The Tranquilo Traveler
The Tranquilo Traveler is a celebration of voluntourism, slow travel, and other interesting ways to see the world. Travel writer and award- winning Moon Handbooks author Joshua Berman created The Tranquilo Travel as a resource for world trippers and international volunteers, a window to the author’s travels in Nicaragua, Belize, and beyond, and an update of his books and articles.
Palm Reading: Of Mystery and Marriage
By Joshua | 
4 Comments » 
The first time I had my palm read on this round-the-world trip was by a man named Manzoor in the back of a Pakistani bus, in the early morning after a horrid overnight trip down the Karakorum Highway. The second time was in a crowded subway in Calcutta, by Pradeep, a good samaritan who had helped us find the station. In both cases, I was asked permission for the honor of reading my palm, and both readers told me that I was a very hard worker and somewhat of a mystery. These things were confirmed by my third reading the other day, in the house of Gourpa Bakshi, a part-time astrologer and fulltime factory staff at a nearby tea garden.
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Bengali Birthday Bash: Bulbulda Will Arrange
By Joshua | 1 Comment » 
Vikash “Bulbul” Roy, is much more than the owner of the vehicle we rent. He is our Godfather, our band manager, our bodyguard, and social planner. The name we call him, “Bulbulda,” literally means “Big Brother Nightingale,” and if there is anything we need in Birpara, there is no doubt: as Sarmishtha and Debasish have told us a hundred times, “Bulbulda will arrange.”
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Jaldapara Wildlife Sanctuary: After the Revolution
By Joshua | No Comments » 
Our elephant’s name was Purnima, “Full Moon” in Bengali, and she was silent save for her heavy footsteps as she carried us through the post-dawn mist of the forest. Suddenly, our mahut dug his bare heels behind Purnima’s ears and she came to a stop as he pointed and whispered excitedly, “Gundar!”
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Tenjewberrymuds
By Joshua | 3 Comments » I had an unbelievably similar dialogue from my hotel room in Siliguri the other day (minus the crisp bacon). The following is a telephone exchange between a hotel guest (G) and room service (RS), at a hotel in Asia, which was recorded and published in the Far East Economic Review:
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Tea Time 4: The Survey Continues
By Joshua | No Comments » 
The final phase of fieldwork for our tea worker nutrition survey has been frustratingly slow. Our work has been hampered by access problems in the form of both permission issues and physical access (erratic and late monsoon rain keep filling rivers whose normally dry beds we must cross to reach the gardens). With our deadline fast approaching, it looks as if we’ll only be able to complete surveys on five or six, rather than eight, gardens.
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Swastika: Symbol of Peace
By Joshua | 9 Comments » 
It is everywhere, this ancient sign of Hindu and Buddhist law. “Swasti” is Sanskrit for well-being, and the angular, clockwise-spinning arms are an auspicious sign of peace, luck, and protection on doorways, signs, gates, and the front of vehicles.
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Kalimpong: The Road to Lhasa
By Joshua | 1 Comment » 
“Buddhism is very simple,” said Ola Bantha, as he stood over our table in his dimly lit Road to Lhasa restaurant. “Nothing is permanent. Materialism is only in the mind.” I dipped another of Ola’s enormous momos into a red-chili sauce and popped it into my mouth, my eyes watering as he continued.
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Oolash! A Day in the Life
By Joshua | No Comments » 
The doorbell starts ringing at 8 o’clock in the morning, Saturday, our first “day off” in weeks. The day’s visitors include the typical Bengal Bunch cast and crew—Bulbul-da, Bodi-the-Nosy, Bling Bling Mani—in and out all day, but there are special guest stars this day as well: Anuradha Talwar, our “boss” from Calcutta, as well as her IUF counterpart who has flown in from Ahmedabad. Their cell phones, laptops, and action-oriented auras add to the general excitement of Things Getting Done as we sit in circles on the floor, one meeting leading into the next.
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Bhutan: Forbidden Border
By Joshua | No Comments » 
I read somewhere, several years ago, when Bhutan was an unimaginably far-away fairyland (instead of an unimaginably close fairyland), that Bhutan’s King had some kind of GDP-equivalent statistic that quantified both the economic well-being and the spiritual happiness of his subjects. The figure took into account religion, environmental beauty, family, etc. Beyond this vague and alluring factoid, however, I know nothing about the tiny mountain state floating high in the Himalayas which, for two months in 2005, would make up my northern physical horizon, and whose colorful gates would shout to me, “NONE SHALL PASS.”
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BY JOSHUA BERMAN
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