Today on Literary Hub I write about the end of The Best American Travel Writing and what it says about travel writing - and about America: https://lithub.com/what-the-end-of-the-best-american-travel-writing-says-about-travel-writing-and-about-america/
We were in Palm Coast, visiting Polish friends, and each morning they would walk their dog Ada on the beach, picking up any droppings, and then on the return leg, against the sun, they would pick up the litter left by humans.
I was interviewed by Jeremy Bassetti for his excellent website Travel Writing World: https://www.travelwritingworld.com/thomas-swick-author-profile/
I was saddened to learn this week of the death of Lili Pohlmann, a Holocaust survivor who devoted her life to improving Jewish-Polish relations. In Krakow in 1999, covering the Festival of Jewish Culture, I happened to sit next to Lili before the opening concert in Tempel Synagogue. She identified important people in the crowd, telling me which ones I needed to talk to, and revealed a little about her life: the happy childhood in Krakow, the wretched war years in Lvov, the transport of Jewish children, including herself, to England after the war.
Following the concert she invited me to dinner with her husband Peter. On the way we stopped at their hotel so she could give the receptionist a gift. (They were leaving in the morning.) Then we headed to a restaurant on Market Square, where the waiter greeted her like an old friend. Lili ordered three shots of vodka and three glasses of beer. “Na zdrowie,” we said, lifting our glasses. Then we dug into pierogies and carp ‘Jewish style.’
Back outside, we said our goodbyes under a full moon.
That evening remains one of my most cherished memories of Krakow.
The news that France has banned unvaccinated American travelers raises the question: How many unvaccinated Americans have passports?
Saw Roadrunner last night. I always liked Bourdain’s show but I knew it was TV, creating illusions – for instance, that he traveled alone. The documentary shows that, in one sense, he did.