A family reunion in the Himalayas. An emotional return to Moldova. A big birthday. I wrote about these things and more this year. As we now turn the page, here are excerpts from some of my favorite 2023 posts:
Our family reunion in Nepal: “We heard the drums as our car pulled up to Champa’s family house in eastern Nepal. Then we saw the dancers. Champa’s brother appeared with an armful of flower garlands. His wife held colorful scarves. We’d arrived in Ilam, where Champa grew up and the two of us met when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer. Now it was 45 years later.”
Vietnam: “People seemed genuinely happy we were there and not only because we were bringing them business after the pandemic. They were proud of their history, their culture and their progress. They wanted us to know they are more than the place where America fought a misguided war.”
Discovering craft beer in Phnom Penh: “As an American who came of age in the 1960s and 1970s, I’d associated Vietnam and Cambodia with war and genocide, not with IPAs. I was glad to update my perspective. If I go back, though, I’m still not asking for the fried insects.”
Returning to Moldova: “We returned to our Peace Corps workplaces and learned, after more than five years, that our impact has endured more than we’d realized.”
Visiting Ukraine’s neighbors: “My friends in Moldova, and those on the front lines in Ukraine, don’t know anything about the dysfunction in our Congress. They just need help, and fast.”
Oregon: “At first glance, Oregon matched its stereotype when we visited last week: a coffee-sipping, beer-brewing, wine-tasting paradise filled with hikers and bicyclists wearing Patagonia jackets and REI backpacks. But then we discovered an Oregon far more diverse.”
Hip replacement surgery: “The experience has reminded me of something I haven’t wanted to think about, which is the inevitability of physical decline. No matter how active, engaged and ‘not exactly retired’ we aspire to be in this stage of life, we cannot avoid life’s frailties forever. We’re all in the lobby for the organ recital.”
My 70th Birthday: “I hadn’t been looking forward to this birthday. A decade ago, when I turned 60, I was still working. Five years ago, I was wrapping up my service as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Moldova. But now, I was entering a decade that used to be synonymous with old age.”
Giving Away My Grandfather Clock: “It’s a reality many older Americans eventually confront: Our adult children don’t want our stuff. … We all fill our lives and hearts in different ways. As I’ve been reminded this week, it’s all stuff, and it doesn’t last forever. Time passes even if the clock breaks. Tick tock.”
Keeping Active: “I wonder sometimes whether I’m trying to prove something, to myself above all. Maybe I’m compensating for the fact that I no longer have the title and recognition of a formal job. Indeed, when I return these days to the campus where I used to work, few people recognize me. They just see a random retired guy. So maybe I’ve been filling up my schedule as a way to say: ‘Hey, I’m still here.’”
Favorite Books: “Bless your heart, Demon Copperhead. You’ve beaten my annual Top Ten book list like a borrowed mule and now I’m madder than a rattlesnake in a forest fire.”
Travel is my passion and I’ve learned a few things while visiting more than 60 countries and all 50 U.S. states. Looking ahead to 2024, I thought I’d share some “lessons learned” you might find helpful, too,
First, some caveats. Your preferences may differ from ours. Champa and I enjoy planning our own trips, exploring cities, hiking in beautiful places and exploring local cultures and food. We’re less interested in theme parks, spas, shopping and luxury. We prefer a new destination over returning to the same beach every year. We join groups only in certain situations. And, especially as older returned Peace Corps Volunteers, we know how fortunate we are to do any of this.
If any of that resonates with you, here are my dozen tips:
Use local experts. If you’re heading someplace where travel is relatively simple, you can probably plan and book everything yourself. Dozens of sites offer information about where to visit, stay and eat in, say, London or Toronto. It’s easy even in a place like Bruges, above, where English is widely understood. For more challenging spots, you might want to use a local planner, as I did for China, Vietnam and Romania. Local experts are easy enough to find online, do a great job and generally cost much less than a U.S. company (which may be using these same people as subcontractors). Why pay for the intermediary?
Take advantage of online itineraries. I check the online itineraries of trips from Rick Steves, Odysseys Unlimited and other companies. Then I work with a local company, or on my own, to plan the trip. I don’t feel guilty about using their information because I am willing to book their trip if their itinerary and price are good. We did this with an excellent South Africa trip from Friendly Planet.
Be wary ofvisits to arts centers. Your planner may suggest visits to local studios specializing in a region’s artistic specialties, such as porcelain or textiles. It can be fascinating to watch these artisans and you’re under no obligation to buy anything from them. But if this is going to make you uncomfortable, spend your time elsewhere. Tell the planner in advance about your preferences and review the itinerary carefully
Use free walking tours. As I’ve written previously, I’m a big fan of the free walking tours offered in many popular destinations. The guides work for tips, so are motivated to provide excellent service. (We always tip them generously if they’ve done a good job.) We usually take the tour soon after we arrive. It’s a great way to get the lay of the land and identify local highlights for possible return visits.
Note where walking tours start. If you’re wondering where to stay in a new city, use a trick we learned from our travel heroes, the Senior Nomads: Look for a hotel, Airbnb or hostel near the walking tour’s starting point. This puts you within walking distance of many sights. If these places are too expensive for your budget, you’ll still have a valuable reference point as you consider other locations.
