that I’ve plotted myself and keeping track of landmarks as I go.

    Don’t get me wrong — I love being able to pull up a Google map and look at street view to get a sense of where I’m going before leaving the house. But so far I’ve resisted using step-by-step navigation.

    I don’t want to lose the ability to find my way.

    What about you? How do you navigate these days?
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    Wanna see the real city? Hang with a local.

    16 Feb 2016

    Wanna see the real city? Hang with a local.

    My friend Michelle and I were exchanging dollars for stacks of kwacha in a black market currency swap in the back of a van, after dark, in a parking lot behind a building that was closed for the night.

    We’d just landed in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi, after about 35 hours of travel from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C. to Rome to Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) to the Congo to Malawi. I could barely keep my head up, but Michelle was hyper alert (that Girl Scout mom training at the ready).

    We’d met the driver of the van, Luzu (in the photo above), a few hours earlier at the airport. But he wasn’t a total stranger — he’d been a trusted and dedicated guide and friend for a doctor who spends a few months in Malawi every year. He’d been assigned to pick us up and make sure we could get some cash before heading out of the city to join said doctor for our two-week tour of humanitarian projects throughout the country.

    Michelle and I look back on that late-night van scenario with a “what were we thinking?” head slap  — it’s the kind of scene from a campy horror movie where the whole audience is screaming at the woman who is stupidly walking toward the mysterious noise in the cellar.

    But we were in great hands. Luzu knew this transaction was actually safer and cheaper than going to an ATM at that hour. He knew where to go. He knew who would give us a fair deal.

    Locals Know

    “Hang with locals” is something that’s easier said than done, right? That’s great advice if you know someone in town (or know someone who knows someone in town). But what if you don’t?

    Check out this brilliant new service that matches travelers with locals to show them around: Lokafy

    The founder describes it this way:

    “I realize that it is the people that made the difference between a place that I simply passed through and one that stayed imprinted in my memory. It was people that brought the place to life.”

    I found Lokafy by way of this article on CityLab (my favorite source of news): In Search of ‘Authentic’ City Tour Guides

    I haven’t yet used the service, but I love the idea.

    It’s common in many countries for locals to proactively offer their services as guides as soon as you arrive in town. They know how to spot the tourists, and they’ve built an entire informal industry around it. I always loved it — I’m happy to pay someone to show me neighborhoods I never would have found (or been brave enough to venture into) on my own.

    Lokafy sounds like a way to bring that kind of ad hoc tour guide match-making into places where you don’t typically have people offering up their local expertise as soon as you get off the train (like, say, New York City).

    As for my time in Malawi, it would not have been the same without Luzu as friend, driver, guide, explainer of all things mysterious to this westerner (like mice-on-a-stick). Some of my favorite moments were sitting in the passenger seat, staring out the windshield, with Luzu on my right telling me stories about his country.

    Luzu at the wheel

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    3 Feb 2016

    One Map Fits All

    Map of every city

    Hat tip to @chazhutton for creating the quintessential map of every city you’ll ever visit. 

    I love this!

    Go here to read his post on Medium (also linked via the headline above). Or follow him on Twitter @chazhutton

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    1 Feb 2016

    OCDtravel in the City

    Cityscape

    As a kid I was obsessed with New York City.

    The noise. The lights. The chaos. The crowds. The variety of ethnicities. The walk-up apartment buildings. The subway. The narrow streets. The brick buildings. The laundry strung from one 6th floor apartment window to another. The alleyways.

    And I hadn’t even been there yet. My idea of the city was entirely based on movies and probably “Welcome Back, Kotter.”

    I grew up out in the country in Clovis, California. Land of orange groves, almond orchards, grapevines, an annual rodeo, tule fog so thick in the winter the only way I knew where to turn to get home was by the Christmas lights the guy on the corner left on his hedges around his property, glowing all winter and only visible once I was within about 20 yards of the turn.

    But cities have always beckoned.

    I’ve now lived in the Los Angeles area for 28 years.

    ———-

    I’ve been ignoring this blog for the past year and a half because I’ve been distracted with a different adventure – grad school. That leaves little time (and money) for travel. But I realized, hey, I could still write about city travel. Or other city things.

    I live in a city. I travel around a city every day. There’s plenty of city-travel-related-minutia I can obsess about. Actually, I already obsess about it, I just need to start writing about it.

    (For instance, when I decided to start commuting again — I recently got myself an office downtown, after working from home for 19 years — I spent hours online looking for the perfect laptop bag.)

    Ok, so here I launch what will be this year’s focus – OCDtravel in the City.

    All city-related topics are fair game. Not just LA … cities in general. I also happen to be taking an urban design class this semester, so who knows what fun topics will emerge?!

    Here’s my first question – when your travel destination is a city, how do you get around?

    • Cab
    • Uber
    • Rent a car
    • Public transportation
    • Walk

    I usually walk as much as possible, and go for public transportation when walking won’t work. I love figuring out a city’s subway system.

    What about you?
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    19 Jun 2014

    Packing Tip — Use a laptop sleeve for wrinkle-free clothes.

    If you’re traveling for just a few days, consider using a laptop bag as your luggage.

     

    IMG_3678

     

    The sleeve area keeps clothes secure and wrinkle-free.

    IMG_3679

     

    I tried this on a recent two-nighter, for which I needed nice slacks. They arrived perfect and I didn’t even need to iron.

    In some cases you might end up with creases where the folds are, but in this case it was fine.

    I always love to find new packing hacks. Do you have any? Please share!

     

     

     

     

     

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  • Travel light.

    Efficient, expansive travel requires less, not more. One bag that serves multiple functions. A sarong that's also a towel, blanket or sheet. Clothing layers that pack small and carry light. A daypack with one-reach access to essentials. A pocket for my Chapstick.
  • My OCD

    can make me feel encumbered and anxious. But the lighter I travel the more liberated I feel (as long as my Chapstick and water bottle are within reach).
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    "Less" requires planning. For me, honing the art of traveling light is a journey unto itself. And I STILL haven't found the perfect travel bag.
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  • Recent Posts

    • Data-Geek Heaven
    • Guilty as charged … but changing, I hope
    • I ♥ the New Pedestrian-Friendly Times Square
    • More Fun with Maps!
    • Wanna see the real city? Hang with a local.
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  • Disclaimer

    The content on this site is based on the personal experiences of an OCD-positive traveler. It is not medical advice. If you think you suffer from anxiety, seek the counsel of a medical professional. Believe me, it helps.

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