I'll post links to travel sites and to places where people are immersing cross-culturally; some links will also be to blogs that seem very special to me. 

I have now been on Twitter for awhile, pushed there by a friend who told me it was a great way to find links to interesting sites and writing, and she was so right.  

It's been on Twitter that I've followed unfolding events in the Arab Spring, from the excitements of Tahrir Square to the heartbreaks of Bahrain, Syria, Yemen, and the fragilities around the whole surging changing picture.

Jon Radojkovic - The site of a close friend Jon, who is very engaged with barns and their social history, as well as with post and beam structures of all kinds, and does barn consulting too.  There are gorgeous barn photos and links to many of Jon's articles on agricultural issues. 

wandel.person.dk/thai.html - An amazing site, with a Thai typewriter; when you look at other parts of the site, you'll find typewriters in other scripts as well. 

Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree - This is the bulletin board that has become a lifeline for travellers.  Just go to the index and find the region and country you are interested in, then immerse in all the threads.

languagedigger.blogspot.com -  In July 2009 I had an e-mail inquiry from Elizabeth, whose blog this is, asking whether we have photos of Kyrgyzstan. Sadly, the answer was no.  But she had signed her letter with her blogspot address too, and so I went to poke around and see.  Elizabeth is a Russian to English translator who is currently based in Moscow, but I think she's American. The blog is well-written, lively, and very fun and interesting, especially for anyone interested in language (not just Russian... there's a lot else) and food.  I now have it on my bookmarks bar, and intend to drop by frequently.  

Recce - An online travel writing magazine, a monthly.  Don George, a wonderful travel writer and thoughtful appreciative guy, a founder of the Book Passage Travel Writing and Photography conference (every August in Marin County), is the constant, but there are also contributions from others.  There's a photo show each issue, in the "Fresh from the Field" section.  

Om Laila - Roula Said's Om Laila system, which grew out of her years teaching bellydance and performing as a singer, qanoon player, and dancer, is anchored in Arab traditions but speaks to us all.  She's now developed a Seven Waves approach to dance and fitness which is just extraordinary - no belly dance experience necessary. I have been taking Roula's classes for some years, and always come home nearly giddy with pleasure, as well as stronger and more supple. 

Cindy Cullen's list of culinary schools in the US.  She wrote to me and said she'd felt there was a need for a comprehensive list, so she complied one, and then asked me to post a link.  You can find it here

I'll post your comments that come in to the email at immersethrough@gmail.com. Let me know if you'd like your email address or website posted so that others can reach you; we'll assume you do NOT unless you tell us otherwise.

You can also comment at my blog: 

comments: 

This year, 2011, a great guy, a chef named Brad Borchardt, was part of immersethrough.  He's now written a lovely long description of his time eating and cooking and eating with us, with lots of photos and commentary on his website expandingpalates.com  Here's a small piece of what he says: 

A good friend, Kaz, wrote a note after she visited the site soon after it went up.  It was lovely to see her get it, grab the idea of immersion and run with it:  i like the idea of your website being an idea about immersion, the whole act, in its many incarnations, of being taken in, brought through, soaked up by. drenched. how literally this happens in places and with food, which we take into our bodies and are then altered by, augmented by. kept alive, too.