San Raphael Swell

Before leaving Boulder, I went to central Utah with my friend and housemate Dave to hike and camp for 4 days in the San Raphael Swell. Excerpts from my journal are posted at the Notebook:

Notes on the San Raphael Swell

The Recess Ends

The Recess Ends is a fantastic documentary film by Matador editor Austin Chu about the impact of the Recession on America.

Austin and his brother Brian filmed the movie in all 50 states and met some memorable characters along the way.

The full-length Recess Ends documentary is available on Matador TV. That's right - TV.

If you haven't seen Matador TV yet, click on over for the best travel video on the web.

Check Out Matador Abroad

Remember Matador? The online community for travelers? In the past few years Matador has published a bunch of my feature articles, and when Brave New Traveler and Matador joined forces, I began editing for them on a regular basis.

These days, Matador is really taking off. As print travel magazines hemorrhage cash, we're closing new ad deals, becoming profitable, welcoming thousands of new members and publishing some pretty spectacular content on a whole network of travel sites.

Along with Sarah Menkedick, an immensely talented writer who lives in Oaxaca, Mexico, I'm editing Matador Abroad, a site that focuses on study abroad and long-term travel. Sarah and I have put a lot of work into Matador Abroad recently, and I'd appreciate it if you could stop by and leave us some comments.

A good place to start is an excellent essay Sarah wrote yesterday called "Why You Should Travel In Times Of Swine Flu".

And remember, if you have an article to pitch, you've got a friend in the editor's chair!

David Miller: Bone Truth Literature

David Miller and daughter Layla

Up this morning at 5:30. My only time to read and write. Running a Roberto Bolaño story through my speed-reader program while listening to drum and bass. Both at 200 bpm. The story is about a struggling Chilean writer (Bolaño) meeting a famous writer, only in this ethereal realm. Some call it magical realism. But it’s not magic. After enough time in Latin America you realize anything is possible like villages under siege by giant pairs of wings. It’s possible here too. This is all the Americas. It’s just that up here we clean the blood on the streets and keep our elders locked away.


But say you end up falling in love with the idea of this naked land. You go down there. Meet someone. Camp with her beside a Mexican graveyard full of paper flowers. Get married under the warm rain in Buenos Aires. Your parents flying down from Atlanta, joyful and bewildered. Mariachis arriving. People crying in the rain, saying “Dios is watching.”

wedding night in Buenos Aires

And then how quickly it moves to you just working back in the US. Getting up at 5:30 because like the young Chilean writer you think most of what’s out there is shit too. And if you could just get the beats and words to match up before sunrise and the dream-feeling goes away. Not looking in a mirror but out from it. Bee, Andrea, Mom, Dad, Brother Sam, Nana. Bolaño. Everyone there. Here. Time’s up.

- from "Twitter Novel" by David Miller

Within the next 6 months, you will read about David Miller and his real-time novel in the New Yorker, in Harpers, in the Times. His work is just too damn good and groundbreaking to stay out of the spotlight for long.

David is writing a novel in real-time on twitter.com, a micro-blogging website. This is, perhaps, one way in which literature will make the transition to the digital age.

Make no mistake - David's writing is literary. It's beautiful and intimate and real and the bone-truth.

David has been a mentor to me these past two years, even though we've only met in person twice, once in Boulder, Colorado, and once in Buenos Aires, not long after his first daughter was born.

He writes about family, faith, distance and fatherhood, and he writes one line at a time.

Here's the link to David's twitter page, where you can read the novel as it is being written.

David Miller's twitter novel

You can either start at the beginning by clicking on "older posts" or just follow the flow.

Or, you can go to this link, where David transcribes the novel with minor edits:

David Miller's novel - full version

Give David some of your time, and when his novel is featured in The New Yorker, you can say you heard about him way back when.


all photos copyright David Miller.

New Article: Travel Risks

My latest article was just published over at the Traveler's Notebook. If you have a moment, please give it a read.

10 Travel Risks NOT Worth Taking

"Clean Coal" Is A Farce

You know those "Clean Coal" ads that feature a bunch of actors pretending to be patriotic Americans looking into the camera and saying "I Believe"?

Well, the coal industry sure spent a ton of money on the ads promoting Clean Coal, and the investment seems to have paid off. Both Presidential candidates support Clean Coal, and Barack Obama even praised Clean Coal in his acceptance speech at the Democratic Convention.

There's just one little problem.

Clean Coal doesn't exist, and it never will. Coal is dirty, new coal plants are expensive and coal mining devastates God's Creation without contributing much of anything to the economy.

We just published an article at Matador in which my good friend Josh Kearns exposes the myth of Clean Coal. Please read it and share it with your friends.

