My Dentist - A Really Cool Guy!

I am very excited that I will be able to conduct my third interview very soon. This time it will be with my dentist, Dr. Rajiv Arya, who, as you will see, is a very interesting, unique and multi-faceted individual.

I have been seeing the same dentist for almost 10 years now and I think he is a really cool guy. He is young, bright, not to mention good-looking, as well as very friendly and helpful. A long time ago, when I did not have dental insurance coverage, he reduced his rates which really helped me out financially a great deal at the time, something that I appreciate to this day.

In my opinion Dr. Rajiv Arya is a very interesting and unique individual. We have had many conversations over the years during my dental visits and I have had a chance to learn a bit more about him. Not only is Dr. Arya an accomplished dental surgeon, he also completed a law degree and today practices corporate and commercial law specializing in the health care industry. This is in addition to practicing as a dental surgeon. Needless to say, he completed his dentistry and law degrees with the highest academic honours and awards.

But we are not just dealing with a distinguished over-achiever here. Dr. Arya is truly a multi-faceted individual with a pronounced humanitarian side. Dr. Arya successfully completed a competitive duathalon in September, 2004 and is currently in training for a trekking expedition traveling to the Himalayas scheduled for March, 2005. The trekking expedition is also to contain a significant study and volunteering component. I will hopefully be able to convince him to file reports from his expedition to the Himalayas in the upcoming weeks.

Dr. Arya has volunteered his time throughout his career(s) in various countries including Canada, India, Malawi and Zambia. He has participated in racial equity and leadership initiatives in South Africa, Poland and Germany; including the study of the far-reaching effects of apartheid and the holocaust. The topic of racial equity and tolerance has been very dear to my own heart and I look forward to probing these topics more in our interview.

Dr. Arya is also scheduled to be a focus commentator in a documentary, entitled 'The Gate', currently in post-production that attempts to analyze the tragedies of the holocaust from a pluralistic perspective. Dr. Arya is also on the board of Directors of Health Outreach - a registered Canadian charity (www.healthoutreach.ca) that focuses on providing free health care to children in developing countries using innovative delivery models.

So, stay tuned, for a very interesting interview with a great guy – my dentist!

SQ.

www.travelandtransitions.com
www.textronics.com

Karla Darocas: Artist, Entrepeneur and Canuck Expatriate in Spain

I had an opportunity to meet Karla last year on one of my trips to Spain. My previous post will give you a bit of background on our meeting. Karla is a fascinating individual, a painter, writer and overall creative person, but also an entrepreneur with a bit of an alternative flair. Here is what she has to say about her experience as a North American expatriate living in Spain.

Karla, enjoying life in Spain.

1. Tell us a bit about your background. Where did you grow up, what is your educational background and what did you do before you moved to Spain?

I was born in Toronto and raised in a small provincial town called Bowmanville – just east of Toronto. I moved back to Toronto after high school and attended Humber College in Rexdale where I studied creative arts – like fashion design, photography and writing. After college, I opened my first enterprise – a boutique in Toronto’s trendy Queen St. area – that sold weird and wonderful wearable art objects.

I sold that business in 1983 and went to the University of Waterloo where I received an honours degree in Fine Arts. I graduated in 1990 – and started my second enterprise – called Zona Communications. It was a communications company – and I jumped into the internet with both feet. I went on to build my first Internet enterprise – which I sold to a California company in 2000. I lived in sunny southern California after the sale of my enterprise – until the New York World Trade Centre tragedy – September 2001.

I packed up everything and went back to Bowmanville. Then 10 days later – I packed some items and flew to Zurich, Switzerland and married my long-time Spanish boyfriend – who had been working in Zurich for 8 years. We packed up his apartment – and by December 2001 – Christmas – we moved to Spain.


Karla's art.

2. You now live on the Costa Blanca in Spain. How long have you lived there and what made you move there?

We have been here since December 2001. We didn’t know where we were going to live – so the first logical place to go was to where Jose, my husband was born – Xativa. This is a castled city in the interior of the province of Valencia. We lived there for 6 months. We were unemployed and free to travel around Spain – as it was our honeymoon. We bought a 4x4 and traveled up mountains and down into valleys and places that no tourist would ever think of going.

However, we really wanted to move out to the coast – to the sea. We had met in a fishing / holiday village called Javea – back in 1988 – when I was a University student. I came to Spain twice – on student loans – to study art at the Prado in Madrid. Then, I would head out to the coast to party and hit the beaches.

My Spanish sweetie was a waiter in a fine little restaurant called – El Solomilllo – right on the beach. We fell into a crazy kind of love – and spent two wild summers together. We kept in touch for the next years though a friend – until the Internet was developed.

When we came to visit Javea from Xativa we found an old friend, Carmelo. He gave my husband a job and we moved over to the coast. We now make Benitachell our home – which is only five minutes from Javea.


The waterfront in the scenic little town of Javea.

3. What is it like to live in Spain? What are the main cultural differences between living in North America and living in Spain? What was the adjustment phase like initially when you moved there?

Spain is an old culture, full of raw passion, tragedy, love and a fascination with the macabre. It takes some time to get used to the intimate nature of the people. They are a nation of huggers and kissers. In North American culture where a handshake is normal to greet people, here in Spain it is a hug and a kiss on both cheeks. This is standard for men and women. No one ever thinks that you are gay because you are kissing a member of the same sex. This is a silly notion.

