Because college admissions committees look for evidence of an applicant’s ability to do more than get good grades and high test-scores, high-schoolers look for ways to showcase their wide-ranging interests. And since these interests are generally conveyed by a commitment to community service, one popular option has been to volunteer abroad. Known as voluntourism, it… more
Colombians have been living through war for more than fifty years. In a conflict primarily between the state and a leftist insurgency, the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), other various antagonists (paramilitary forces, competing leftist guerrilla groups, and narco-armies) have complicated and bloodied the picture: over 220,000 people have been killed—80 percent of them… more
Quick test: Point to Brunei on a map. Do you know where it is? Do you know what it is? Is it the capital of a Middle Eastern country? A Balkan enclave? An Asian province? The answer: None of the above. Officially the Nation of Brunei, Abode of Peace, the country is a small Islamic… more
"It’s hardly surprising, given the mayhem and misery across the Middle East, that people who know and care about the region are scratching their heads trying to explain, never mind solve, its overarching problems," Ian Black, The Guardian's Middle East editor, wrote in his recent review of Holy Lands: Reviving Pluralism in the Middle East. There… more
When President Obama goes to Riyadh on Thursday, he should meet not just the Al Sauds, but the Saudis the rulers deem politic to hide under a bushel. If he does so, he will discover a country which defies the western stereotype of a bland killjoy state, and away from the religious police preserves as variegated… more
Since the first case of the mosquito-borne Zika virus was reported in Brazil, in May 2015, the South American country has seen an unprecedented rise in cases of children being born with microcephaly. Zika has also begun to spread beyond Brazil’s borders to other parts of Latin America and the Caribbean, resulting in what the… more
When Europeans began arriving in the New World at the end of the 15th century, they used the region to source silver, gold, coffee, and wool. Today, China is the foremost trading partner with several Latin American countries, and buys oil from Venezuela, Mexico, and Ecuador; iron ore from Brazil; beef from Argentina; and copper… more
Brussels, the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union, was for many years synonymous with excruciating hours of EU talks that drag on only to yield watered-down compromises wrapped in legalese...
In Holy Lands, longtime Middle East journalist Nicolas Pelham presents a strikingly original and startlingly optimistic look at the region. Sure, there's plenty of bad news and cruelty to report on, but Pelham also tells the story of those who are embracing diversity and trying to live side by side with all types of people, in the… more
Here’s what’s supposed to happen: if a tennis player fails a drug test, he or she is expected to announce a mysterious injury, and then stay out of competition until a secret trial delivers a verdict. If found guilty, the suspension is only revealed months later. But on Monday, Maria Sharapova, the highest-paid female athlete… more