Use Google Maps. You probably use Google Maps already to plan driving trips or find a friend’s house. But it’s more powerful than that. I use it to explore cities on foot and find things I need, like a restaurant in Riga, a winery in Williamette or a tour in Tbilisi. You can also check the weather, find the best times to visit places, create a custom map or download maps for cities where you may have limited Internet access. I stay connected with an international plan from T-Mobile.
Use Google Translate. Online translations have improved dramatically. I now feel much more comfortable traveling in places where I don’t know the local alphabet or language. If I need to communicate, I just speak or type into Google Translate and show the translation. If I can’t understand a local menu or sign, I point my phone camera at the text and read the translation. It’s usually imperfect but good enough.
Charge in local currency. In many countries, cash remains the best way to buy things, whether because of custom (as in Nepal), rapid inflation (Argentina) or limited technology and connectivity. Generally, though, you can pay with a credit card. Be sure to get one that doesn’t add fees every time you use it abroad. If the merchant asks whether you want to process the transaction in dollars or local currency, choose the latter, even though this may seem counterintuitive. The credit card company will convert the charge into dollars at the international exchange rate whereas a transaction made in dollars uses a rate set by local banks or merchants, which is usually worse.
Take advantage of travel credit cards. If you’re a loyal customer of an airline, hotel chain or other travel company, you may already be using their credit card and enjoying the benefits. If you’re less loyal, like me, you can take advantage of introductory offers. United Airlines gave me enough miles to book two long flights after I made some purchases with their Visa card. Before my free year expired, I canceled that card and took advantage of a similar offer from Delta. After Champa and I visit South America next month, we’ll fly home for free.
Use taxi apps. Until recently, I was nervous about taxi drivers in foreign countries, wondering whether they would cheat me. Uber and similar services have eased that problem. When we were in Qatar last year, for example, I used Uber to travel from the airport to the hotel, and then around the capital city, Doha. The driver understood where I wanted to go and the price was fixed. Uber doesn’t work everywhere so, if necessary, I download a local app in advance. In Moldova, I used Yandex Go; in Thailand, I used Bolt. You pay with cash with these apps but they work fine and are much less stressful than haggling with a foreign driver.
Think twice before pre-ordering a visa. If you’re traveling to a country that requires a visa, you’ll probably buy it online — a process that’s become much simpler. Countries now send you QR codes or downloadable visas after you submit the paperwork. Sometimes they require you to do this before you travel. If you can wait until you actually arrive, though, that’s often the best option. It’s usually quick and you’ll avoid paying the fees, which can be substantial, until you’re sure your plans haven’t changed. Check online beforehand and see what other travelers suggest.
Buy a luggage scale. Everyone has their favorite travel device: a pillow, a cosmetics kit or something else. Mine is the small hand-held luggage scale I use to weigh suitcases before heading to the airport. It shows the weight in both pounds and kilograms. No longer do I approach airline counters wondering whether my bags are too heavy and subject to hefty fees
I know these tips address only some of the many questions you may have as a traveler, but I hope you found them helpful. If you have tips of your own, please share them here for me and others to use.
Bless your heart, Demon Copperhead. You’ve beaten my annual Top Ten book list like a borrowed mule and now I’m madder than a rattlesnake in a forest fire.
Barbara Kingsolver’s brilliant novel about young Demon’s perilous life in Appalachia was published last year but I read it too late for my 2022 Top Ten list. It turned out to be my favorite book of the year. I also admired its co-winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, Trust, Hernan Diaz’s novel about wealth and deceit in New York. Likewise for another prize-winner, Nobel Prize recipient Abdulrazak Gurnah, whose spellbinding Afterlives transported me to colonial East Africa.
I’m not a professional critic who receives free advance copies, so I read these three books too late for my list. So, too, for some other excellent novels: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow; Olga Lies Dreaming; The Trees and The Measure.
My new list again highlights ten books published during the year but, as in 2022, 2021 and 2020, it’s limited to those I read by mid-December. Here’s my 2023 Top Ten:
James McBride’s The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store was my favorite (so far). Set in Pottstown, Pa., it unravels the mystery of a skeleton found in the bottom of a well. McBride draws on his own Jewish and Black heritage to paint a rich portrait of Chicken Hill, a neighborhood whose diverse residents grapple with poverty, discrimination and a rapidly changing world. It’s a whodunit with a huge heart
My other favorite was Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton, an eco-thriller set in New Zealand. A guerrilla collective of environmental activists forms an uneasy alliance with an elusive American billionaire who wants to build a survivalist bunker. His real goals prove more sinister, leading to an apocalyptic confrontation. The title comes from Macbeth and the final act is just as bloody.
Action and violence also abound in Small Mercies, but here the conflict revolves around the Boston school desegregation battles of the 1970s. As in Mystic River, author Dennis Lehane captures that city’s voices. His central character is Mary Pat, a tough “project chick” from Southie with two failed marriages and a son lost to heroin. When she learns her daughter may be involved in the murder of a young black man, she is caught in a whirlwind, just like the city around her.
