Author: karl

The first time I walked through the whitewashed gate of Tashilhunpo Monastery, I had been on the road in Tibet, China for almost two weeks. I was tired, a little…

When I tell friends I spent a full day at Ocean Park Hong Kong and still didn’t see everything, they usually look surprised. Most visitors to Hong Kong, China assume…

I have lost count of how many times I have told friends that the most surreal building in Asia is not a temple or a skyscraper, but a full-scale replica…

When I first climbed the viewing platform above the Baishui River and looked down at Xijiang Miao Village, I stopped talking for a full minute. More than 1,000 wooden stilt…

The first time I stood on the shore of Sayram Lake (also called Sailimu Lake or Sayram Hu), I stopped talking. The water was a blue I did not know…

I still remember the first morning I walked into Badaguan. I had come to Qingdao for the beer and the sea, but within ten minutes of turning off the coastal…

I still remember the moment I stepped out of the humid Guilin afternoon and into the cool, glowing dark of Reed Flute Cave. The temperature dropped, the air turned mineral…

I’ll be honest: before I visited the Du Fu Thatched Cottage, I thought it would be a quiet, slightly dusty shrine to a poet I only half-remembered from school. I…

I still remember the first time I walked through the red-pillared gate of the Nanjing Presidential Palace. One moment I was on a noisy city street, the next I was…

I still remember the first time I stepped into Lion Grove Garden and got completely turned around within five minutes. I had a map, a phone, and a clear idea…