I’m only a tourist here but, coming from dignified Baku, I get the feeling Tbilisi is quite a hedonist. This city stays up late, drinks a lot, eats a lot, and smokes a lot. Georgians are mostly Eastern Orthodox, but the churches are sharing a fair amount of real estate with bars, shisha parlors, spas, and casinos.
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Baku is the capital of Azerbaijan, and wow, the city has been a huge surprise to me. It is surely one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever visited. It is a combination of Paris (but cleaner) and Dubai (but with more personality). Elegant old neighborhoods border modern architectural wonders. It has two beautiful coast lines on the Caspian Sea, and it’s probably among the most walkable large cities in the world.
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Amritsar is a city near the northwestern part of India in the region called the Punjab. It’s the home of the Sikh religion and the Sikhs’ most important place of worship, Harmandir Sahib, also called the Golden Temple. This is not a normal temple. In addition to being a holy place of prayer and reflection, its kitchen and hundreds of volunteers serve more than 100,000 free meals every day. This work is part of the Sikh philosophy of “sewa” or service, and the reason I came to Amritsar.
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Bhaktapur was one of the three Nepalese kingdoms that united to become the Nepali nation in 1768. It’s a few miles southeast of Kathmandu, small and peaceful. In the historic old city, street dogs ask for a hug and the kids hang out on the ancient temples doing homework. In the several plazas, holy places and palaces show off a variety of architectural styles, mostly Newari, Nepali and Indian. Most have been rebuilt after a devastating earthquake toppled many of them in 2015.
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Pashupatinath is a sacred Shiva Temple in Kathmandu and among the most important pilgrimage places for Hindus. The temple is part of a large complex on the banks of the Bagmati River, which flows into the most sacred river Ganges in India. In the past week, I’ve spent several hours at Pashupatinath to learn about the Hindu way of death, which of course is also about the Hindu way of life.
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If Bali is the love, Nepal is the soul. Although Nepal is mostly known for the Himalayas, and as the staging area for climbing Mt. Everest, it is also a place of wonderful cultural and religious traditions, hiking, and many kinds of folk art. I was in Nepal 15 years ago with my extraordinary doctor friend, Karen Sokal Gutierrez, to help with a project that, for practically no money, eliminates pain and malnutrition in children. I wasn’t very helpful to Karen and her project, but I had a wonderful experience and I’m back to re-discover a little of this remarkable country.
Ubud feels like love. Here, daily life is full of small rituals that express gratitude and respect and caring — for the gods, for nature, for the community. Flowers, incense, celebrations, dancing, music. These are not rituals for tourists, rather the culture that brings tourists here. The Hindus of Bali believe in karma, and that we serve the universe and ourselves when we are grateful and respectful and caring.
Here are some examples of what I saw all over town in Ubud.
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Yogyakarta is just loaded with murals, some artistic, some playful, some political. Here are a few of them. They don’t need explaining. Just enjoy….
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Camino Milagro 