A Flight to Tehran: The Full Story

What does it feel like to travel to Iran, to fly into the country for the first time? Here’s the story of our flight to Tehran including some things you might expect, and some others you might not.

Destination: TEHRAN. I ogle my boarding pass at the departure gate in Istanbul. We bought the tickets months before, all easy enough. So easy in fact that we wondered if the day of our flight would actually ever come; a rejected visa application snatching it all away in a breath.

But our Iranian visas were approved and there we were waiting to board a plane — our plane — to Tehran.

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Traveling to Iran: Why We’re Going

Travel to Iran

This is the story of Iran, a country we once expected to visit last, as a final bow wrapped around a journey that tells the story of making human connections around the world. It's also an explanation of why we're traveling to Iran this Friday.

Travel to Iran
Persian architecture and design, Sheikh Lotf Allah Mosque in Esfahan.

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Hot Sauce Tasting: Hurts So Good

A quick visit to a hot sauce store in Berlin turns into an unplanned three-hour hot sauce sampling that made us feel like we just dropped acid.

Have you ever planned a hot sauce tasting? Ever even imagined one? Well, maybe you should.

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Base Flying Berlin: An 11th Wedding Anniversary Jump (Video)

Berlin Base Flying

What is marriage, if not a leap of faith?

Fourteen years ago, on or around our second date, Audrey and I went skydiving together. It was, as you might imagine, both terrifying and fantastic. And as much as you also might also imagine that it wiped away my fear of heights, it did not. Perhaps it chiseled away at that wall, but it certainly didn’t tear it down. I still swoon thinking about that airplane canopy above 16,000 feet. I still get wobbly above 10 stories.

So here we are 14 years later in Berlin, celebrating our 11th wedding anniversary. What better way to recognize the occasion than to jump (base fly) from the top of a 37-story building?

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Berlin Gastro-Rallye: A Night of Food, Culture and History

A view of Berlin — its cycles of destruction and renewal and the evolution of its food scene — through the lens of a one-night gastro tour.

If you wish to learn about a place, eat your way to the answer. This maxim resonates no less so than in Berlin, a city whose history tells of a rise from the ashes and from oppression and whose present-day witnesses a continual carving out of its own identity.

For as much as we’ve learned and eaten during our time in Berlin, there was apparently still more to eat, still more to learn.

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Bangladesh Food: A Culinary Travel Guide

What is Bangladesh food? Or more correctly, Bangladeshi food? Which dishes should you seek out and what sort of flavors and spices might you find when you visit the country? This Bangladesh Food Guide shares some of our favorite Bangladeshi dishes, meals and experiences from traveling around Bangladesh for almost six weeks and trying all different kinds of Bangladeshi foods on the street, in tea stalls, canteens, restaurants and in village homes.

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