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iochat537 · 2 years

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taegularities · 2 years

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thank you ! i also love the indian cuisine so much 😩 i was in london once and went to an indian restaurant and when i tell you the food was 🥰😍😘 chefs kiss. UNFORTUNATELY its cery spivey and i HATE spice with all my being but its worth it lmao. And yeah, sometimes they think im chinese and i even had thai once ( which i dont understand lol ) but japanese is the one i get the most. the thing is actually turkish ppl are originally from central asia yk ? they lived side by side with mongolians. and bc of all the empires and tribes they went all the way to west asia. turkic ppl ( the og turks ) used to look like east asians but bc they went to west asia they mixed a lot with persians and also greeks so most turkish ppl dont look central/east asian anymore ! there are ofc some ( like me ) who do and its really funny when ppl cant grasp this bc they dont know the turkish history ✋🏼😂😭 for example actresses like aybuke pusat who a lot of ppl think is korean or esra kilic ! ❤️❤️❤️ sending lots of love 🧚🏻

ahhh the indian cuisine is exquisite 🤤 lmao yes spice is part of our culture, it's always there :') but most of the time, you can tell the waiters to make it less spicy, i think they never mind! and yeah, i've actually heard about the mongolian thing, which makes sense, i do know a few turkish ppl too who get confused as asians. i also know about a minority turkic ethnic group in china, i think. but that's so interesting, lmao look at us explaining our origin left and right 😭

#sending u all my love too <33 #notes for rid 🌹#anon

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insanityclause · 5 years

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Zawe Ashton, Charlie Cox, and Tom Hiddleston sit down at a back table of a midtown Italian restaurant and launch into it.

“I don’t know …” “I think I’ll have the …” “Are you getting a starter?” “If you get that, I’ll share it with you.” “Whisky at lunchtime?”

“We’re not doing this on purpose,” Hiddleston assures me, although their staccato rapport bears an uncanny similarity to dialog that Harold Pinter—in whose Betrayal the three are currently starring—might have drafted. “Sometimes, you just find yourself recreating his rhythms.”

I hadn’t actually assumed that there was anything staged about their chatter. It seemed more like the results of months of close collaboration and a natural intimacy. The current Broadway production is a transfer of a West End show from last year; the three actors have been performing together since March, but their association began earlier than that.

Back in October of 2018, Hiddleston and Ashton participated in an Intelligence Squared debate pitting Tolstoy against Dickens. Hiddleston dramatized the part of Levin from Anna Karenina, Ashton played Kitty. (In an odd convergence, we discover that my father also participated in the debate.) Cox’s take when he discovered that the other two actors had met on a panel debating the virtues of two nineteenth-century intellectual giants: “This is going to be the worst four months of my life. Can we just talk about Friends?”

But the two men also go way back: In 2011, Cox—best known for his turn as Daredevil in the Marvel franchise—took Hiddleston to an Arsenal game at Emirates Stadium, arriving to pick up the 6’2” actor in a Fiat cinquecento. “That’s smaller than a smart car,” Cox clarifies for those (like me) unfamiliar with the ‘90s-era Italian hatchback. Cox is an avid Arsenal fan—he even bought a house in the north London neighborhood of Stoke Newington to be close to the stadium—but when I ask Hiddleston if he shares the same allegiance, he speaks with the measured care of someone sensing the rabid scrutiny of a million Premier League fans. “When I was younger, in the 1980s,” he says, “I supported Liverpool, but I would never elevate myself to the level of a Liverpool fan.”

Photo: Courtesy of Marc Berner

We seem to be moving backwards through the actors’ acquaintance, not unlike the movement of the play itself, which begins with the cold dregs of an affair, and moves in a reverse chronological order through its more heated center and inception. It’s hard to talk about Betrayal without emphasizing this ostensibly experimental aspect of its construction, but as we speak, it occurs to me that this is in fact often the way that people tell the story of their relationship to one another: first comes the lunch order, then comes the January football match years ago, then the casting, and so on.

I had assumed that this version of Betrayal, when it first appeared in London, was part of a season of Pinter plays performed at The Pinter Theater in London and directed by Jamie Lloyd, but it turns out that its origin was more fortuitous. Ashton and Hiddleston had been brought in to perform a scene at a gala commemorating the playwright’s birthday, and at the conclusion, Pinter’s widow, Lady Antonia Fraser, turned to Hiddleston and said: “It was wonderful, that scene, perhaps you’d like to do the whole thing?” And then they were off—led by Lloyd, who, Hiddleston says, the actors inherited “match fit” from his season of directing the Nobel Prize–winner. Cox was tied up when he was first approached to play the third point of the tortured love triangle, but when he became available, he leapt at the opportunity. “I just googled ‘Betrayal word count,’ and then said: I’m in,” he jokes.

Continuing the backwards momentum, I leapfrog further, discovering that all three actors grew up in London: Ashton in Hackney in north London, around the corner from the house where the playwright lived most his life—“There’s no membrane between me and Harold,” she jokes—Hiddleston in central London and then Wimbledon, and Cox south of the river, in Victoria. Between the three, they’ve covered a lot of the capital’s geography, and so I ask them about the role that the city plays in Betrayal, a fourth factor in the love triangle, the characters traversing the city to reach the secret Kilburn flat where they’re conducting the affair or visiting posh Hampstead houses. Does anything get lost in translation among American audiences? “We never get a laugh with Kilburn, and we never will!” says Ashton. “It’s such a London-centric piece. Especially in our production, which is more conceptual in design, you’re asked to imagine a lot.”

