It has to be said that Manila is not the most appealing of cities. While the largely reconstructed old city of Intramuros has its charms, much of the rest of the city is a sprawl of modern skyscrapers, older housing, near-slums, and very congested traffic. It is the world’s fourth largest city and one of its most densely populated. However, there are gems to be found half-hidden in the sprawl.
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The Louvre Abu Dhabi displays art from very early civilisations up to the present day, in chronological order. And unlike many others, it presents various contemporaneous cultures alongside each other. You follow a thread from early self-contained kingdoms through conquest and expansion into empires.
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The master of word invention was Lewis Carroll whose works are liberally scattered with these portmanteau words, that is, words that combine two different words to make something new.
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Sometimes on a trip it’s important to take the pace down a notch. In the end it doesn’t matter if you squeeze in every sight or miss a few. By rushing around you can fail to really appreciate where you are and to notice the smaller details that distinguish one place from the next.
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A few weeks ago I took you for a walk around the colourful Mexican city of Oaxaca. On that occasion I skipped over most of the major sights but promised to return to visit them later. Today is that ‘later’!
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Mexico City’s Museo Nacional de Antropologia has to be one of the most impressive museums I’ve visited, and also one to which I really failed to do justice! My excuse is that perennial traveller’s bugbear, jetlag, compounded by a twelve hour overnight flight without sleep.
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Every trip, every journey, turns you into a slightly different person than you were before you left. The sights you saw, the experiences you had, the people you met; these are all part of you now.
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The tomb known as Tomb Seven is the most famous of many discovered at Monte Albán, as it contained the largest number of Mesoamerican objects found to date, both from the Zapotec culture and later Mixtecs.
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I don’t know about you, but logic tells me that there is no more reason to make a resolution to do something better / more / less on the first of January than on any other day of the year. And also that there is no more reason to believe we will succeed in sticking to that resolution then rather than on a different date.
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Like many people I have long been fascinated by the lifestyle of the Amish and Mennonite people. Their rejection of many of the technological conveniences we take for granted. Their seclusion from modern society. And the beliefs that influence the choices they make about how to live. One way to learn more is to visit.
