Kamakura. It’s one of those words I’d never heard until I went to Yokote in north Japan.
Snow was falling as I arrived in the city, 260 miles from Tokyo. Softly at first, like…
This page gathers together different traditions from around the world, traditions that include dealing with love and death, grief and hardship, curses, parties, religion and more. Dive in to explore and find out a little bit more about the world…

Kamakura. It’s one of those words I’d never heard until I went to Yokote in north Japan.
Snow was falling as I arrived in the city, 260 miles from Tokyo. Softly at first, like…

The song sounded soulful but also a little sad. The man’s voice, with a tremor likely absent in his youth, addressed the crowd as though we were but one.
One person. A girl. A friend. A home. I couldn’t quite be sure, losing words as they…

At 3am I woke up. At 4am I gave up. For the last few hours, I’ve…

Picture the scene. You’re walking through a Swedish market, your young daughter holding your hand. She sees row upon row of sweet candy canes, bright luminescent swirls of sugar and mint that gleam in scarlet and white, holly leaf green and ivy, forming…

The older I get, the more I enjoy cooking classes. With an opening statement like that, I’m in danger of

Dust rose from the ground as the horse thundered past and the sun began its ablutions. It painted pinks and pomegranates, amber, pistachio, charcoal and soft apricot rust across the walls of Petra before calling it a day and turning in for an early night…

Italian food. There was a time when I couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about, but I can barely remember that now. The moment my train slowed to a stop in Trieste (and, if I’m honest, quite a while before that) my daydreams wandered…

A clock plods through its strict rhythm as the clink of china echoes through

It’s a narrow wooden bridge, so when a girl runs past, the reverberations affect us all. She’s a teenager, or maybe older, in classic blue jeans and US sneakers, with flowing blonde hair. A few minutes later I see her again, wrapped in a traditional Tlingit cloak and chanting with her ancestors.
We’ve crossed the bridge to the space outside Chief Shakes’ House, some 1000 miles north of Seattle.

In France, The Rules Are Complicated
In France, saying cheers is not enough (well, it’s santé for a start, which means health rather than happiness.) No, you must…

Months ago, I wrote about the golden padlocks locked to the Isabel II Bridge in Seville. Then I spotted the same tradition in Paris, on the Pont des Arts, surely one of the most romantic examples of civil engineering that anyone could find. Somewhere between finding love in Paris and stumbling across…

They say that you never forget your first time – and for me that was in Seville. While strolling along in the unfiltered sunshine, sharp flashes of light caught my eye. This was it, this was what I had heard about:

Five symbols squeeze together, like children trying to fit into one photograph.
NO8DO, NO8DO, NO8DO.
It’s written on unfurling flags and…

Every ash cloud has a silver lining, as the new saying goes. One unexpected advantage, though, was…

“We’ll always have Paris,” as the immortal line goes. Now, it seems, Paris will always have something to remember as well…

The streets of Seville have thronged with Semana Santa this week. Between Palm Sunday and Easter itself, the city hosts a delicate combination of solemn religious processions and a candy-floss-coloured carnival…

It’s Semana Santa or Holy Week in Seville. Here’s a sneak preview of a procession [...]
Hi, I'm Abi, a writer and photographer who swapped a career as a doctor for a life on the road. Find out more
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