But if the three performers are London-bred (and based), they have taken to their New York residencies. Hiddleston lives near Central Park, a location he chose so that he can run there every day: “The first time, I thought there was a race on—turns out, people just run in New York.” (Though he ran the London marathon once, he’s not planning on repeating it in New York—“probably wouldn’t be able to do the show afterwards,” he muses.) Cox has settled for the time being in Tribeca, where his routine is structured by preschool drop-off for his three-year-old daughter, Elsie, and weekly visits to the Russian and Turkish baths. Ashton is busy preparing for a production of a play of her own, for all the women who thought they were Mad, which has its U.S. premiere at Soho Rep later this month. She rattles off a list of shows she’s seen or would like to see—Ain’t Too Proud, Slave Play, The Inheritance, and all three chime in with exuberant appreciation of the energy of Broadway—“the density of the lights,” as Ashton puts it, “the collective energy of all the people in the vicinity.”

“I love entering the theater through a stage door that’s the door for three other theaters,” says Cox, and Hiddleston, too, seems to appreciate the on-top-of-each-other architecture of Broadway theaters. “Before the show, I open my window, and I can hear the audiences coming in for Ain’t Too Proud,” he says, “and the usher telling them to ‘step this way.’”

“I keep getting told off for being too loud when I leave,” Ashton interjects. “It’s clearly a quiet part of Phantom of the Opera. But even that’s delightful.”

With such palpable enthusiasm, and since we’ve also covered the beginning (birth, childhood) and the middle (their friendship, the play), I ask them about the (hypothetical) end: Gun to their head, if they could only do film and television or theater for the rest of their life, what would they choose?

Reluctant silence, followed by some grudging admissions: “In terms of the lifestyle,” Cox says, “I don’t think it gets better than the theater. I spend all day with my family. On a Thursday, I leave the house at 6:30. I get out of bath time.” And then there’s the iterative rewards of performing the same lines night after night: “There are changes you get to make over the course of a run, you can subtly shift your performance to make it richer.”

“We’re in a play that was written a long time ago by a legendary playwright,” says Ashton. “And we’ve brought something fresh to it. You can do that in theater.”

Hiddleston takes the longest to weigh in. “I know in my bones, I feel like a creature of the theater. But I’ve had very meaningful experiences on film sets as well. But we’re very happy.” Ashton interjects: “Rehearsing this play was one of the happiest experiences of our lives.”

The three actors are unlikely to be able to perpetuate this mutual contentment beyond the play’s run. Hiddleston is scheduled to begin work on Loki after spending the holidays back in London with his family. Ashton will be busy with the two productions through the fall, and Cox is unsure of his next project. (Dealer’s Choice, he answers quickly, when asked about his dream role: “I’m just about getting to the right age to play one of the characters.”) I suggest they find another wrenching play about love gone awry to keep them content. “It's true,” says Hiddleston. “I remember doing Othello in London, and people in the audience would be in floods of tears. And then they'd come backstage and we’d all be laughing. There’s a cognitive dissonance.”

An assistant arrives to inform them that it's time to prepare for the show. And so all three stand up and depart, more than happy to perform their nightly tragedy.

#Tom Hiddleston #Zawe Ashton #Charlie Cox #Betrayal #interview

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tomhiddleslove · 5 years

Text

Zawe Ashton, Charlie Cox, and Tom Hiddleston sit down at a back table of a midtown Italian restaurant and launch into it.

“I don’t know . . .”

“I think I’ll have the . . .”

“Are you getting a starter?”

“If you get that, I’ll share it with you.”

“Whiskey at lunchtime?”

In October 2018, Hiddleston and Ashton participated in an Intelligence Squared debate pitting Tolstoy against Dickens. Hiddleston dramatized the part of Levin from Anna Karenina; Ashton played Kitty. (In an odd convergence, we discover that my father also participated in the debate.) Cox’s take when he discovered that the other two actors had met on a panel debating the virtues of two 19th-century intellectual giants: “This is going to be the worst four months of my life. Can we just talk about Friends?”

But the two men also go way back. In 2011, Cox—best known for his turn as Daredevil in the Marvel franchise—took Hiddleston to an Arsenal game at Emirates Stadium, arriving to pick up the 6-foot-2 actor in a Fiat Cinquecento. “That’s smaller than a smart car,” Cox clarifies for those (like me) unfamiliar with the ’90s-era Italian hatchback. Cox is an avid Arsenal fan—he even bought a house in the north London neighborhood of Stoke Newington to be close to the stadium—but when I ask Hiddleston if he shares the same allegiance, he speaks with the measured care of someone sensing the rabid scrutiny of a million Premier League fans. “When I was younger, in the 1980s,” he says, “I supported Liverpool, but I would never elevate myself to the level of a Liverpool fan.”

We seem to be moving backward through the actors’ acquaintance, not unlike the movement of the play itself, which begins with the cold dregs of an affair, and moves in a reverse chronological order through its more heated center and inception. It’s hard to talk about Betrayal without emphasizing this ostensibly experimental aspect of its construction, but as we speak, it occurs to me that this is in fact often the way that people tell the story of their relationship to one another: First comes the lunch order, then comes the January football match years ago, then the casting, and so on.

I had assumed that this version of Betrayal, when it first appeared in London, was part of a season of Pinter plays performed at the Harold Pinter Theater in London and directed by Jamie Lloyd, but it turns out that its origin was more fortuitous. Ashton and Hiddleston had been brought in to perform a scene at a gala commemorating the playwright’s birthday, and at the conclusion, Pinter’s widow, Lady Antonia Fraser, turned to Hiddleston and said, “It was wonderful, that scene, perhaps you’d like to do the whole thing?” And then they were off—led by Lloyd, who, Hiddleston says, the actors inherited “match fit” from his season of directing the Nobel Prize–winner. Cox was tied up when he was first approached to play the third point of the tortured love triangle, but when he became available, he leapt at the opportunity. “I just googled ‘Betrayal word count,’ and then said: I’m in,” he jokes.