In Hello Beautiful, Ann Napolitano tells the story of a boy growing up in a loveless house who finds refuge among his basketball teammates. William goes to college on a scholarship and seems to finally find happiness with an ambitious classmate whose Chicago family embraces him. When their marriage falls apart, he discovers even deeper love — and then tragedy — with an unexpected partner. He nearly dies before reconciling at the end with a figure from his past.
Tom Lake, by Ann Patchett,is set mainly in a cherry orchard in northern Michigan. The farm’s mother, Lara, slowly shares with her daughers — and us — the story of her brief acting career and love affair with an actor who became one of the world’s most famous movie stars. One daughter thinks the actor is her father. Her mother reveals the truth while gently prodding her daughters to contemplate deeper truths about family and what matters in life.
For more action, consider All the Sinners Bleed, the latest thriller from S.A. Cosby, whose Blacktop Wasteland and Razorblade Tears appear on my previous lists. This time Cosby opens with a shooting at a rural Virginia school that leads to chilling revelations about the murders of local Black children. The sheriff slowly makes sense of the case while confronting racism, religious zealots, snake charmers and a former girlfriend who became a podcaster.
The remaining four books on my list are nonfiction, led by Jonathan Eig’s masterful biography of MartinLuther King Jr., which draws on a trove of previously unreleased White House telephone transcripts, F.B.I. documents, letters, oral histories and other documents. I thought I knew a lot about King, but I learned many new things about him as both a man and historical figure, as well as about Malcolm X, the Kennedys and others. Most of all, Eig shows us King’s incredible determination and heroism. I came away with even greater gratitude for his life.
Considerably less admirable are many of the characters in David Grann’s The Wager. Set mainly in South America in the 1740s, it’s a page-turner about a British vessel that wrecks off the coast of Patagonia while pursuing a Spanish galleon. Its survivors are marooned and then embark on a harrowing journey. Those who reach Brazil are hailed as heroes until several other castaways appear and accuse them of mutiny. Who is telling the truth? Author Grann, who wrote Killers of the Flower Moon, presents the evidence he uncovered during years of research.
Timothy Egan’s A Fever in the Heartland takes place closer to home, in Indiana during the 1920s. A charismatic charlatan named D.C. Stephenson leads the Ku Klux Klan to national power, culminating with a march through Washington, D.C. He recruits politicians and others to his movement, which appears unstoppable until his abuse of a local woman leads to his downfall. Especially in today’s world, it’s a sobering reminder of how easily hate groups can attract followers.
My final book, also nonfiction, is a memoir by the historian Drew Gilpin Faust. Necessary Trouble describes her childhood in rural Virginia, a life filled with horses, privilege and racism. Young Drew is a precocious child, as you’d expect of someone who would become Harvard’s president, and she struggles to make sense of her life. Her perspective keeps changing as she travels to Eastern Europe, gets involved in the Civil Rights Movement and protests the Vietnam War. I was moved by her empathy and beautiful writing.
I’ll also salute two excellent nonfiction books that didn’t make my Top Ten: The Undertow, Jeff Sharlet’s journey into far-right extremism, and Traffic, Ben Smith’s origin story about online disinformation, featuring his time at Buzzfeed.
Equally disturbing, although fiction, was Emma Cline’s The Guest, about a young woman who uses sex and manipulation to con her way through the luxurious world of the Hamptons. I was engrossed by her odyssey of desperation and, after finishing it, went on to read Cline’s earlier (and even more chilling) The Girls, based on the women who followed Charlie Manson.
Other novels I enjoyed were much lighter, such as Pineapple Street, about Brooklyn’s wealthy elite; Romantic Comedy, featuring a writer who finds love at a show resembling Saturday Night Live; and The Chinese Groove, about an overly optimistic immigrant who confronts the realities of America.
I love crime fiction and this year discovered Don Winslow, specifically City of Dreams and City on Fire. They’re both set in Providence, where I once lived. I also enjoyed a pair from Ruth Ware: Zero Days and The It Girl. I liked two other thrillers, Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead and Every Man a King by Walter Mosley, but found both less compelling than previous work from these two distinguished writers.
A book even older than those I cited at the beginning is Richard Ford’s 2014 novel Let Me Be Frank With You. It’s the fourth in Ford’s series of novels about Frank Bascombe of New Jersey, who is now confronting the indignities of older age. It made me laugh (and cringe) more than any other book this year.
I was less enthusiastic about two of the year’s most honored books, The Bee Sting by Paul Murray (too long; couldn’t finish) and The Rediscovery of America by Ned Blackhawk (an overdue history of Native America but too scholarly for me). I also gave up on Under the Wave at Waimea by Paul Theroux, usually one of my favorites.
Finally, a salute to Cormac McCarthy, who died in June. I’d read several of his books but never All the Pretty Horses, whose brilliance reminded me of his singular talent. I will miss his voice even as I look forward to 2024 and a new year of great books — regardless of their publication dates.
As always, if you have suggestions of your own, please share them here.
"Not Exactly Retired" 