I don't care how much money the coal lobby spends on ads or how much money they donate to political campaigns - the truth will always emerge.

The Myth Of Clean Coal

Tom Gates: New Matador Editor

Tom Gates is one of the most talented writers I know. His style reminds me of David Sedaris and Bill Bryson - cynical, wry humor, flawless sense of pacing and that rare sort of self-deprecating honesty that makes narrative writing shine.

Tom is the newest member of the Matador editorial team. For a sample of his work, check out his hilarious rant about New York City or read any of the blogs on Tom's Matador profile.

Juiced On Odwalla

In the past few weeks the word "juice" seems to have taken on new meaning. Did you know that if you're excited about something these days, you're juiced? As in, "I'm really juiced for Brave New Traveler's two year anniversary party".

Juice can also mean something akin to thoroughness. This makes sense, in a 'squeeze the last drop' sort of way: "I worked until midnight to really juice the article."

Juice has new meaning at Matador these days because we're juiced to launch a partnership with Odwalla, makers of healthy and delicious juice. Bear with me a moment, because I'd really like to get your thoughts on this venture.

Yesterday we published a profile of Odwalla over at MatadorGoods.com. I've been drinking Odwalla since college, when Super Food was my daily treat during exams. My mom loves the stuff too - especially Mango Tango.

I always loved the juice, but never really thought about the company that makes it. Turns out, Odwalla is a stand-up organization, a socially responsible company doing good work in an industry that all too often relies on pesticides and low-paid migrant labor.

At Matador, we've been looking for ways to pay our talented writers more than $25 per article while growing the community. We love our jobs, but some of us are married and one of us has an adorable little girl, and all of us have bills to pay.

How to make money without sacrificing our values, or pissing off community members with too much advertising?

The answer, I think, is to pursue wholesome relationships with companies that we truly respect, and whose products we feel good about endorsing.

Please, take a moment to check out our profile of Odwalla, and tell me what you think. Is this sort of sponsorship cool with you guys? Do you have other ideas?

And what's your favorite Odwalla?

Swords, Tofu and Travel Stories

A couple of links for you today.

The first is to my latest blog post from the Phuket Vegetarian Festival. This is a pretty ridiculous festival, as evidenced by the photo to the right, taken by Ryan Libre.

Swords and Tofu

I've also got a new edition of Tales From the Road up at BraveNewTraveler if you're looking for some quality travel writing.

I Just Got Interviewed...

If you have a moment, please check out my interview with Aaron Hotfelder over at Gadling.

Here's an excerpt:

1. Brave New Traveler takes a different approach to travel than a lot of other sites. What are you trying to accomplish with BNT, and were you surprised to find such a wide audience for your message?

Most travel sites are focused on destinations. This isn't a bad thing - travel is about going someplace new after all - but the destination focus does contribute to the idea of travel as just another marketable commodity.

The BNT team finds the thought of buying a travel experience ridiculous and sad. We see travel as a spiritual journey, an almost sacred way to find our place in the modern world.

We published a really popular collection of 50 Inspiring Travel Quotes recently. Here's one of my favorites, by Miriam Beard:

"Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living."

That quote sums up our attitude at BNT pretty well.

Am I surprised to find such a wide audience for this content? Absolutely not. People are hungry for essays and articles that go deeper than commercial fluff.

Here's the full interview: 'Talking Travel With Tim Patterson'

Politics!

I'm shocked, dismayed and, frankly, scared about the current state of American politics. Our nation is being hijacked by a rich, war-mongering elite.

Here are three political essays I hope you take a moment to read.

10 Reasons We Should Say No To The 700 Billion Dollar Bailout by Matador founder Ross Borden.

Why There's No Way I'm Voting For McCain by me.

Matador's Official Endorsement Of Barack Obama.

New Article! Youth Travel Programs

Taking a year to vagabond through China and study Mandarin looks more and more like a wise and practical alternative to a prestigious internship with Lehman Brothers or Bear Sterns.


Youth travel programs are one of the most important investments we can make. Please take a minute to read my latest essay over on the Matador Study blog:

Youth Travel Programs Are Vital To Our Security

Travel Risks

Photo by Ben

“Real adventure - self-determined, self-motivated, often risky - forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the earth and you will bear witness. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.”

–Mark Jenkins

I've got a new article up on the traveler's notebook. It's about travel risks worth taking, and I'd love to read your comments.

10 Travel Risks Worth Taking

Saigon Reflections

The Dragons program in Cambodia is over, and once again I'm writing and editing for Matador, the San Francisco based company that's breaking new frontiers in online travel media.

Here's a link to my most recent blog post on Matador, a reflection on lessons of the past two months and the exciting potential of online travel community:

"Live From The Nirvana Cafe"