Venezuela’s endless Coast • Feast on Marrakesh • ExplorE BuEnos AirEsWatch SparkS Fly at a Fire FeStival • keep Cool in Death Valley

MAr ‘09

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features

las Fallas españaWatch sparks fly at aspanish Fire Festival

Dear all,i’M MoVing tobuenos airesThe city that inspiresa permanent escape

keep Cool inDeath Valleyit’s just a walk inthe national park

Istanbul in24 Hours

haVe a quickie

Venezuela’sEndless Coast

where to Soak

travelmagMAR’09

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departments

get soMe grub Marrakesh: Eat, Drink, be Merry

¿Como se Dice?learn the lingo

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Vendors will do anything to attract your attention, from dragging you to a seat to chasing you down the lanes.

Join the locals and feast on anything from snails to goat heads in the old town square of Djemaa el Fna.

Marrakesh: eat, drink, be MerrY.

R

Regarded as having perfected the art of cooked street food, Marrakesh is traditionally the province of the working class. There are hundreds of sidewalk grills scattered throughout both the medina and Guéliz. Step up for a tasty, satisfying meal at one of these institutions; it’s a priceless experience that costs next to nothing. From midday to midnight, choose from grilled minced beef, sausage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan

salads, and french fries, supplemented by bread, ol-ives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

For the ultimate grilling experience, there’s only one place (although some cautious travelers save their sensitive stomachs until their last night). By dusk, more than a hundred stalls sizzle and smoke their way through mountains of fresh meat and vegetables. Step up to the stall of your choice and order from the wild array of perfectly done veg-gies, salads, kefta (beef patties), merguez sausages, beef brochettes, couscous, and even french fries. In cooler months or during Ramadan, try a bowl of hearty harira (chickpea, lentil, and meat soup) soup

or country eggs in homemade bread. The meal starts with free bread (to weigh down your paper place setting) and a hot dipping sauce called harissa. The mint tea at the end should be free, too. There’s little continuity of quality, even at the same stall, so it’s potluck and instinct all the way for each sit-ting. Vendors will do anything to attract your attention, from dragging you to a seat, chasing you down the lanes, and best of all, performing

by Michelle Rial

get

so

Me:

Things you cAn Findin DjeMaa el Fna

snailsgoat headspritefresh orange juice

lambkebabolives couscousapricotspitabaklava

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Happening restaurants, bars, galleries, shops and clubs aside exquisite Ottoman mosques.

Lose yourself on an action-packed layover with our quickie guide to the Turkish capital.

P

People, Istanbul is hot. And we’re not talking about the weather. These days, there are more happening restau-rants, bars, galleries and clubs around town than there are exquisite Ottoman mosques (and that’s a lot). The international fashion and design press have been talk-ing up İstanbul ad nauseam, but the most significant thing about the accolade ‘World’s Hippest City’ is that

İstanbullus themselves have come believe it. The creeping sense of de-crepitude that had fallen like a pall over their once-all-powerful home town has vanished, replaced by a sense of energy and innovation not seen since the days of Süleyman the Magnificent.

The city’s over-abundance of im-portant historic buildings and excit-ing new art galleries and museums

provides visitors with more than enough to see during the day, but it’s at night that the place swings into high-velocity, mega-stylish action. Locals are flocking to see and be seen at an ever-growing array of bars, clubs and restaurants, bringing with them an infectious sense of joie de vivre and a discerning ability to judge these places on their standard of ser-vice, drinks, music and food as well as their position in the what’s-hot-and-what’s-not stakes. smoke thto attract your attention, from dragging

by Michelle Rial

Istanbulin 24 hours

Hav

e a

:

WakE up anD HEaD to sultanHaMEt

bEat tHE lunCH CroWDs at tHE spICE bazaar

MEDItatE to tHE Call to prayEr In tHE bluE MosquE

saVor a kEbab aftEr buyIng a sCarf In tHE granD bazaar

ContInuE tHE MosquE tour at tHE aya sofIa

joIn CHIlDrEn, bIrDs, faMIlIEs for a rElaxIng MoMEnt by tHE bospHorous

pICk up soME Corn baCk In sultanHaMEt

takE In tHE sunsEt by tHE fIsHErMEn at tHE galata brIDgE

iTinErAry

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Venezuela boasts the lon-

gest stretch of Caribbean

coastline to be found in

Endless coastline: Venezuela

by Michelle Rial

wänder:mar’09wänder:mar’09

Every other South American countries are romanticized for the tango, Machu Picchu or Carnaval, Venezuela’s international reputation swirls around oil, the brash political style of President Hugo Chávez and the occasional international beauty pageant winner. However, there is so much more to Venezuela than these typical headlining issues. As a mat-ter of fact, Venezuela is a country of staggering variety and remains

a land that is greatly undervisited by international travelers. But you should really see the coast. It is phenomenal. Chevere, they’d say.

The country claims Andean peaks; the longest stretch of Caribbean coastline to be found in any single nation; tranquil offshore islands set amid turquoise seas; wetlands teeming with caimans, capybaras, piranhas and anacondas; the steamy Amazon; and rolling savanna punctuated by flat-topped mountains called tepuis. The world’s high-est waterfall, Angel Falls (Salto Ángel), plummets 979m from the top of a tepui in Parque Nacional

Canaima. Those seeking adventure will find hiking, snorkeling, scuba diving, kitesurfing, windsurf-ing, paragliding and more. Even better, most of these attractions lie within a one-day bus trip or a short flight from each other. Those interested in culture can revel in the pulsating salsa clubs of the nation’s capital, Caracas, explore various regional festivals, look for arts and crafts in the bucolic towns of the interior, or check out some of the world’s best up-and-coming baseball players hit a few innings in a

Every few minutes a new coastal landscape. Just nearby is Aruba, Trinidad. It’s the best of best worlds.

WH

eRe

to:

Venezuela

coro

manare

cayo azul

maiquetia

playa piscina

cAriBBEAn guidE Toan enDless Coast

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Expect to feel nothing short of

sparks at this bonafied Spanish

festival of fire.

STORY: ALEX CRUZ | PHOTOS: MICHELLE RIAL

allas are expensive, often ugly, and most often politically incorrect and offensive. Which is probably why it’s so fun to watch them burn. Sometimes ugly, sometimes caricatures, sometimes funny, soemtimes insulting, politi-cally incorrect. sage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan salads, and french fries, supple-mented by bread, olives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

Are Fallas-Sculptures beautiful, gorgeous, aesthetic? it’s a complex question. What is art? Some people don’t like the fallas. They come here with their own expectations of what good art is and they dislike the chaotic pile of the ninots in a falla, and the bright, striking colours.

You have to simply accept the fallas for what they are. They are not a form of sophisticated,

intelectual scuplture. They are a unique form of art that exists only in Valencia. They are a pile of messages united by a theme, sprinkled with humour, sex and caricature. They are a focus of a people’s festival, built to be under-stood even by simple folk, built to mount over the crowd and intrude into the daily routine. Yes, they are in bold colours, and yes they do resemble a row of caricatures, but this is what the fallas are. In addition, the fallas have their own framework of boundaries to consider. The wooden carcass and the papier-mache do have their limitations and the stuff that the artists finally come up with, considering they are not cutting-edge architects, is truly amazing. For the ultimate grilling experience, there’s only one place (although some cautious travelers save their sensitive stomachs until their last

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*NatioNal Park

*

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X marks the spot for various enchanting loca-tions that don’t give Death Valley its name. Dunes and

marshes around the salt pan. Most of the year the bed of the Amargosa River is only a series of dry channels. The river brings some water into the southern end of the valley from desert areas to the east, but most of its flow is underground. Salt Creek, draining the northern arm of the valley, also has only short stretches of perennial surface flow.