Spain is a noisy country. They have a great love of fireworks. Motorcycles do not have mufflers and they roar like big beasts through the streets. People don’t talk to each other – they yell. A North American would think that fight is taking place in a bar when the Spanish get going. But they are not fighting, this is normal communications.

Spain is a dangerous country. Every criminal who flees persecution in their own country comes to Spain. Every type of mob is here, Russians, Romanians, Italians, Yugoslavians… Plus every killer soldier left over from some Central European war. Terrorism has been a common scenario in Spain thanks to the Basque separatist movement (which learned everything they know from Canada’s FLQ). Every week, an unknown body will show up dead in a ditch due to some Columbian drug payment that didn’t get paid.

Drinking and Driving in Spain is normal. Death is cheap on the motorways. Every weekend families say goodbye to loved ones as the jaws of death scrape the mangled bodies of young and old from a twisted up piece of metal that used to be a car. Beer is not considered a dangerous drink, yet it has a 5% alcohol content. If you do need to get one you can go through the Drive-Thru window at your nearest McDonalds. Both wine and spirits are very cheap in Spain – so it is an alcoholic’s dream come true.

Smoking is not prohibited and cigarettes are very cheap. Everyone here starts smoking at a very young age. The women stay nice and thin as they don’t eat, they just smoke. Everyone has black circles under their eyes. The mix of the cheap brandy and cheap cigarettes creates for very smelly people.

4. You have now spent several years living in Spain. What places have you seen? What festivals have you experienced? What gastronomic pleasures have you enjoyed?

Our favourite festival is the Fallas Festival in Valencia. We look forward to the first two weeks of March with such passion. It is the most amazing festival both visually and emotionally. The combination of art and fire, noise and danger – it all comes together in this festival.

We have so many favourite foods – like paella and sausages packed with pork and mountain grown herb. We love flan and rice puddings. We love all types of seafood and fresh veggies from the market.


Karla's art.

5. You are always involved in a variety of endeavours. Tell us about the various websites you are working on.

My husband and I try and keep all of our important information on our own website – http://www.darocas.com/ - this is where I keep track of my paintings too. Then, I have another website called http://www.spainlifestyle.com/ where I store my writings and poems and photos of the renovations on our house. Then, we have another site called http://www.spainphotos.net/ where we store our Spanish adventure photos.

6. In addition to web sites, you also participate in several business organizations. What are they and what is your role?

http://www.palomera.com/ is a website that seeks out and tracks what the Spanish business community is doing and we can watch business trends.

Last year, I started a business club for women – which has grown and we are actually hosting International Women’s Day. It just goes to show the power of women to make something out of nothing. This is a club of international women who have come to live on this coast. The website is http://www.wibc-spain.com/

7. Obviously both you and your husband have a strong entrepreneurial orientation. You are now also involved in a project that involves a luxury Canadian cedar log home development in Spain. Tell us more about that project.

We both love wood homes. The homes in Spain are made from cement – so they tend to be cool in summer, which is good, but during winter and the stormy season cement homes are damp, cold and clammy. They are always full of cement dust and if they don’t get enough sun they get moldy.

The Spanish don’t have a good understanding of wood home building but the many of immigrants from England, France, Switzerland, Germany and so forth love their wood homes. So I hooked up with some old university friends from Canada who design and build wood homes in order to be able to offer a Canadian cedar log home to the Spanish landscape and marketplace. We are currently working on a project with a Spanish developer to build the first wooden home community in Spain. That website is called http://www.spainloghomes.com/

8. In addition to your entrepreneurial ventures, you are also an artist. Tell us a bit about your artistic background and the creative endeavours you are involved in now.

I love to paint. I had not done it for many years due to being so involved with the internet industry. When we moved here I was so happy to get back to my passion and use my skills that I developed at university. Now, I paint to please myself but the paintings sell very easily to people buying new villas or to tourists.


Karla's art.


9. Talk to us about the expatriate experience in Spain. Where do community of foreigners live, how do they interact, what types of business and activities are they involved in, and how has that changed the country?

The coastlines of Spain are turning into very international communities. It reminds me of what California and Florida must have been like back in the 60’s and 70’s. Every retired person from northern Europe is moving to Spain for the sun and sea.

They are bringing their cultural mix and adding it to the Spanish culture. The rest of Spain is changing too – for the good and for the bad. There are more social reforms happening in Spain now – for women and for labour and social welfare. The new government is young and progressive.

The bad side is that the progress is too fast and the natural beauty and landscape is being filled up with cement houses looking like low cost housing, but as holiday homes they are fetching a huge price. This inflation is eating away at the poor in this country and now young Spanish people are looking at an era where they will not be able to buy a home.

10. What advice would give to someone else who is considering moving to Spain?

Don’t’ move to Spain unless you are willing to be flexible. There is nothing stable about this country and perhaps there never will be. If you are rich, and can live off a pension and golf everyday you will be fine. If you think you can move to Spain and get a job forget it. However, if you are an entrepreneur and can see the holes in the marketplace and you have the guts and know-how to fill the hole you will be fine.


