Unique Faces Of Gerewol Festival
Unique Faces Of Gerewol Festival. The Wodaabe are a subgroup of the Fulani ethnic group. The Fulani which goes by a number of names is one of the largest ethnic groups found in West Africa and the Sahel. The Fulani number approximately 60 million. The Wodaabe on the other hand only number 100,000 across Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, CAR, and DRC. The Wodaabe are historically nomadic cattle-herders and traders Woda can be translated as “those who respect taboos” referring to the Wodaabe’s isolation from the broader Fulani group and the Wodaabe’s commitment to tradition. The Wodaabe herd long-horned Zebu cattle and follow the rain from south to north from June through September. A group is comprised of several dozen relatives. The Wodaabe follow the Islamic faith and began to convert in the 17th century. I stayed five days with some Wodaabe in southern Chad at the end of the rainy season in early October. I attended the Gerewol Festival. You can read about my experience of Visiting Gerewol Festival. The Gerewol Festival is a matchmaking opportunity for [...]
Visiting Gerewol Festival
Visiting Gerewol Festival. The debate can become a bit heated when a group of traveler’s endeavors to define “off the beaten path”. The definition is somewhere between subjective and slippery. It is moving target based upon where you are from and where you live. Something exotic to you, is pedestrian to the person that lives there. From the western perspective, I will posit that Chad fits the definition of off the beaten path location. Let’s start with visitors. Chad ranks 189th in tourist arrivals on the most recent year of data I could find in 2017. That’s not good. The best-known gateways to fly in from are Casablanca, Istanbul, Cairo, Addis Ababa, and Paris. Paris is the only European gateway and has only two flights a week. For those Chasing 193, when you visit Chad a land-locked country, in north-central Africa, you might want to check the box and spend the night in the capital, N’Djamena, have dinner and head out. This city of one million, is not recognized as a world class city. Its dusty, hot, [...]
Tommy Shuai Shao … Chasing 244
Tommy Shuai Shao Counting Countries has traveled to 168 countries I am friends with Tommy on Facebook and also met him on the somewhat famous Adam Hickman Covid Zoom travel trivia game, but he was many of my social media friends who I really did not know. On Tommy’s FB page I noted some interesting posts with a lot of flight maps. It definitely caught my attention and thought I would love to learn more about Chasing 244. After my conversation with Tommy, I will be checking in with Thor Pedersen again of Once Upon A Saga. I have been documenting Thor’s journey to every country in the world and all of the challenges he has been facing with this pandemic. You will hear a snippet of this conversation but my patrons will hear the entire conversation. Thanks to Phillip Jones, Simen Flotvik Mathisen, Steph Rowe, Ted Nims, Bisa Myles, Thor Pedersen, and Adam Hickman for supporting Counting Countries. They help pay for the production of this podcast. You can support this podcast by going to Patreon.com/CountingCountries. [...]
Counting Countries Special Announcement
Join us in Yerevan, Armenia from October 14 -16, 2022 At the Armenia Hotel Yerevan For the: Extraordinary Travel Festival This will be a multi-day event with great and inspiring speakers And at night we will be hosting parties and dinners to have fun and unwind This is a great opportunity to meet travelers from all over the world Our goal is to bring people together from around the world, who are: Traveling to every country in the world Passionate to explore extreme destinations And love to have fun and network with likeminded people To learn more about this event, please go to: www.extraordinarytravelfestival.com Use code EPS to save $50 off your ticket
Abandoned Young Pioneer Camp In Armenia
Abandoned Young Pioneer Camp In Armenia. Road trip! Armenia style. At first brush, on a guided trip you might think Armenia is solely populated with ancient rock monasteries and abundant helpings of khorovats (BBQ Armenian meats). But scratch the surface just a bit … and you will realize this landlocked country offers much more. On my two-day road trip to the northern part of the country, no churches or monasteries were on the list. In fact, the mission was a visit to an abandoned Young Pioneer camp in Spitak. The Young Pioneers founded in 1925 was the socialist version of the Boy Scouts, ubiquitous in the former Soviet Union and other socialist countries. In 1973, 40,000 summer camps could be found just in the Soviet Union servicing nearly 10 million kids. As Armenia was part of the Soviet Union until 1991, Armenia kids headed off to the mountains to have in a patriotic manner across the republic. This included the Fairy Tale Young Pioneer Camp set in the mountains on the outskirts of Spitak, a town devastated [...]
Ted Nims … Hanging With Alferd Packer
Ted Nims has traveled to 127 countries. Ted Nims Counting Countries. I met Ted at a small travel meetup in Boston a couple of years ago, but knew him prior to that as one of my patrons for Counting Countries. We both have homes in Chicago and we also connected a couple times in the Windy City. We met up in late June for lunch and then retired to the Counting Countries Studio to record this podcast. After I speak with Ted we will hear from Nick Butter once again at the end of the podcast, a guest from earlier this year. Nick founded the 196 Foundation. This is a charity inspired by his trip around the world. I will let Nick explain how this all works during our conversation. But I will add that I have become a supporter of the foundation. And I am now one of 500 plus people who have joined together in this project. I imagine everyone of us is inundated with multiple offers to donate or support one cause or another. [...]
