Word: beach
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...have become virtual colonies, offering pints of ale at the Bird in the Hand, ecstasy and colonic irrigation. On the island of Koh Phi Phi, a formerly idyllic haven now crammed with dive shops, restaurants and travel agents offering cut-rate tours to see where Leonardo DiCaprio filmed The Beach, Australian Simone Richard has the traveler look down pat: washed-out Thai fisherman's pants, dirty blond hair squeezed into corn rows and fading henna on her hands. Over?honestly?banana pancakes, the 22-year-old says she's made friends with people from all over the world, except...
...center of the backpacker world is the Thai island of Koh Pha-Ngan. Evidence of the crushing weight of the 10,000 people who dance each full moon away lies a few yards offshore from the Hadrin Beach party zone. In contrast to the spectacular fish and coral found elsewhere, the waters are lifeless. The only color to be seen under the waves comes from the luminous green of a beer can or the white from a Styrofoam takeout box. Onshore, as the sun goes down, the beach could barely be more alive. Crowds of backpackers squeeze into seven beachfront...
Nearly 30 years on, Wheeler concedes that backpackers have helped ruin parts of Asia. "The place I always look at is Kuta beach on Bali," says the 54-year-old Australian. "It was really quite a wonderful place, and I go back now and think, 'What a hellhole.'" His books bear some responsibility, he admits. "We are an influence, there's no question of that, and maybe there wouldn't have been so many backpackers without us." But as visitor numbers climb each year, no one has any plans to stem the flood. Wheeler offers no grand solutions, sticking...
...Varrier takes me to Silk Street, which was the Chinese quarter in Zheng He's day. But he warns me against getting my hopes too high: "There's nothing Chinese about it now." He's right. Silk Street is a narrow lane, not far from the beach, and none of the bungalows shows signs of antiquity. Where the Chinese once built a fortified warehouse and quarters for high-ranking traders - including, presumably, the admiral - now stands an Islamic school. Zheng He, a Muslim, might have approved. Next, we make our way to the center of town, the site...
...France and one in the United States. Hajek says a 30-50-kg model will be available for sale in September. With patents granted or pending in some 60 countries, thousands of years after man first learned how to combine soda from ashes, lime from seashells and silica from beach sand to form glass, Hajek is ready to set the world of crystal manufacture on fire with his microwave furnace...