Thanks, Karla, for sharing your viewpoints and experiences. I appreciate your insider’s insights into a culture that has fascinated me for a long time. Good luck with your endeavours in Spain!

SQ.

http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Second interview coming up: Karla Darocas!

My Second Interview: Karla Darocas – Expatriate Canuck in Spain!

As you will probably know by now, I have a real fascination for everything Spanish (my article on Hispanophilia will attest to that), so I headed over to Spain twice last year. On my second trip where I visited places such as Barcelona, Tarragona, Valencia, Montserrat and Ibiza, I also spent a couple of days on the Costa Blanca, the most easterly part of Spain that sticks out into the Mediterranean.

My friend and Internet mentor David had linked me up with one of his close friends, a very interesting woman from Canada who had moved to Spain a few years earlier. Karla Darocas was very gracious and invited me to stay with her for a night or two and I had a chance to get a brief glimpse into the life of an expatriate Canuck on the Spanish Costa Blanca.


Karla in the beautiful town of Javea.

Karla, her Scottish friend Rhonda and I went on a day trip on the local train to Benidorm, the largest tourist resort town along the entire Costa Blanca. We talked about life in Spain, about the culture and in particular about the humongous influx of Northern Europeans, particularly retirees, who are settling along the Spanish coastline. If I remember correctly, Spain is expecting something like 4 million Northern Europeans to settle in Spain over the next few years.


From left to right: moi, Karla and Rhonda on the Costa Blanca.

As a result there has been huge real estate development along the entire coastline and in some places like Marbella literally every square inch of available space has been paved over. For anybody with any kind of love for nature, what has happened along the coasts of Southern Spain is really quite painful to see. Development has progressed with very few limits and as a result Spain is facing serious water shortages and environmental issues due to overdevelopment, overcrowding of coastal areas as well as the building of golf courses. The tremendous increase in prices along the coast has made it virtually impossible for the locals to be able to afford a house there.


Benidorm's famous balcony by the sea.

However, despite all these excesses, there are still many beautiful places, and particularly the area where Karla lives is an extremely scenic part of Spain. Karla is a very interesting individual who is an artist, but is also involved in a variety of business and non-profit endeavours. Again she is one of those people who manage to combine the artistic with the entrepreneurial. I found her to be a very generous host and I appreciated the opportunity to spend a day and half with a person who could give me local insight into the area.

Her interview will provide unique insight into a culture that fascinates many of us in one of the most beautiful and diverse countries around. Karla’s frank insights describe Spanish society and the life of a North American expatriate and provide an inside look into a beguiling and contradictory culture.

www.travelandtransitions.com
www.textronics.com

Presenting: BARBARA WINTER!

Well, I am really excited to be able to present to you my first interview: Barbara Winter, best-selling author and creative entrepreneur extraordinaire. I am always fascinated by people who manage to combine their artistic and creative talents with being a successful entrepreneur. In the end that’s what I am aspiring to achieve.

I first met Barbara in a seminar in Toronto and I enjoyed her humorous, casual yet informative style. A few phone conversations and a tele-class later: here she is!


Barbara in front of Buckingham Palace.

1. Please tell us a bit about your background and work experience.

I've been self-employed for 30 years so the things I did prior to that seem very much in the distant past. My first job was as a high school English and speech teacher. Then I worked for the State of Minnesota Employment service. After taking three years off to be a fulltime mother, I was an interior designer with Ethan Allen. Every one of those jobs taught me things that helped me when I started my own business--including teaching me that I never wanted to work for anyone but myself.

2. You are one of the pioneers of self-employment. When and why did you decide to become self-employed? What was it like when you got started? How have things changed since then?

I certainly wasn't encouraged to be self-employed when I was growing up. The decision evolved gradually. I had gotten interested in personal growth and development back in the early seventies and was slightly frustrated that all the books and seminars (which were far fewer than there are today) were by men, for men. I decided to take some of the things I'd learned and do seminars for women. I also began publishing a newsletter called The Successful Woman. It was all trial and error.

There was very little information to help me then. I began working from home, but was somewhat embarrassed about that. I had no idea that I was going to be part of the home business revolution. Essentially, it's so much easier now to be self-employed because there are more of us doing it and there's more good information.

3. One of the primary focuses of this website is travel. Tell us about your "Support Your Wanderlust" seminars.

Well, I've always had wanderlust myself and as I got more confident about being self-employed I knew I wanted my business to include travel. As time went on, students in Making a Living Without a Job seminars kept telling me that they wanted to travel so How To Support Your Wanderlust came out of those requests--and my own and other entrepreneur's experiences creating profitable travel for themselves.

4. How do you integrate travel into your entrepreneurial ventures? What opportunities of travel have you been able to enjoy through your business endeavours?

I travel extensively throughout the US doing seminars. Now that I've joined forces with Nick Williams, who lives in London, we're doing more work together in the UK, as well as in the US. As a writer, I've also traveled and incorporated research into those trips adding another profit center-- and tax deductible travel.

5. How often do you travel and how do you reconcile travel with all your various business endeavours?

It varies, but I've kind of developed a system that works for me. The seminars I do in adult ed programs are primarily held on Friday evenings and Saturdays so I travel on the weekends with those. When I'm in Europe, I have to have my writing projects done before I leave. I've always preferred to travel more frequently, but for shorter periods of time so that makes it possible to keep up with the demands of my business at home because I'm usually not away for long, long periods of time. And I only buy houseplants that can survive without me.