Continuing the backward momentum, I leapfrog further, discovering that all three actors grew up in London: Ashton in Hackney in north London, around the corner from the house where the playwright lived most his life—“There’s no membrane between me and Harold,” she jokes—Hiddleston in central London and then Wimbledon, and Cox south of the river, in Victoria. Between the three, they have covered a lot of the capital’s geography, so I ask them about the role that the city plays in Betrayal, a fourth factor in the love triangle, the characters traversing the city to reach the secret Kilburn flat where they’re conducting the affair or visiting posh Hampstead houses. Does anything get lost in translation among American audiences? “We never get a laugh with Kilburn, and we never will!” says Ashton. “It’s such a London-centric piece. Especially in our production, which is more conceptual in design, you’re asked to imagine a lot.”

But if the three performers are London-bred (and based), they have taken to their New York residencies. Hiddleston lives near Central Park, a location he chose so that he can run there every day: “The first time, I thought there was a race on—turns out, people just run in New York.” (Though he ran the London marathon once, he’s not planning on repeating it in New York—“probably wouldn’t be able to do the show afterwards,” he muses.) Cox has settled for the time being in Tribeca, where his routine is structured by preschool drop-off for his three-year-old daughter, Elsie, and weekly visits to the Russian and Turkish baths. Ashton is busy preparing for a production of a play of her own, for all the women who thought they were Mad, which has its U.S. premiere at Soho Rep later this month. She rattles off a list of shows she’s seen or would like to see—Ain��t Too Proud, Slave Play, The Inheritance—and all three chime in with exuberant appreciation of the energy of Broadway. “The density of the lights,” as Ashton puts it, “the collective energy of all the people in the vicinity.”

“I keep getting told off for being too loud when I leave,” Ashton interjects. “It’s clearly a quiet part of The Phantom of the Opera. But even that’s delightful.”

Reluctant silence, followed by some grudging admissions. “In terms of the lifestyle,” Cox says, “I don’t think it gets better than the theater. I spend all day with my family. On a Thursday, I leave the house at 6:30. I get out of bath time.” And then there’s the iterative rewards of performing the same lines night after night. “There are changes you get to make over the course of a run, you can subtly shift your performance to make it richer,” he adds.

“We’re in a play that was written a long time ago by a legendary playwright,” says Ashton. “And we’ve brought something fresh to it. You can do that in theater.”

The three actors are unlikely to be able to perpetuate this mutual contentment beyond the play’s run. Hiddleston is scheduled to begin work on Loki after spending the holidays in London with his family. Ashton will be busy with the two productions through the fall, and Cox is unsure of his next project. (Dealer’s Choice, he answers quickly, when asked about his dream role: “I’m just about getting to the right age to play one of the characters.”) I suggest they find another wrenching play about love gone awry to keep them content. “It’s true,” says Hiddleston. “I remember doing Othello in London, and people in the audience would be in floods of tears. And then they’d come backstage and we’d all be laughing. There’s a cognitive dissonance.”

An assistant arrives to inform them that it's time to prepare for the show. All three stand up and depart, more than happy to perform their nightly tragedy.

[ Link to the original article is in source below. ]

#Tom Hiddleston #Zawe Ashton #Charlie Cox #Betrayal Broadway #Vogue Interview #Jamie lloyd production #harold pinter play #hiddles 2019 #Theatre tom #Tom Hiddleston interview #new york city

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myrskytuuli · 5 years

Text

Well, I’m back in Finland. After spending the first five weeks of 2020s in Balkans (Kosovo), I can definitely say that I have paid an appropriate homage to the spirit of the twenties.

The notable thing about Kosovo is that everything is (for a northern European), incredibly cheap. This has led to the fact that all the expats in Pristina live like it was the roaring twenties, and they were the Gatsbies of their own lives. We very quickly made friends with the interns working in the different embassies, and promptly followed their invites to restaurants, parties, and clubs. Almost every night was spent dining in a restaurant, followed by drinks at the bar. Every weekend was spent at a party of some kind, never ending before 1am, the alcohol is so incredibly cheap, that the only thing holding you back is your own constitution.

When Evelyn Waugh wrote his novel Vile Bodies about the spirit of the 1920s, saying:

“‘Oh Nina, what a lot of parties.’…Masked parties, Savage parties, Victorian parties, Greek parties, Wild West parties, Russian parties, Circus parties, parties where one had to dress as somebody else, almost naked parties in St John’s Wood, parties in flats and studios and houses and ships and hotels and night clubs, in windmills and swimming baths, tea parties at school where one ate muffins and meringues and tinned crab, parties at Oxford where one drank sherry and smoked Turkish cigarettes, dull dances in London and comic dances in Scotland and disgusting dances in Paris- all that succession and repetition of massed humanity… Those vile bodies…”

...I felt that. I felt like I understood what he was talking about.

Then there is the fact that Pristina is a city that feels like it was plucked straight out of the first half of the 20th century. The polluted smog from factories makes the streets look like they were straight out of a noir film with the foul smelling smog curling around street lights, the neon signs being the only thing shining through. people still smoke cigarettes inside restaurants, and by the time it is 5am in a hotel bar, the cigarette smoke is thick enough to make it hard to see around you. In a city where most people live in terrible poverty, the young foreign citizens live like young money in 1920s New York. They all know each other, they drink, they eat fancy, and take a taxi everywhere, and always try to find the next party for a lack of anything else to do.

