Can I take a photo?” I ask a gypsy man Ranga selling bead necklaces on the Promenade Beach in Pondicherry. Pat comes his response: “How much you give me?” In awe over  his ‘English’ response I smile and say “I buy a necklace from

Imagine coming across an article titled “How to stay safe in Colombia”, with the preamble running thus: “Cartagena (the beautiful port city of Colombia) has been the focus of a crackdown by the authorities on sex tourism and attacks against foreigners”, when you are planning a trip

At 11,562 ft above sea level, a duff pair of lungs gasps for breath. It requires pails of oxygen. Not squawks of instructions. But at Leh’s Kushok Bakula Rimpoche Airport, warnings arrive before the bags tumble on to the carousel. Rest for at least 24 hours. Do

Walking through Hamburg’s main train station on our first day in the city, my husband, Anton, spots a man sitting in a tiny bar enjoying a beer and a smoke. His peculiar garb — black corduroy jacket, vest and bell-bottom pants, along with a battered top hat

Want to lime?” That was first question from my Trinidadian guide. “Lime? No.” I certainly wasn’t nauseous after the 14,330 km-flight from Goa to the Port of Spain. “Can yuh grease yuh waistline?” Popped another question. Were

When you plan a holiday in Turkey, a must is of course the historic city of Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire (renamed from Constantinople). But having seen, over the years, glorious pictures of hot air balloon rides over the steep, slender and naturally eroded rock

Any amount of reading, browsing the internet or mining the social media will not prepare you for the cultural grandeur at Hampi, the capital of the mighty Vijayanagara Empire. It is now a village of magnificent ruins, thousands of giant boulders, caves and heritage structures that beckon

Tucked away on the border of Bengal and Jharkhand, Maluti is a nondescript village located around 230 km from Kolkata. Though the village falls under the jurisdiction of Jharkhand, with Dumka being the district headquarters, the inhabitants are all from Bengal. Their ancestors had settled here several