6. Please tell us about your life and business philosophy in general.

My philosophy--in its simplest form--is "have a great life and talk about it." I decided long ago to make myself a guinea pig and experiment with ideas before passing them along in my writing and teaching. I consider myself a card-carrying dream builder and my greatest joy is helping others go for their own dreams.

7. You are a bestselling author of the book "Making a Living Without a Job". Tell us more about that book.

Making a Living Without a Job was first a seminar which was enormously popular--still is--that put together my ideas about being creatively self-employed. When it went into book form, I wanted to write a manual that wasn't just about getting started, but also about keeping going. It really was meant to free the corporate slaves by exposing them to a different way of working and thinking about their own lives.

8. What about your most recent book "Jump Start Your Entrepreneurial Spirit"?

Jumpstart Your Entrepreneurial Spirit is a collection of 52 short essays about all sorts of things appropriate to the entrepreneurial life. It includes lots of the intangibles things that make for success and lots of stories about people that inspire me.

9. Please tell us about your " Winning Ways" newsletter and the tele-classes and seminars you offer?

One of the most critical things for anyone wanting to succeed at self-employment is to have steady reinforcement. A newsletter does that beautifully and also gives me a format to share new business ideas, books, and stories from my seminar students. Winning Ways comes out six times a year and is great fun to write. I'll be starting my 19th year of publication, which is a longevity record for small business newsletters. While I still do short seminars that include the ones you've mentioned and another called Establish Yourself as an Expert, this past year I've been moving to longer events, which I love. Here in Minnesota I do one called Camp Entrepreneur. Nick and I also do an event in Las Vegas called Being an Inspired Entrepreneur and another in the Lake District in the UK called Building the Possible Dream. I'm quite smitten with all the longer events and plan to do more of them in the future.

10. For a while now you have been involved in building a business across international frontiers. Please tell us more about your newest initiative – Dreambuilders.

One of the interesting challenges I've been dealing with for the past couple of years is learning how to work with a business partner who lives 4,000 miles away. While e-mail and the telephone make it easy to stay in touch, Nick Williams and I are also aware of the fact that we're most creative when we're together in the same place. Sometimes we also have little cultural differences of opinion which we always manage to work out, perhaps because we both find it fascinating to see a different perspective. These are all just little issues that add spice to our business, I'd say.

I once wrote an article called Another Barrier Down in which I talked about the fact that we are the first people in the history of the world for whom geography is not an obstacle for starting a business. In the article I said the business of the future will look quite different: our customers and clients will be people who share a consciousness, not a postal code.

It's that new paradigm that Nick and I have heartily embraced in creating the Dreambuilders Community. We're getting members from all over the globe who share our consciousness. It won't be long before we're holding events in a number of different countries and seeing that the entrepreneurial spirit can flourish almost anywhere. It's wildly exciting to be part of this growing global community of inspired entrepreneurs.


Let me thank you, Barbara, for sharing your experiences and some insight into your creative entrepreneurial mind. So far I have learned a lot and I am definitely planning to sign up for your next “Establish Yourself as an Expert” teleclass!

SQ.

http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Barbara Got My Creative Juices Flowing!

Rekindling My Creativity

Just about half an hour ago I got off the phone from my first “tele-class”, basically an hour and a half long conference call, with Barbara Winter who delivered her tele-seminar “A Beginner’s Guide to Getting Published.”


Barbara Winter definitely has a sense of humour!

Today it was a fairly small group, and as an author of 2 books including one bestseller, Barbara shared with us her knowledge of the publishing world. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and it was truly quite simple. A tele-class essentially works like a conference call, you call a long-distance number, provide a code for the conference and you get linked in.

We briefly introduced ourselves at the beginning, then Barbara began to cover her material, talking about conventional publishing, self-publishing and various other topics of interest to novice authors. She has a very casual, engaging style and although this format of knowledge sharing was totally new to me, I have to say, it was easy to follow and I learned a lot.

Listening to Barbara really inspired me to try to spend more time on my newly rediscovered passion. I essentially dedicated the last close to 20 years of my life building a business, taking two part-time business degrees, spending a good deal of time on business processes, accounting and record-keeping systems and figuring out how to make a small business grow. (How many times can you mention the word "business" in one sentence? I detect a trend here....)

What I haven’t done is stayed in touch with the creative side of me. This need to rekindle my artistic side has been fermenting inside me over the last two years or so. Last September I finally put the pedal to the metal, so to speak, and I started publishing my thoughts and experiences over the net. It’s hard to tell whether there is an audience yet for my materials (I haven’t even figured out yet how to install a statistics package on my blogging website), but regardless, the Internet is a fabulous outlet for sharing my first steps as a novice writer.

Taking this class tonight was great fun and a real inspiration to keep going, to reunite the entrepreneur in me with the budding artist, and I really thank Barbara Winter for providing the stimulation to keep going. I already look forward to posting my interview with Barbara in the near future, so stay tuned, it should be interesting.

SQ.

www.travelandtransitions.com
www.textronics.com

Photoblogging - I finally figured it out!