I wouldn’t want to live there for a long period, but for this one month I have to say that I fully enjoyed the very moist blast to the world of abandon and parties.

#personal nonsense

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maryxglz · 5 years

Link

Zawe Ashton, Charlie Cox, and Tom Hiddleston sit down at a back table of a midtown Italian restaurant and launch into it.

“I don’t know . . .” “I think I’ll have the . . .” “Are you getting a starter?” “If you get that, I’ll share it with you.” “Whiskey at lunchtime?”

But if the three performers are London-bred (and based), they have taken to their New York residencies. Hiddleston lives near Central Park, a location he chose so that he can run there every day: “The first time, I thought there was a race on—turns out, people just run in New York.” (Though he ran the London marathon once, he’s not planning on repeating it in New York—“probably wouldn’t be able to do the show afterwards,” he muses.) Cox has settled for the time being in Tribeca, where his routine is structured by preschool drop-off for his three-year-old daughter, Elsie, and weekly visits to the Russian and Turkish baths. Ashton is busy preparing for a production of a play of her own, for all the women who thought they were Mad, which has its U.S. premiere at Soho Rep later this month. She rattles off a list of shows she’s seen or would like to see—Ain’t Too Proud, Slave Play, The Inheritance—and all three chime in with exuberant appreciation of the energy of Broadway. “The density of the lights,” as Ashton puts it, “the collective energy of all the people in the vicinity.”

“I keep getting told off for being too loud when I leave,” Ashton interjects. “It’s clearly a quiet part of The Phantom of the Opera. But even that’s delightful.”

“We’re in a play that was written a long time ago by a legendary playwright,” says Ashton. “And we’ve brought something fresh to it. You can do that in theater.”

An assistant arrives to inform them that it's time to prepare for the show. All three stand up and depart, more than happy to perform their nightly tragedy.

#tom hiddleston #betrayal broadway #betrayal #bernard b jacobs theater #broadway #theatre #harold pinter #charlie cox #zawe ashton #jamie lloyd

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londonfoodandmore · 2 years

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Discover Authentic Turkish Cuisine at Istanbul Cafe & Bistro in London's West End Quarter

Located steps away from Great Portland Street Tube and a short walk from Regents Park, Istanbul Cafe & Bistro has become one of the best-kept secrets for Turkish cuisine in London’s West End quarter. The restaurant serves delicious kebabs, lamb shish, fresh vegetables, hookah, coffees, and more, all made with love and using traditional recipes. Istanbul Cafe & Bistro has been a fantastic…

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#lunch #Turkish cuisine #Turkish Restaurant

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inwintersolitude · 6 years

Text

- January 20th 2019 -

What are some of your favorite cities you've been to? London is my #1 favorite. Some other favorites are Denver and Hamilton, Bermuda.

Would you allow your children to date prior to 16? (assuming you want any) I never want children, but I do think that 16 is borderline too young for kids to be dating.

Did you ever go through a phase where you thought guys in bands were 'hot?' Nope.

What's something about adult life you were never warned of or prepared for? How much of life is simply maintenance and upkeep of your existence. Pay the bills, schedule appointments, clean the house, open and sort the mail, mow the grass, get your car's oil changed, buy groceries, etc. etc. etc... It's an endless cycle of mundane things that just have to get done or else they'll pile up and become even bigger tasks in the end. Tasks you never had to even think about when you were a kid and your parents took care of all of that.

Did your parents teach you proper table manners when you were growing up? Yes, they placed a lot of importance on manners and etiquette.

What was the last thing you baked? Baked herb chicken.

Do you live more than 5 hours away from the nearest international border? Yes. It's about a 6 hour drive to the Canadian border.

Does your town have a farmer's market? Yes but it's not year-round. Only from May til September, I think.

What's the westernmost point you've been to? The coast of California, a bit north of San Francisco. Or maybe Seattle is farther west? I don't know, I think they have roughly the same longitude.

What was the last restaurant you made a reservation at? I'm pretty sure it was for afternoon tea at the Palm Court at the Langham Hotel, when my husband and I were in London.

When did you last feel lonely? Honestly, I think it was back in early 2011. I almost never experience loneliness since I'm an extreme introvert and I enjoy solitude. But in April 2011, my husband left for a month of training at his first airline pilot job, after we had spent nearly every day together for an entire year and had been living together for 6 months. I remember feeling very lonely with him away from home for a whole month but at least I had work, college, and flight instructor training to keep me busy while he was gone.

Can you easily tell when others are masking their true emotions? Not usually. I'm not good at reading people.

How often do you wash your car? It varies. Maybe once every 1-2 weeks in the winter when it's getting dirtied up by road salt, and in the spring when it gets a coating of pollen. Less often in the summer and fall. And I only wash the truck probably once every 2 months.

When did you last lend money to a friend? I don't think I've ever lent money to a friend. If a friend happened to need money, I'd rather just give it to them as a gift and not a loan.

Which app on your phone do you tend to get the most notifications from? Probably the Nest camera app. I get a notification every time the security camera picks up motion while it's armed, and it sometimes gets triggered by the occasional neighbor driving by.

Do you own a Dutch oven? If so, what was the last thing you cooked in it? No.

Do you find it easy to put yourself in somebody else's shoes? Not at all.

What is currently on your kitchen table? A set of small baskets I bought yesterday for pantry organization... some mail and papers that need to be sorted... a small Turkish silver and glass bowl that I use as sort of a centerpiece... and a knit hat that I still need to put away in the foyer closet.

