WHEELS OF FORTUNE

Recently I was reading a Huffington Post article about overrated travel destinations, and the author suggested ditching Costa Rica for Hawaii because “the roads are better, things are a little tidier, most people speak English…the food is actually interesting and they have really great umbrella cocktails.”

No disrespect for Hawaii (I’ve never been), but I don’t agree that it should supplant Costa Rica on anyone’s travel itinerary just because it’s easier to navigate. Our adventures on Costa Rica’s crappy roads—including nearly squashing some pedestrians and being pushed backwards up an incline by a helpful group of Ticos—were some of my favorite memories from our trip around the country. Not because we enjoy complications (although everything running smoothly doesn’t make for nearly as good a story), but because the nature of our escapades was uniquely Costa Rican.

Perhaps that’s the difference between touring and traveling: Tourists try to minimize uncertainty with a regimented schedule and cultural encounters distilled through English-speaking guides, while travelers embrace the unknown—mishaps and all—as part of an authentic experience. All I know is that sitting on the beach with a bottle of Imperial and a bowl of ceviche is significantly more pleasurable after you’ve faced a few bumps in the road.

CAT POOP COFFEE

One day we were drinking coffee at the home of a Korean friend when she informed us that the beverage we were consuming had been made from cat poop. Naturally, we thought she was joking; then we were horrified as she insisted it was true. It wasn’t until I got home and Googled “cat poop coffee” that I fully believed what she was saying.

Apparently, when the Dutch established coffee plantations on the islands of Java and Sumatra in the 1800s, they prohibited the native farmers from picking any of the coffee for their own use. To skirt the rule, the farmers collected feces from a long-tailed cat called a civet (Not what’s pictured above. That’s just a Burmese temple cat.), which ate the coffee fruits but left their seeds undigested. The natives then cleaned, roasted, and ground the “kopi luwak,” and voila: cat poop coffee became a trend.

Eventually the plantation owners themselves began to favor the rare civet coffee, and in a Tom Sawyer-esque turn of events, it became the most expensive coffee in the world. These days it costs around $35 to $80 per cup and is consumed mostly in South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan. Although it’s plenty safe to consume (Trust me, I checked!), industry experts mostly concur that it’s a gimmick. I’d have to agree: it pretty much tasted like a stale cup of Folgers.

WORLD'S FRIENDLIEST PEOPLE

Last month the New York Times’ Frugal Traveler wrote an article deconstructing the question “Which country has the world’s friendliest people?”, while the World Economic Forum recently published this interesting map (note that South Korea ranks, along with Russia and Venezuela, among the least welcoming countries). Of course, there are good people in every country, and traveling usually results in some kind of connection with the locals. But when a people are extra hospitable/warm/welcoming, it can make a good trip truly memorable.

Such was the case when we visited Japan in February. Everywhere we went, we were overwhelmed with hospitality—from the ryokan owners who lent us snow boots to the innkeeper in Fukuoka who gave us her cast-iron squid ball pan. On our first trip there, in December, a young man went out of his way to help us buy subway tickets and take us to our train in Tokyo (an experience you can read more about in my article for this month’s Global Traveler).

Perhaps the best part about these interactions was that they were completely unexpected. Strangely, the Japanese have a reputation for coldness and xenophobia, but our exchanges were the complete opposite. In fact, I felt more welcome there than I ever have in Busan, where foreigners are a dime a dozen. Maybe that’s the key: places that aren’t overwhelmed by visitors are in the end more receptive to them.

JAPAN'S SNOW MONKEYS

There’s a lot to love about the Japanese aesthetic, but one of my favorite elements is their cultivation of pleasantly surprising incongruity. In other words, the Japanese have an appreciation for the absurd…and what could be more absurd than a monkey in a hot tub?

The Jigokudani Monkey Park was our first stop on an eight-day visit to Japan this month, and it set the bar pretty high for the rest of the trip. We traipsed through snowy woods near the town of Yudanaka (about 45 minutes by train from Nagano) to find nearly 200 macaque monkeys alternately digging in the snow for seeds and resting their furry bodies in a steaming hot spring.

For the most part, they completely ignore the tourists shoving telephoto lenses in their faces. Someone discovered the monkeys’ high-altitude hangout in the 1960s, and humans have been flocking to see them bathe ever since. It was tough to tear ourselves away from watching their weird faces, but fortunately we had our own hot baths, cold saké, and mountain vegetable tempura to look forward to at the nearby ryokan (traditional inn).

DOI SUTHEP POSTCARD

I'm embarrassed to admit that I still haven't sorted through my photos from our travels in Myanmar and Thailand last summer. This fellow was taking a break from tossing holy water onto pilgrims at Doi Suthep, a hilltop temple near Chiang Mai. Supposedly it was erected on the spot where a mysterious white elephant lay down and died. The nice thing about sifting through my notes and photos slowly is that it lets me recall more colorful locales as the cold, bleak days drag by in Busan. A description of our life-changing trip to Myanmar is a long time coming.

In the meantime, here's an article I wrote about Austin, Texas—a city that’s racing ahead of America’s recession—for the January issue of Global Traveler magazine.

TOKYO STREET STYLE

Since Tokyo is synonymous with street style, I couldn’t resist snapping portraits of some of the city’s fashion-conscious citizens when we visited last week: the Sailor Moon look-a-likes luring passersby into manga shops, the Little Bo Peep girls out for a stroll in Akihabara with their boyfriends, the teenagers in layers and lenseless glasses loitering outside Shibuya station.

Aside from all the crazy subcultures, I was surprised to see that mainstream fashion in Tokyo closely resembles the Pacific Northwest (think Pendleton flannels, Patagonia fleeces, and puffy vests). In one of Harajuku’s many “vintage” stores, I saw a tatty North Face jacket from the 1970s retailing for about $200. If only I had known—I gave one exactly like it to Goodwill a few months ago.

BUSAN CHORAL FESTIVAL

Last week I spent two days shooting photos at the Busan Choral Festival & Competition, an annual celebration of choral music featuring singers from all over the world. It was fun getting to see the colorful costumes and chat with choirs from places like Indonesia, Norway, China, and Latvia.

The highlight of the festival was a performance by the renowned Incheon City Chorale, who made a grand entrance down the aisles with thumping drums, hanbok (traditional clothes), and a powerful arrangement that sounded like something from the days of the Chosun Dynasty. Unfortunately, from there their performance devolved into a silly display of Gangnam Style dance moves and pantomimed lovers’ quarrels. I’m all for not taking yourself too seriously, but it seemed strange to undermine an art as elegant as choral music for the sake of a few laughs. The audience seemed to love it though, so maybe I’m just old-fashioned.