Photoblogging is finally here!!!! Barcelona - architecture galore. Imagine this – I am in the process of working on 2 websites without a bit of knowledge of website design and HTML programming. As a matter of fact, blogging with http://www.blogger.com/ is a simple as it gets and anyone with basic literacy skills can do it too. My main website, http://www.youtravelcheap.com/ , is hosted on http://www.1and1.com/ where I use a template site builder to work on my site. I know, it’s pretty basic, but I wanted to get some of my content on the net without needing a web designer or spending hundreds of hours of courses to do it. View of the inner courtyard of the monastery of Montserrat. But one thing was bugging me – I love photography and although you can see my travel photos http://community.webshots.com/user/vanguard111 I wanted to add some images to my blogs, particularly to the travel blogs. And I just couldn’t figure out how to do it! Another work of art in Ronda. So finally yesterday I spent a good many hours, downloading a free software called Picasa which is basically an image editor and which is set up to work with http://www.blogger.com/ . In conjunction with another free software called “Hello” it allows me to actually touch up my pictures, organize them and upload them to my blog. I was very excited. For someone with no graphic/web design expertise these are little feats of accomplishment that I am extremely happy about. Magnificent flowers on Ibiza. So now that our image capability is here, I’ll include some of my favourite pictures, which will allow all of us to catch a few colourful moments away from these dreary days of winter. Barcelonan architecture. The church in Sitges, a gorgeous place. Toronto's "Necropolis" - a very old and beautiful cemetery. A little hideaway on Ibiza's north coast. The Campanile in Piran on the Slovenian Coast. SQ. http://www.travelandtransitions.com/ http://www.textronics.com/

Bestselling Author Barbara Winter coming up!

As an entrepreneur, fledgling creative person and travel enthusiast myself, I always keep learning from other entrepreneurs who have successfully combined business, creativity and travel in their own way. Last fall I took a seminar at the Learning Annex in Toronto with the title “How To Support Your Wanderlust”, which ended up being a very entertaining and informative seminar.

Barbara Winter is a Minneapolis-based entrepreneur, writer and speaker who has spent the past 17 years helping people discover their passions and turn them into profitable businesses. She is the author of the best-selling book, Making a Living Without a Job: Winning Ways for Creating Work That You Love (Bantam, 1993), and the publisher of Winning Ways, the newsletter for people living and working with passion.


Bestselling author Barbara Winter.

In addition, Barbara teaches seminars and teleclasses on “Establish Yourself as an Expert”, “Making a Living Without a Job”, and “How To Support Your Wanderlust”. Barbara’s most recent endeavour, her book Jumpstart Your Entrepreneurial Spirit is hot off the press and just came out last month.

One of Barbara’s mantras is to turn artists into entrepreneurs and to turn entrepreneurs into artists. This is incidentally exactly where I am at in my life right now: after 2 business degrees and 15 years in business as an independent entrepreneur, the time has come for me now to reintegrate passion and creativity back into my life, which the website and my travels will offer me to do.

Barbara likes to turn people into inspired entrepreneurs who expand their horizons. I knew that Barbara would be a great candidate for an interview, she is funny, creative and full of great ideas and energy. I am sure that her seminars and books have inspired thousands of individuals to get up and pursue their passion and create their own businesses.

What I like to do in my interviews is I like to talk to the person, get to know them a bit better on the phone so I can compile written questions (hopefully semi-intelligent ones..;) for them that they can answer in their own words. The hour I spent on the phone with Barbara has been very entertaining and informative for me at the same time and I felt totally energized after talking to her.

As a novice writer myself, just listening to Barbara gave me lots of ideas for my own writing and publishing endeavours. Barbara really knows how to capture her audience and I am actually planning to take her upcoming teleclass A Beginner’s Guide to Getting Published.

Barbara is an interesting, inspiring individual that many of us can learn from. Stay tuned for my first interview!

SQ.

http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Pilot Guides - My Favourite TV Show

My husband will attest that I am one of these people that can eat, drink, talk and do travel pretty much all the time. I just love travel, I read books on travel all the time, subscribe to numerous travel magazines – in several languages, as you can imagine. I visit and research travel websites, of course I talk to travelers and naturally I watch travel shows on TV! I am wondering if there is actually a saturation point for me at which travel loses interest. Well, I haven’t seen one so far yet….

So, talking about TV shows, I thought I’d share with you my favourite travel show on TV and one of my guilty viewing indulgences: PILOT GUIDES!


Ian Wright, a pretty funny travel dude.


In Canada “Pilot Guides” airs on the Outdoor Life Network, usually on weekdays at 10 pm. It’s a TV show that is produced in Great Britain by Pilot Productions. According to their website, http://www.pilotguides.com/, they are “an independent TV production company who have produced specialist TV shows for 9 years covering travel, food and history. The company and its presenters have won numerous awards and achieved fame in the field of off-the-beaten track travel TV with the TV show Pilot Guides (known as Globe Trekker in the USA and was previously broadcast under the name Lonely Planet), a show which celebrates the best, newest and most exciting travel hotspots in the world. Other successful shows in their catalogue include the travel and food show Planet Food, adventure and trekking show Treks in a Wild World and shopping and travel series Bazaar.”