What is your favorite time period in history to learn about? Medieval Europe, or WWII, especially the Eastern Front.

How old were you when you met your current best friend? I had just turned 19.

Have you ever kissed a smoker? Nope.

What is the minimum age to obtain a driver's license in your state/country? I know it was 16 in my home state. And I just looked up what it is in the state I currently live in - it's 16 years and 3 months... seems like a weirdly specific age to choose for that haha.

^ Do you think this is an appropriate age, or should it be higher/lower? I'm kind of torn between having it at 16 vs. 17.

If you won the lottery, do you think any of your family members would ask you to give them some of your money? I know they wouldn't. Most of my relatives are fairly well-off already, and definitely not the type to ask others for money.

What is the craziest thing you've seen happen at your workplace? A goddamn plane crash! At the first airport I did operations at. Thankfully it was very minor, just a student pilot who porpoised the airplane on landing and smashed the propellor and nose gear into the pavement on the runway. They weren't hurt, just very shaken up.

Do you own any home automation gadgets like wifi thermostats or wifi bulbs? Yep, nine Phillips Hue smart bulbs, and two Nest cameras.

What is something you gave up on after many failed attempts? Playing an instrument. I played piano as a kid, and flute when I was in middle/high school, but I was never good at any of it. I briefly tried to get back into playing the piano as an adult because I truly do think it's a gorgeous instrument, but nope... I simply have no musical talent, so I don't even try anymore. I'm not even really interested in playing an instrument nowadays, anyway.

How old were you when you started to seriously think about what career path you wanted to pursue? I knew as young as 12-ish that I wanted to go into aviation, and I started looking at university degree programs when I was around 16.

Have you ever disliked a book so much that you didn't finish it? Not that I can think of.

Would you rather read a book, or listen to the audiobook? I'd rather read a book. My mind tends to wander when I'm listening to audiobooks and I don't seem to retain as much as when I read it in book form.

Do you think tomorrow will be a better day than today? I hope it's just as good as today was, if not better.

#survey #surveys #personal blog

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simonconsultancypage · 6 years

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Top Ten Places (That You Might Not Think of) to Visit

The Adriatic Sea, viewed from the city walls of Dubrovnik

In a few days, I will be publishing my annual Top Ten D&O Stories list for 2018. For now, though, I know that everyone is enjoying the holidays, and that right now no one really wants to be reading about insurance or the law. So instead, over the next few days I am going to be publishing a series of alternative Top Ten lists, starting with today’s list of Top Ten Places (That you Might Not Think of) to Visit.

First, a few preliminaries. There are some big obvious places that everybody wants to visit. No one needs me to tell them that, say, London, Paris, Vienna, Madrid, or Rome are great places to visit. So today’s the Top Ten list is a sort of an alternative list. This is a list of places you might not know about but that you really ought to visit. Without any further ado, here is my Top Ten List of Places to Visit, starting with number 10. (Please also see my list of Top Ten Urban Hikes, below)

Seoul, Korea

10. Seoul: At first blush, Seoul might seem to be an odd choice for this list. It is one of the largest cities in the world by population. But despite its size and undeniable prominence I doubt it would make most people’s list of top places to visit. The fact is that Seoul is full of interesting and historical sites, great restaurants and street food, and interesting neighborhoods. And the best of all, there is a massive national park full of mountains and hiking trails right in the city.

The Five Grand Palaces of the Joseon Dynasty are now largely restored and make for interesting exploration. The tree-lined Insadong neighborhood is lively and full of interesting restaurants in the narrow side-alleys serving regional cuisine. The pedestrianized streets in the Myeongdong neighborhood are lined with stores and full of food vendors selling street food from food carts. The Bukhansan National Park, a beautiful area of forested mountains covering over thirty square miles that can be reached by city bus. (See more about the park in the second list, below). Seoul is an unexpectedly interesting place, well worth a visit. (My blog post about Seoul is here.)

The main hall at Gyongbokgung, with Bukhansan looming in the background

Evening in the Insadong neighborhood

Street food in the Myeongdong district

9. Mostar: Mostar is the largest city in the Herzegovina province of Bosnia-Herzegovina. It is also one of the most colorful and interesting places I have ever visited. It sits astride the beautiful, naturally green-tinted Neretva River. The city’s streets and skyline reflect the city’s long history as part of the Ottoman Empire. The main shopping street has the feel of a Turkish bazaar. The river’s eastern shore is lined with mosque minarets.

Minarets over the Naretva River, in Mostar

The street market in Mostar has the feel of a Turkish bazaar

The high point of Mostar is its famous Stari Most (the Old Bridge), which connects the city’s Muslim eastern side to its Catholic Croat west side. The bridge was completed in 1568, under the Ottomans. It is considered by many to be the preeminent piece of Balkan Islamic architecture. It was destroyed during the terrible war that wracked the country in the 1990s. The bridge unites the river’s eastern Muslim side to its Catholic Croat side, although the divisions between the communities unfortunately remain. It has been beautifully restored, though many other traces and remnants of the war remain. Mostar is a fascinating place — there are very few other places where history seems quite so raw and accessible. My blog post about Mostar is here.

The Stari Most, in Mostar

The Stari Most and the Naretva River, Mostar

Hobart, Tasmania

8. Hobart: Located on the Derwent River and nestled beneath Mt. Wellington on the Australian island of Tasmania, Hobart is far, far away, but well worth the journey. Within the city, the Queen’s Domain, a rolling park full of woodlands and fields, includes the last of the island’s original endemic grasslands. A great bicycle path rolls along both sides of the river; the Tasman Bridge connects the city to the communities on the river’s far side. The bike trail on the opposite side goes through bike trails through the riverside communities of Rosny, Bellerive, and Howrah, affording breathtaking views back toward the city and the mountain behind. Hobart is about as far away as you can get but it is a great place to visit. Distant, calm, and beautiful. (My post about Hobart is here.)

