Transitions Abroad Magazine January/February 2003 Vol. XXVI, NO. 4

Alternative Travel Guides

Independent Traveler
Go See for Yourself Rob Sangster
Tips for Independent Travelers Jeff Goldman
Thailand’s Smiling Similans Dave Underwood
Budget Travel in Sumatra Dan Hamlin
Apartment Rentals in Europe Jennifer M. Eisenlau
Short-Term Rentals in the Netherlands Jennifer Colvin
Norway’s Coastal Steamers Ben Lyons

Feature
Going Local in Polynesia Tom Booth

Back Door Travel
What’s New in Europe Rick Steves

Living Abroad
Living in Bangkok Robert Hein

Working Traveler
Work in Sunny Saipan Arin Greenwood
Winter Jobs in Spain Paul Jackson
Lawyers in Paradise Robert Diemer
Work in Malaysia Caroline Couronne

Jobs Abroad
Directory of Key Employers Susan Griffith
Choosing a Volunteer Placement Organization Joseph Collins, Stefano DeZerega, and Zahara Heckscher

Alternative Travel 2003 Directory of Programs

Education Abroad
Cultural Transitions Laura Higgins Florand
Study at a Canadian University Heidi Schmaltz
Teaching English with ELS in Korea David Cox
Teaching in Taiwan with Hess Gilbert Wong

Program News & Notes

Classifieds

Transitions Abroad
A Season in Cairo Erika L. O’Neill

From the Publisher

We prepare to go to press just after the 39th anniversary of JFK's assassination, an event that many of us felt to be a turning point in our lives and in retrospect see as a turning point in America's relationship with the rest of the world. We (my wife Joanna and 3-year-old son Greg, who happened to have been born on the same day as John Kennedy, Jr.) got the news onboard a ship from Europe to North Africa. We were at the start of a yearlong voyage across North Africa and much of the Arab world. At that time America was widely admired and its president loved — which partly explained the warm reception our family enjoyed from Morocco to India.

In contrast, today's front-page story in the New York Times on the murder of an American in Sidon, Lebanon says the authorities are "looking at the case in the context of the anti-Americanism that is raging across Lebanon and much of the Middle East." (See my photo of Lebanon’s port of Sidon 39 years ago, page 12.)

This issue begins with an argument by Rob Sangster that now is the time to visit Muslim countries and ends with Erika O'Neill's reflection on how she fell in love with Egypt as a student and why she now thinks of the Middle East in terms of the safety of her family and the threat of another terrorist attack. To reverse the growing tide of hatred in the Arab world and our own growing fear will require much more than a military response to religious fanatics and evil dictators. It will require the awareness and understanding that comes only through sustained and meaningful people-to-people contact, through educational travel.

One of the few bits of good news to come out of the 9/11 horror is the increase in the number of American students going abroad. The Institute of International Education (IIE) surveyed 324 educators on college campuses at the start of the fall 2002 term to see how many of their students were studying abroad this year compared to last. Fully 45 percent of respondents reported an increase. This comes against the background of an increase of 116 percent (71,154 to 154,168) from 1991/92 to the present. (For a summary of the major findings of IIE's Open Doors 2002, go to opendoors.iienetwork.org.)

The fact that students' responses to terrorism is to seek first-hand interaction with other cultures — and the increased cultural competency and respect for cultural differences that should result — is good news indeed.

— Clay Hubbs