There are now more than 100 episodes of Pilot Guides that cover every continent, and what I really like about them is that they present adventure travel in a light-hearted, humorous and even educational way. In virtually every location the presenters go off the beaten path, meet the locals and do some crazy things. In many cases this involves eating some strange-looking (and, as I am sure, strange-tasting) local delicacies, celebrating with the locals, and getting introduced to their customs and traditions. Trekking, hiking, mountain biking or scuba-diving are usually involved as well. All shows have a bit of geographical and historical background and therefore have good informational content as well.

My favourite 3 presenters are Ian Wright, a quirky Englishman with a pretty heavy accent, a great sense of humour and absolutely no hesitations to taste any kind of native dish. Ian now has his own TV show: Ian Wright Live with its own website, http://www.ianwrightlive.com/ , where he shares clips and travel stories with a live interactive audience.

Beware though - sometimes this may turn into a sheep-eyeball-eating contest where Ian invites somebody from the audience to recreate a travel experience that he may have had in some far away country. Obviously this person then has the pleasure of eating a culinary sample of this particular dish, right in front of a live TV audience. Here you can link to an interview that demonstrates that Ian Wright is a rather interesting and surprisingly multi-dimensional fellow.

Megan McCormack and Justine Shapiro are the two other presenters who are willing to explore every location to the fullest in local activities and adventures. They also show great sensitivity in presenting the local cultures, even in politically explosive areas, whether it be in places like Israel or the Middle East. Check out an interesting interview with Justine as well.


Christine Shapiro, somewhere in West Africa.


Even though I personally haven’t done any real adventure travel in exotic locations, watching one of these shows makes me feel like I am out on the road with the presenters, on the back of the truck hitching a ride, or interacting with the locals. It’s perfect for us armchair travelers, who don’t have the time or money to get away when we want. Watching Pilot Guides is one of those guilty pleasures that give me a wonderful escapist feeling when I am a bit stressed out and when I need a little break from everyday life..

SQ.
http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Toronto: Festivals Parks, Sports & Rec

Toronto's Old City Hall, surrounded by shiny skyscrapers

Toronto is a city with great recreational opportunities. There are so many activities to choose from and there’s a festival or special event going on virtually every week.

Festivals and Events
- Film Festival: The Toronto International Film Festival is widely recognized as the most important film festival after Cannes and the largest and most successful public festival in the world.
- Celebrate Toronto Street Festival: 5 major intersections shut down for this summer extravaganza of live music, performance arts and food
- Caribbana: North America's largest cultural festival transforms Toronto into a Caribbean paradise of pageantry, music, dance and art, attracting over one-million people annually.
- Caravan: Toronto's annual around-the-world party at 30 international pavilions across Metro Toronto. Two-hundred shows, foods, arts.
- Pride Week: Toronto boasts one of largest, most happening Pride celebrations in the world, and an entertainment scene that is as impressive as they come (in fact, Queer as Folk is shot right here in downtown Toronto!).
- The Toronto Downtown Jazz Festival and the Beaches Jazz Festival
- Winterlicious and Summerlicious: Toronto’s summer and winter restaurant promotion events
- Molson Indy: One of Canada's largest sporting events, it features Canadian champ car superstars Paul Tracy, Patrick Carpentier and Alex Tagliani competing at speeds up to 200 mph through the streets of Exhibition Place,.
- Royal Agricultural Winter Fair: signature classics like the Royal Agriculture and Royal Horse Shows. One million square feet of vibrant marketplaces with 300-plus vendors, restaurants like the Vintner’s Terrace and much more. Group and corporate programs available.
- The Canadian National Exhibition: The celebration continues as one of the largest fairs in North America gears up for its 126th year with over 500 attractions, 700 exhibitors and 60+ rides.

Here is more info on special events in Toronto: http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/special_events/




Parks
Viewed from the CN Tower, Toronto is actually a very green city. Despite its large population and huge expanse, Toronto has preserved a large amount of green space and retained a great quality of life.

- High Park is the city’s largest park, it stretches from Bloor Street down to close to the lakeshore and features a large pond, sporting facilities, a zoo and a museum.
- The Toronto Islands are a little recreation oasis in themselves with facilities for boating, canoeing, walking and biking trails and the Centreville amusement park. A 15 minute ferry ride from Harbourfront will take you over there. It’s a little green enclave with a gorgeous view of the downtown skyline.
- The Toronto Waterfront Park System provides public green spaces all along Toronto’s shoreline on Lake Ontario. Pack a picnic basket or go rollerblading. A fabulous place to relax right in the city.
- The Humber and Don River systems provide a large network of biking, walking and hiking trails and offer a breather in the middle of a large cosmopolitan urban centre. They connect into a system of smaller ravines where you can connect with nature, right in the heart of Toronto.

Sports and Recreation
- For fans of spectator sports, Toronto is home to 5 official sports teams: the Toronto Blue Jays (major league baseball), Toronto Raptors (NBA basketball), Toronto Maple Leafs (NHL hockey), the Toronto Argonauts (CFL football) and the Toronto Rock (Lacrosse).
- Being situated on one of the great lakes, Toronto of course is a mecca for water sports (sailing, power boating, canoeing, rowing). Toronto also has the largest facility for beach volleyball players in the country at Ashbridges Bay.
- Fitness aficionados will find wonderful facilities for cycling, rollerblading, jogging, skating and swimming. 210 public tennis facilities will also help keep you fit, and heck- we even have a ski hill.
- The City of Toronto operates 5 public golf courses where you can play affordable golf in the middle of the city.