The Queen’s Domain, in Hobart

Along the Derwent River, in Hobart

Royal Castle, in Warsaw’s Old Town

7.Warsaw: Warsaw, Poland’s capital city, largely destroyed in WWII, is today a dynamic city full of life. Its historic, atmospheric Old Town has been painstakingly and stunningly restored. Although many remnants of the Soviet era remain, they are slowly being replaced. One of the city’s many unexpected features is that it is full of green space. Nowy Świat, the Royal Route, lined with shops, restaurants and cafés in restored neo-classical buildings, runs through the city’s historic district and connects the royal palaces. Along the way is the Łazienki Krowlewskie (Royal Baths) park, a wooded, 200-acre area that includes the baroque 17th century Palace on the Isle. There are also a number of interesting museums and memorials testifying to city’s terrible 20th century ordeals, including most notably the Warsaw Rising Museum, dedicated to the tragic Warsaw Rising of 1944. (My post about Warsaw is here.)

Nowy Świat, the Royal Route, in Warsaw

The Palace on the Isle in Łazienki Krowlewskie (Royal Baths) park

Oslofjord

6. Oslo: Oslo, Norway’s capital city, is located at the northern end of Oslofjord. The city’s proximity to the mountains means that the Nordmarka recreational area can be reached on the city’s Tunnelbane (metro), affording great views of the fjord. In the city proper, the Det kongelige slott, built in the 19th century and now serving as the home of Norway’s present King Harald V and Queen Sonja, sits on a rise within the city center and looks eastward down Karl Johans gate, the central city’s main thoroughfare, toward the Storting, the Norwegian Parliament building. Along the harbor is the city’s most recognizable landmark, Akershus Festning, a 13th century fortress located on a headland within the harbor at the top of the fjord, and the new distinctive Opera House, built on the city’s harbor in a shape intended to be reminiscent of an ice berg. The views along the harbor are distinctive as well, and, as noted below, there are great places to hike in and around Oslo as well. There are a lot of great places to visit in Scandinavia, but Oslo is a great place to start. My posts about Oslo are here and here.

Det kongelige slott

Oslo Opera House. Note the cranes behind; Oslo is basically one big construction site as the country puts its oil wealth to work

A frozen mist over the Oslo harbor

6. Budapest: Budapest is a big beautiful city full of Old World Europe charm. In his book, The Danube, a Cultural History, Andrew Beattie called Budapest “the loveliest and most elegant city on the Danube.” Budapest, Beattie writes, “takes the Danube to its heart.” In Budapest, the steep hills along the city’s west side “allow an appreciation of just how much the river seems to be cradled by the city.” It is as if the Danube is “flowing, steady and implacable, through a cupped hand.” Buda, on the city’s Western hilly side, and Pest, on the level eastern side, were for most of their history separate cities. The two formerly separate cities are now joined by numerous bridges.

Budapest on the Danube

The two most distinctive features on the Buda side are the historic Castle Hill, crowned by a reconstructed Habsburg era castle (now the national art gallery), and the taller, more rugged Gellért Hill, which affords a great view across to Pest. Across the river in Pest, the many beautiful pedestrianized streets in the central district are lined with cafes and restaurants, as well as innumerable souvenir shops selling stacking dolls and intricately embroidered lace tablecloths. In Pest, along the river north of the Chain Bridge, is the dramatic Hungarian Parliament building, possibly the most beautiful building on the entire river. Budapest, like the excellent Hungarian wine, is to be savored and enjoyed. My post about Budapest is here.

Gellért Hill

Vaci Utca, the famous pedestrianized street in Pest

The Hungrian Parliament Building, on the Danube

Flowing through the center of Ljubljana is the Ljubljanica River

4. Ljubljana: Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, may not be familiar to many, so here’s what you need to know: Ljubljana is an absolute gem – compact and beautiful. Ljubljana has a great vibe, great wine, and interesting architecture. Ljubljana, my friends, is a seriously cool place. As seems to be the case with so many Eastern European capital cities, Ljubljana’s historic old town sits at the base of the a castle hill. The city’s current population is about 250,000, but Ljubljana feels smaller – it is a city that can be covered almost entirely on foot. It is in fact an extraordinarily pleasant city in which to walk around. The tree-lined river with promenades on either side winds through the old town. Casual strollers walk along the river, while others sit at sidewalk cafes and restaurants taking in the pleasant ambiance.

Much of the city was destroyed by an earthquake in 1895, and many of the buildings in the New Town were rebuilt in an attractive Vienna Secession style. A generation later, the local architect Jože Plečnik, whose distinct style is virtually ubiquitous in Ljubljana, added a host of buildings, landmarks, and public works. On the opposite side of the city’s central district is Tivoli Park; Rožnik, an almost 1,300 foot wooded hill with hiking trails slopes upward behind the formal park. The woods on the hillside have a convincingly rustic feel, providing a little bit of a taste of Slovenia outside of the capital city’s confines. Ljubljana is a special place, one that you really don’t want to miss. My post about Ljubljana is here.