At times in the past, much more wa-ter reached Death Valley. During the Wisconsin Glacial Period of the Pleis-tocene Epoch, (about 50,000 years ago) a body of water -- Lake Manly -- filled the valley to a depth of 600 feet. More recently (from 2,000 to 5,000 years ago), a shallow lake occupied the valley floor. Evaporation of this lake created the pres-ent salt pan.dred stalls sizzle and smoke

oth the medina and Guéliz. Step up for a tasty, satisfying meal at one of these institutions; it’s a priceless experience that costs next to nothing. From midday to midnight, choose from grilled minced beef, sausage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan salads, and french fries, supplemented by bread, olives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

For the ultimate grilling experience, there’s only one place (although some cautious travelers save their sensitive stomachs until their last night). By dusk, more than a hundred stalls sizzle and smoke their way through mountains of fresh meat and vegetables. Step up to the stall of your choice and order from the wild array of perfectly done veggies, salads, kefta (beef patties), merguez sau-sages, beef brochettes, couscous, and even french fries. In cooler months or during Ramadan, try a bowl of hearty harira (chickpea, lentil, and meat soup)

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wänder:mar’09

oth the medina and Guéliz. Step up for a tasty, satisfying meal at one of these institutions; it’s a priceless experience that costs next to noth-ing. From midday to midnight, choose from grilled minced beef, sausage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan salads, and french fries, supplemented by bread, olives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

For the ultimate grilling experience, there’s only one place (although some cautious trav-elers save their sensitive stomachs until their last night). By dusk, more than a hundred stalls sizzle and smoke their way through mountains of fresh meat and vegetables. Step up to the stall of your choice and order from the wild array of perfectly done veggies, sal-ads, kefta (beef patties), merguez sausages, beef brochettes, couscous, and even french fries. In cooler months or during Ramadan, try a bowl of hearty harira (chickpea, lentil, and meat soup) soup or country eggs in home-made bread. The meal starts with free bread (to weigh down your paper place setting) and a

zle and smoke their way through mountains of fresh meat and vegetables. Step up to the stall of your choice and order from the wild array of perfectly done veggies, salads, kefta (beef pat-ties), merguez sausages, beef brochettes, cous-cous, and even french fries. In cooler months or oth the medina and Guéliz. Step up for a tasty, satisfying meal at one of these institu-tions; it’s a priceless experience that costs next to nothing. From midday to midnight, choose from grilled minced beef, sausage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan salads, and french fries, supplemented by bread, olives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

At times in the past, much more water reached Death Valley. During the Wiscon-sin Glacial Period of the Pleistocene Epoch, (about 50,000 years ago) a body of water

-- Lake Manly -- filled the valley to a depth of 600 feet. More recently (from 2,000 to 5,000 years ago), a shallow lake occupied the val-ley floor. Evaporation of this ties), merguez sausages, beef brochettes, couscous, and even

34

Tourist Attraction in

It’s the place to settle for

the people who won’t.

Story by MIchelle rIalPhotoS by alex cruz

Tourist Attraction in

37:wänder:mar’09

Argentina, she decided. I will live in Buenos Aires. I will eat empanadas. I will dance the tango. I will use my rusty Span-ish to say words like “Bailamos,”

and “Mi casa es tu casa.”

She arrived in Buenos Aires with a backback and a complex. Ar-

gentina, she said. I am here. Blah blah blah. Medina and

oth the medina and Guéliz. Step up for a tasty, satisfying meal at one of these institutions; it’s a priceless experience that costs next to noth-ing. From midday to midnight, choose from grilled minced beef, sausage, lamb chops, brochettes, Moroccan salads, and french fries, supplemented by bread, olives, and hot sauce. No credit cards, clearly.

For the ultimate grilling experience, there’s only one place (although some cautious trav-elers save their sensitive stomachs until their last night). By dusk, more than a hundred stalls sizzle and smoke their way through

wänder:mar’09

Say whaaat? Spanish.Get your point acrosswith minimal drawingsand hand gestures.

¿coMo se dice?

by Michelle Rial

Chuchería Chew•chair•e•yah

Candy or junk food.salty or sweet.

Media Naranja med•Yah nah•rahn•ha

literal translation:half organgeMeaning:soulmate

lea

Rn t

He:

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Empanada em•pah•nah•dah

Desnudo/a des•nude•oh/ah

a savory pastryoften filled with meat, cheese orvegetables.

naked man:desnudo (oH)naked woman:desnuda (aH)

literal translation:half organgeMeaning:soulmate

MAgAzinE dEsign, concEpT, phoTos By MichEllE AlExAndrA riAl

© MAr