All in all, Toronto offers a fabulous environment and an excellent quality of life. For more info check out these general Toronto links:

http://www.torontotourism.com/
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/
http://www.toronto.com/
http://www.torinfo.com/
http://www.showmetoronto.com/


SQ.
http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Toronto: Sights, Culture, Shopping

Queen's Park - seat of the Ontario government
Neighbourhoods
Toronto has a multitude of ethnic neighbourhoods, including Greektown (where the action keeps going until way after midnight), Little Italy, Corso Italia, 3 Chinatowns, Korea Town, Little Poland, Little India, Portugal Village. Other ethnic communities also congregate in certain parts of town and you can explore Jewish, Russian, Ukrainian, Somalian and many other restaurants and stores where you can browse for ethnic food, fashion and art from far away places and check out delicacies from the entire world in Toronto’s more than 7000 restaurants.

In addition to the ethnic flavour that Toronto so plentifully offers, there are a variety of other unique neighbourhoods. Downtown has several interesting areas to visit:

- the Financial District with all its skyscrapers. It also houses the "underground city" - 11 km (6 miles) of interconnecting passageways under the streets that feature more than 1,200 retail stores and services.
- the Downtown Entertainment District – bars and dance clubs galore
- Queen Street West – a hip and eclectic shopping area
- the Gay Village: this is where Toronto’s large gay and lesbian community congregates. Here you can find bars, shops, restaurants and open-air patios
- the Fashion District with a myriad of fashion outlet stores and loft apartments that were converted from 19th century factories
- Harbourfront with its boat cruises and the ferry terminal, restaurants and art, theatre and music venues
- Rosedale and Forest Hill: two stately very upscale neighbourhoods in a park-like setting
- Cabbagetown: a former working class area, it now houses beautiful renovated Victorian homes
- the Distillery District: North America’s best preserved collection of Victorian industrial architecture, formerly the Gooderham & Worts Distillery founded in 1832. It now houses galleries, artist studios and workshops, boutiques, retail stores, restaurants, bars and cafés
- The Beaches, one of my favourite areas, with its shops, parks, sports facilities, bike trails and beach volleyball facilities are Toronto’s version of California on the waterfront.
Check out more information on Toronto’s neighbourhoods here.


Toronto's Beaches: a serene place for relaxation and recreation.

Main Sights and Architecture
Being a relatively young city, Toronto has a rather eclectic mix of architecture which includes

- the CN Tower, at 553 m the world’s highest free-standing structure
- the Skydome, a modern multi-purpose stadium with a retractable roof
- the shiny downtown skyscrapers
- Historic Fort York, the site of the Battle of York during the War 1812 and the birthplace of modern Toronto
- Old City Hall, built in the Richardson Romanesque style
- the campus of the University of Toronto, Canada’s largest university
- Casa Loma, built in the 1920s as a dream castle by Sir Henry Pellat, a wealthy famous Toronto industrialist
- Queens Park, the provincial government buildings, also built in Romanesque style


Casa Loma, Toronto's fairy tale castle.

Culture: Theatre, Music. Museums
Toronto is the 3rd largest theatre centre in the world. Here you can enjoy Broadway-style musicals, homegrown productions, traveling road shows and classical concerts. Some of the great theatre and music venues include the Royal Alexandra Theatre, the Princess of Wales Theatre, the Elgin/Winter Garden Theatre, the Hummingbird Centre for the Performing Arts, Royal Thomson Hall and many others.

A more complete list of theatres and production companies can be found at this link:
http://www.showmetoronto.com/toronto_theatres.htm

Toronto also boasts a great diversity of cultural institutions and museums:
- the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum)
- the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario)
- the Bata Shoe Museum
- the Hockey Hall of Fame
- the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art
- the Bay of Spirits Gallery – Toronto’s finest collection of native arts and crafts
- Black Creek Pioneer Village: a collection of 40 restored homes, tradeshops, public and farm buildings, with interpreters and artisans in period dress
- The Holocaust Centre of Toronto
- The Ontario Science Centre

Markets and Shopping:
- St. Lawrence Market: the city’s original market, where farmers, artists and artisans ply their wares. Known for the freshness and high quality of its meat, fish and farm products.
- Kensington Market: known in the 1920s as the Jewish Market, Kensington Market today is a collection of merchants from around the world. Here you can find fishmongers, street musicians, impromptu speechmakers and shoppers all crowding the streets.
- The Eaton Centre, Toronto’s famous indoor shopping mall, built around an airy atrium, features 285 stores in the heart of downtown Toronto. It is one of Canada's great public spaces.
- The Bloor Street/Yorkville holds many upscale designer boutiques, antique shops, galleries, spas and restaurants.

http://www.torontotourism.com/
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/
http://www.toronto.com/
http://www.torinfo.com/
http://www.showmetoronto.com/

SQ.
http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Toronto - A pretty hip place!

I know I am a little biased, but really, Toronto is a GREAT place. I have lived in the Greater Toronto Area for the last 18+ years and for the last almost 10 years I have lived right in the City of Toronto. And I love it! I wanted to put together a little profile of Toronto, this quirky, multicultural microcosm of a city.


