Rowdy Planet
Will Durant
The South creates the civilizations, the North conquers them, ruins them, borrows from them, spreads them: this is one summary of history.
01
Stories
Stories that matter. The people, fables and legends that have shaped our world. And the pervasive humanity that percolates us all.
02
Coordinates
One specific historical or cultural geo-location that left an everlasting impression upon us. Don’t miss these coordinates.
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42-Hours In
Bite sized itineraries to places that we found most interesting. Spend 42 hours. Or 2 weeks. Make your own journeys from there.
Shiva in Crete? It was an especially hot summer afternoon in mid-June when we landed up at Knossos, the sprawling excavated Minoan Palace on the island of Crete in Greece. We had been in Greece for almost 3 weeks by this point. It had been a fascinating journey through time. As the guide walked us through the Palace, narrated the Cretans worship of the bull, showed us weapons that looked like Tridents, art with brown-skinned people mixed with fair-skinned people, a female goddess with snakes around her body, and the Legend of the Minotaur – a half-bull, half-man, that thought just hit us like a lightning bolt.
Will Durant
It may be of some use to those upon whom the passion for philosophy has laid the compulsion to try to see things whole, to pursue perspective, unity and understanding through history in time.
History is mostly guessing; the rest is prejudice.
That event began an intimate infatuation with history. A subject, dry with dates, names and artifact descriptions, that most of us hated in school, but one that manages to fascinate us given our perspectives as an adult.
We started with the short, crisp, to-the-point yet a little Europe-biased Ernst Gombrich’s History of the World. We poured through Susan Bauer’s History of the World series. We obsessed over the Durant books, The Story of Civilization, that documents 110 centuries of human history in 11 volumes – not remembering most of it, but appreciating every word of it. The fascinating glimpsed through The Travels of Ibn Batuta. Mark Kurlansky’s Salt, A World history. The Encyclopedia of World Maps as drawn over the centuries as a reflection of our human understanding of the world. Anything and everything we could find.
This also began our obsession with visiting the places where history was created. To touch and feel the walls, the stones, the statues. To feel the bitter cold of a January evening in Auschwitz or the searing heat at the Battle of Thermopylae in August. To listen to the locals unearth the myths that might have been reality at some point in time. To stand frozen in space-time wondering how time itself has transpired through humanity and its deeds.
Whether you’re a casual traveler, or a history enthusiast, let our blogs and photographs guide you through ancient civilizations, medieval kingdoms, and the cultural treasures that have shaped the course of history. We hope we can help you trace the footsteps of emperors and philosophers, balance your prejudices, and build your own fables.
HISTORICAL & CULTURAL
Veles was a Slavic god of deception. Like Loki. The ancient Book of Veles, the town of Seles, the 2016 Presidential elections in the US, and the modern journalistic Book of Veles: a multi-layered journey of deception in the world of Generative AI.
The Quarantine began in medieval times when Ragusa (Dubrovnik) started isolating people in the Lazareti. Initially a Trentine, it eventually became the Quarantena via Venice.
American Eugenicists like Albert Priddy, worried that the flooding of America by immigrants would precipitate race suicide, thus helping create Confinement Centers for the genetically unfit.
Anthony Bourdain
Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind.
TRIP SUGGESTIONS
SlovakiaA coordinate based approach to exploring. Get your Google or Apple Maps out, plug in the coordinates we provide, and look around, read about the place, see how it fits into the Atlas of Time, and plan for your visit.
In these narratives, we talk about one specific historical, cultural or gastronomical geo-location that left an everlasting impression upon us.
Bill Bryson
“I can’t think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything.”
BLOGS & ARTICLES
The Death March at Auschwitz
The largest of the SS concentration camps existed at the Auschwitz complex – a network of 2 large camps and...
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Google Maps is trying to kill me
Remember the launch of Apple Maps? Placing you at unknown destinations, instructing you to drive on non-existent roads, or through built-up...
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Eastern European Bar Scene (Slovakia)
Since their Velvet Revolution and Velvet Divorce (so named, because there wasn’t a drop of blood shed this time around)...
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Rowdy Planet is a family of four five from the San Francisco Bay Area. Like you, we love to travel with the fascination of the history and culture of its people always in our minds.
Other outlets
Rowdy Planet has an Instagram account and a Twitter account as well. Our Samoyed, Kulfi, has his own website and Instagram account.