A view of Ljubljana from the top of Rožnik, with the Slovenian Alps visible just beyond in the mist

Auckland

3. Auckland: Auckland is a beautifully situated and prosperous city located on New Zealand’s northern island. The city is built between two harbors — Waitemata Harbor to the north, which opens east to the Hauraki Gulf,and Manukau Harbor to the south, which opens west to the Tasman Sea. Thanks to changes in the country’s immigration laws, the face of the city has changed as well – Auckland has to be one of the most diverse cities on the planet. It has the largest Polynesian population of any city in the world and a huge Asian and southeast Asian population as well.

Waitemata Harbour to the north, looking toward Hauraki Gulf

Devonport, a pleasant seaside suburb with small shops, cafes and restaurants sits on the opposite side of Waitemata Harbor. Mt. Victoria, a nearly 300 ft. volcanic outcropping that affords great views back toward the city center as well as out beyond the harbor to Hauraki Gulf. A 45-minute ferry ride across Hauraki Gulf is Waiheke, a rugged 12-mile long island. Every turning and side road on Waiheke leads down to beautiful, shell-covered beaches. The beaches further away from the ferry landing are generally deserted, and each one seemingly more attractive than the one before. With all of these many natural advantages, Auckland is a get-away of a very unique and special kind. (My post about Auckland is here.)

One of the many beaches in Waiheke

2. Tallinn: The most important thing to know about Tallinn, Estonia’s capital, is that its old town and historic city walls — including 26 watchtowers — are largely intact, making it one of the best preserved medieval cities in Europe. Within the walls, the city is full of Gothic-era houses, beautiful church towers, and graceful spires. The fortified areas and much of the city within have been mostly (although not entirely) refurbished. The streets of the old town are lined with excellent restaurants, shops, and cafes. Just five tram stops east of the old town is Kadriorg, a city park build from the pleasure gardens of the palace that the Russian Emperor Peter the Great built for his wife, Catherine. The palace now houses an art museum.

Tallinn Town Hall

There are several excellent museums in Tallinn that help explain the country’s fascinating and complicated history, including in particular the Museum of Occupations, which explored the city’s occupation by the Russians and Germans between 1939 and 1991. Since 1991, the country has been transformed. The current atmosphere is overwhelmingly positive and forward-looking. Estonia joined the EU in 2004 and it adopted the Euro in 2011. Tallinn itself projects openness and dynamism. It is also a distinct and fascinating place to visit. My post about Tallinn is here.

Kadriorg Palace

1. Dubrovnik: We were fortunate enough to have the chance to visit Dubrovnik last Memorial Day weekend. Despite the crowds from the cruise ships in the city’s narrow streets, Dubrovnik is my new favorite place. It also may be the most photogenic city in the world. Dubrovnik is located on the Adriatic Sea, on the Dalmatian coast of Croatia, only a few miles north of the border with Montenegro. To the city’s northwest, on a small peninsula, a separate fortress tower overlooks the walled city. Within the walls, the streets are narrow. Just offshore from Dubrovnik is the wooded island of Lokram. A walkway atop the city walls affords great views back into the city, toward Lokram, and out into the Adriatic Sea. A cable car leads up to the top of Mount Srđ with great views of the old town and of the island.

Dubrovnik Old Town and Lokram Island

Inside Dubrovnik Old Town

Lokrum is a 15-minute ferry ride from the city. A walkway winds around the island. On the island’s far side, there is a long rocky shingle where there were many swimmers and sunbathers. You can lower yourself into the Adriatic using one of the many ladders along the rocks. Back in the city, Gradac Park, located just to the west of the fortress, is a great place for a picnic on benches overlooking the sea. In the evening, you can watch darkness gather and the moon come up over the Adriatic. As night time falls, you can be sure that you have just spent the best day of touristing ever. My post about Dubrovnik is here.

The Adriatic, viewed from Lokram, looking toward Montenegro

Moonrise over Lokram Island and the Adriatic

Top Ten City Urban Walks: As might be discernible between the lines in my descriptions above, one of my favorite things to do in a new city is to walk around and explore, and there is nothing I enjoy more than a good hike. In that spirit, I have listed below my ten favorite urban hikes. To make this list, the hike must be interesting, afford interesting views, and be reasonably accessible from the center city. With those criteria in mind here is my list of top ten city hikes.

10. Freiburg: The German college town of Freiburg is located in the country’s southwest, near the Schwarzwald (Black Forest). The city is nestled at the base of the Schlossberg, a steep wooded hill that rises to the east of the town, providing sweeping views of the city below, the surrounding hills, and, far to the west, the Vosges Mountains. Deep in the woods are the remains of the ancient Schloss (castle). The city itself is great and worth a visit, but Freiburg also is worth visiting for the many hiking trails along the Schlosserg.

Walking through the woods on Schlossberg

A view of Freiburg from the top of Schlossberg

9. Howth (Dublin): About a 30-minute ride north of Dublin on the DASH commuter train is the atmospheric old port city of Howth (pronounced “Hoe(t)”). Above the city are rocky headlands overlooking the Irish Sea, affording views to north of the Eye of Ireland and to the south of Dublin and the Wicklow Mountains beyond. Best of all, when you finish hiking the trails through the headlands, you can head back to the village of Howth and have a Guiness in a seaside pub.

Looking south toward Dublin’s harbor entrance, and beyond to the Wicklow Mountains

The Eye of Ireland

8. Lübeck: The venerable German port city of Lübeck is located on an island in the Trave River. A footpath winds along the riverside around the entire perimeter of the island. This is the kind of walking I enjoy most, with a changing series of interesting buildings and views providing a glimpse into the past and present life of an historic and interesting place. It is possible to walk around the island in a couple of hours, but there are so many detours and distractions that it took me quite a bit longer. An excellent way to spend an afternoon.

