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.
Bangkok: Silk Buzz Saw
By Joshua | 
No Comments » 
“When socialism is pushed beyond a certain point, it becomes totalitarianism. Capitalism, on the other hand, if carried to its extreme, becomes anarchy. Anyone who doubts the accuracy of this last observation has never walked the streets of Bangkok.”
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Goodbye Chiang Mai
By Joshua | 3 Comments » 
We didn’t think the day would come, but here we are: Packed bags, paid bills, shipped packages; it is time to travel.
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Fellow Tranquilo Travelers: Joe Cummings and Bill Weir
By Joshua | No Comments » I would love to devote a posting to each of the friends we’ve made here, since they are all extraordinarilly creative, unrushed, and tranquilo travelers; but time on Chiang Mai’s blazing Internet opportunities is running short, so I’ll begin with my fellow guidebook writers.
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Map: Cambodia to Ko Chang
By Joshua | 2 Comments » 
This is our overland route from Phnom Penh to Bangkok (from last December).
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Happy Ending Part 2
By Joshua | 3 Comments » 
And there was much rejoicing.
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Places we’re going; change in plans
By Joshua | 5 Comments » We didn’t plan on staying five straight weeks in Chiang Mai, but here we are, fast approaching the expiration of yet another 30-day visitor’s pass in The Kingdom.
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“What, if anything, am I?” Woody Allen, White Cloth, and Meditation
By Joshua | No Comments » 
Being in Chiang Mai, Thailand and writing about some place on the other side of the world for 12 hours a day, for weeks on end, can do strange things to a traveler’s mind. Luckily, this is a city with plenty of opportunities to look inside and slow things down. For instance, last Sunday, while Tay was participating in a women’s yoga weekend (to “celebrate the goddess”) with one of four mermaids, I hopped in a tuk-tuk to the Wat Umong forest temple to join “an informal discussion, in English, on the Buddha’s teachings.”
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Another tranquilo drawing by Todd Berman
By Joshua | 1 Comment » 
A sketch inspired by the travels of the artist’s (and my) mother, specifically, this photo from Mom’s visit to Thailand.
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Visa Run: for the Myanmar Border
By Joshua | 3 Comments » 
Our second 30-day pass in Thailand inconveniently expires in the middle of Tay’s massage course and my deadline, which means we cannot extend our visa run into a longer tour of Myanmar (formerly Burma) or Laos. To the Mae Sai border and back is all we have time for and it is a full-day endeavor. Still, by joining a group of similarly situated farangs, we squeeze in a few interesting sites — Chiang Saen, the Golden Triangle, and, of course, a couple of hill tribes.
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Abroad in Chiang Mai
By Joshua | 1 Comment » 
Tay and I eagerly trade in our loose tourists’ ramble for a temporary structured life of routine; we’re still on the road, still far away from home, but content to settle into a brief expat’s existence here in Chiang Mai.
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Pages
BY JOSHUA BERMAN
Categories
- 0. Volunteering Abroad
- 1. Round-the-World Honeymoon
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