This article appeared in New Zealand Herald on February ’24. You can see the original print here. In the pantheon of great American cities, New Orleans, Louisiana (NOLA) occupies its own very special niche. With its diverse strands of Native American, French, West African, and Spanish cultures and languages all coming together to produce the…
This article appeared in CNN Travel on September ’23. You can see the original digital print here. In the long history of colonial rule in Asia, the shadow of Denmark does not loom large. It would be fair to say that few Indians and even fewer Danes are aware that this northern European nation had a…
Spain is a fascinating country to explore, but undoubtedly the most enthralling and exciting region is the southernmost province of Andalucía. Almost all international visitors to Andalucía land at Málaga airport and most invariably and inevitably head straight to sun themselves on the beaches of the Costa Del Sol. This is a pity because Málaga,…
This article appeared on the July ’23 issue of Travel + Leisure India. You can see the original digital print here. Georgian wine has captured the world’s attention with its explosive growth in recent years. Travel + Leisure India & South Asia’s contributor travels to the Kakheti wine region in Georgia to understand what makes the country’s…
In February 2022, my wife, Saroj, and I took a driving tour of the Coromandel coast to explore the lost empire of the Cholas. The word Coromandel is an anglicization of cholamandalam; in Tamil this means the realm of the Chola kings. Along the way, we discovered many unexpected treasures and came to appreciate a…
This article appeared on the April ’23 issue of Outlook Traveller India. You can see the original digital print here. Spanning the greater part of four centuries, the reign of the Chola dynasty was one of power, stability, and endurance. The Chola Empire, whose reign stretched for 460 years from the beginning of the 9th…
The most famous personality to come out of the small country of Georgia in the Caucasus was Joseph Stalin who ruled the Soviet Union with an iron fist for thirty years from the death of his predecessor Vladimir Lenin as General Secretary in 1924 to his own death in 1953. As first-time visitors to Georgia,…
All images courtesy of Sundeep Kumar. When I first visited Sri Lanka at the invitation of Jetwing Hotels in February 2020, just before the pandemic hit and turned the world upside down, my wife and I stayed at the iconic Lighthouse Hotel in Galle. It is one of those places that sticks in one’s memory,…
In the rich and varied history of the Indian subcontinent stretching back millennia, few of the empires, kingdoms, and ruling classes that populated its pages ventured overseas. Perhaps it was because of the vast size of the subcontinent, which offered immense opportunities domestically for exploration, conquest, and commerce, without the need to venture very far.…
Being fortunate enough to have gone to Princeton University whose mascot is the tiger, I am proud of being a Tiger alumnus, but I’ve never seen the animal in the wild. A timely invitation to visit Bagh Villas, a luxury jungle camp on the edge of Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh, gave me a…