7. Suomenlinna (Helsinki): Just a short ferry ride from the Baltic city of Helsinki is the fortress island of Suomenlinna. There are a host of military installations on the island, some of them still in active use. A rugged pathway leads along the shoreline, affording great views out to the Gulf of Finland and back toward Helsinki. In the island’s interior, a network of pathways traverses meadows and rolls around ponds and woodlands. An sunny afternoon on island is about as pleasant a way as you can every spend a day.

From the ramparts of the fortress on Suomenlinna, looking out into the Gulf of Finland, toward the Baltic Sea

6. Hamburg: Hamburg is a North Sea port city located on the Elbe River. In the city’s center are two man-made lakes, the smaller Binnenalster (Inner Alster) and the larger Außenalster (Outer Alster). A walkway runs around the two lakes. It takes about an hour and a quarter at a good clip to complete the 4.7 mile circuit around the larger of the two lakes. Between the lakes, and at the northern end of the smaller lake, are two side-by-side bridges, the Kennedybrücke to the north and Lombardsbrücke to the south. At the Southern end of the smaller lake is Hamburg’s famous street, Jungfernsteig. Along the way around the larger lake, there are great views of the city, of many interesting houses, and of life along the lakes. I really like Hamburg, for many reasons, but I think the top reason is how much I enjoy walking around the lakes.

The Außenalster, in late afternoon

A view toward Hamburg from the northern end of Außenalster, at dusk

5. Akersleva (Oslo): A footpath runs along the length of the Akerselva, a river that rolls downhill for about five miles from Lake Maridalsvannet, Oslo’s largest lake and its main source of drinking water, to the city center. In the 19thcentury, the river was the center of the city’s industrial activity, with mill buildings, textile factories, and mechanical workshops lining its banks. The structures, now mostly repurposed as galleries, offices, and schools, still stand, mostly congregated at the point where the river’s steep hillside descent forms rapids or waterfalls. The river pathway is now wooded and quiet, and in late spring the woods were full of flowering trees and birdsong.

Lake Maridalsvannet

Rapids on the Akerselva

Arthur’s Seat, Edinburgh

4. Arthur’s Seat (Edinburgh): At the foot of the historic Royal Mile and looming above Holyrood Palace is the craggy peak known as Arthur’s Seat, the highest point among the rocky outcroppings of the Salisbury Crags. A series of trails leads to this rugged hillside’s peak. On a clear day, the view from Arthur’s Seat can seem almost limitless. To the east, the Firth of Forth stretches out to the North Sea. About twenty miles away, the soft, rolling beauty of the Pentland Hills frames the view to the southwest. To the north, Edinburgh castle soars about the city below.

A pathway on Arthur’s Seat

A view of the Firth of Forth, looking toward the North Sea

Looking toward the Pentland Hills

Palacio Nacional de Sintra

3. Sintra (Lisbon): A short ride by commuter train outside Lisbon is the historic community of Sintra, home to several Portuguese royal palaces. In the village itself is the Palacio Nacional de Sintra, an interesting historic site. Above the village and palace, on the top of the adjacent mountainside, at the top of a steep pathway, is the Castelo dos Mouros, built in the 8th or 9th century by the Moors, later captured by Norse invaders, and ultimately taken by the Portuguese. The views from the vertiginous battlements are absolutely astonishing. Beyond that, and even further up along an even higher mountainside is the colorful and distinctive Pena Palace. The terraces of the Pena Palace afford terrific panoramic views of the surrounding countryside, of the ocean, and of Lisbon itself, more than 20 miles away. Hiking the hills in Sintra is a strenuous, demanding, all-day project, but it is also one of the all-time great tourist adventures.

Castelo dos Mouros

Pena Palace

Bondi Beach

2. Bondi to Coogee Walkway (Sydney): The beach community of Bondi (pronounced “BOND-eye”) is about a 15-minute cab ride from the Sydney central business district. Bondi Beach is itself a beautiful place; one of its great attractions is a coastal hike, the Bondi to Coogee Walk. The walk is a seaside trail that winds along the ocean shoreline. It is about 12 km (about 7.5 miles) round trip. There are great views of the ocean, of the various communities along the ocean front, and of the several small beaches between Bondi and Coogee. I am going to cheat on my top ten list here to add that there is another great coastal hike in Sydney (I just couldn’t decide which one to choose), the Manly to Spit Bridge Scenic Walk, a rugged trail that rolls along the shoreline of Sydney Harbor. The pathway is 20 km round trip (about 12.4 miles) and affords great views of the harbor coastline, of the Sydney Harbor entrance, and of the harbor section of the Sydney Harbour National Park. These two walks, separately or together, are among my favorite hikes anywhere.

Along the Bondi to Coogee walk

Bronte Beach, between Bondi and Coogee. (You can see storm clouds to the South.)

The Sydney Harbor entrance, viewed from the Manly to Spit Bridge walk, in the Sydney Harbor National Park

1. Seoul: Bukhansan National Park, located inside Seoul’s city limits, is full of jagged mountains. The mountains are traversed by steep, stony trails. One rugged path leads basically straight uphill to a gate in the city’s ancient defensive wall, sections of which still run along the ridge-top. The hike to the top is about as demanding as I have attempted, at least as far as urban hikes go. There are several stretches that require scrambling on all fours. From the ridge-top, there are spectacular views of the surrounding countryside and of nearby Seoul itself. Beyond Seoul are ranks of successive mountain ranges, marching toward the distant horizon. A terrific hike and altogether a fabulous experience.

A section of the city’s defensive walls

A view of Seoul, just below. Ranks of mountain ranges march into the haze, toward the horizon

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