Toronto's skyline, complete with CN Tower and Skydome.

Let me start by I what I find most unique about Toronto: the tremendous mix of cultures, languages and communities that we have here. UNESCO has designated Toronto as one of the most multicultural cities in the world, as a matter of fact Toronto is home to more than 100 cultures and its new slogan is the world within a city™ .

What’s unique about Toronto is that all these ethnic groups live together in a relative state of harmony. Nothing is perfect, of course, but Toronto is a more inclusive and tolerant place that literally any place I have ever visited, including other world cities.

With a population of 4.2 million, Toronto is Canada's largest city and comes in 5th in size after in North America, after Mexico City, Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago. Situated 566 feet above sea level on the northern shore of Lake Ontario (part of the Great Lakes system), Toronto is one of the southernmost cities in Canada. In fact, it has nearly the same latitude as northern California.

All in all, Toronto is a fabulous place and there is no way you should have to get bored here. Check out these links for further information.

http://www.torontotourism.com/
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/
http://www.toronto.com/
http://www.torinfo.com/
http://www.showmetoronto.com/

SQ.
http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/

Slovenia - A Little Jewel

A Gem in the Heart of Europe

During my trip in November I had a chance to explore Slovenia a little bit, with our brief stops in Ljubljana and our overnight stay in Piran on the Adriatic coast. Slovenia is a tiny beautiful country with a population of less than 2 million people.


View from the Castle of Ljubljana towards the Julian Alps.

The main cities of Slovenia are Ljubljana, the capital, and Maribor, which is located among wine growing hills just south to the Austrian border. Ljubljana is an architectural gem, a city of Renaissance, Baroque, and especially Art Nouveau facades that boasts the greatest exhibition of the architecture of the master Jože Plečnik.


Amazing Art Nouveau masterpieces.

Slovenia was settled by Slavic tribes around the 6th century, brought under Germanic rule in 748 and became part of the Austro-Hungarian empire in the early 14th century until 1918. As a matter of fact, a lot of the architecture in the cities is built in the Austrian style.


One of Ljubljana's architectural gems.

After World War II Slovenia joined the Socialist Federal Repulic of Yugoslavia and in the spring of 1990, Slovenia become the first Yugoslav republic to hold free elections and shed 45 years of communist rule. After a brief 10 day standoff with the federal army in 1991, Slovenia gained independence as a separate country and was formally recognized by the European Union in 1992. Since May of 2004, Slovenia is a member state of the European Union and today it is one of the most successful of the former Yugoslav republics.


Pirano's Venetian architecture.

Its geography is quite diverse. Much of the country is mountainous, with the highest mountains located in the Julian Alps in the north-west part of the country. Mount Triglav (2864 m) is the highest mountain and a favourite destination for hikers. Bled is a fashionable resort town, set on a beautiful emerald-green lake that has an island with a church in the centre, overlooked by a dramatic castle.

The main Alpine chain continues along the Austrian border and another mountain range stretches south into Croatia. Due to its mountains and rivers, Slovenia has become a favorite destination for adventure travelers and outdoor enthusiasts. Skiing is also very popular in Slovenia. In addition, Slovenia also has many thermal spas and health resorts.


Pirano - a gorgeous little harbour town on the Slovenian coast.

The main rivers in Slovenia are the Drava, Sava and Soča River. The Soča River in particular is associated with a very tragic chapter of history: it was part of the infamous Isonzo front during WWI which claimed the lives of an estimated one million people and was immortalized by Ernest Hemingway in his novel A Farewell to Arms.

Between Ljubljana and Koper on the Adriatic coast is a limestone plateau that contains the most extensive network of karst caverns. The Postojna Caves are famous worldwide for their interesting stalagmite and stalactite formations. The Skocjan Caves, which are on UNESCO’s list of natural and cultural world heritage sites, boast the 1400-meter long and 150-meter deep underground canyon of the Reka River.

The Slovenian portion of the Adriatic coastline is very small. It only has four villages: Koper, Strunjan, Izola and Piran. Every kilometer of the Slovene coast is a new surprise. There is a natural reserve with the unique, eighty-meter Strunjan cliff, the highest flysch wall on the Adriatic coast. The coastal area is called Capodistria and in the 15th and 16th century this area was part of the Venetian Republic. The architecture in this area shows a definite Venetian influence and the coastal villages are very picturesque. The most famous beach resort is Portorož which is composed of a strip of high-rise hotels, restaurants and bars as well as a casino.


Monastery in Pirano.

Tourist information for Slovenia can be found at the following websites:
Slovenia: http://www.slovenia-tourism.si/
Slovenia: http://www.ntz-nta.si/?id=3222
Ljubljana: www.ljubljana-tourism.si/index.cgi?set_lang=us
Maribor: http://%20www.maribor-tourism.si/ang/danes.asp
Bled: http://www.bled.si/index2.sxp?lang=2

Here are some essential resource books on Slovenia to consult for further information:
Lonely Planet Travel Guide
The Rough Guide to Slovenia
Slovenia - Enchantment of the World
The Julian Alps of Slovenia - A Walking Guide


SQ.

http://www.travelandtransitions.com/
http://www.textronics.com/