Remnants of the Marxist Era

For almost half a century, Europe was divided into East and West by the "Iron Curtain", a border stretching from the Barents Sea to the Black Sea. The Iron Curtain Trail invites people to retrace and experience the former division of the continent on a 6,800 km cycle track along the length of the former border, combining European culture, history and sustainable tourism. The Iron Curtain Trail thereby contributes in a lively and very practical way to the creation of a genuine European identity....

Communist regimes in the Eastern bloc always had their own buildings, statues, reliefs and other accessories to continually remind citizens of their ideology and the system they were living in.   Unappealing Monuments Communist buildings were usually massive and gray, statues were gigantic and symbols were written in both Russian and Hungarian. There were plenty of monuments symbolizing the so called happy worker, strong, masculine women, reliefs of red stars, hammers and sickles. Almost all ...

Will "Red Tourism" take off in the Chinese Hainan? Or is the future "Green" and "Blue"? Last year, the Chinese government announced controversial plans to transform Hainan island – China’s southernmost province – into an international tourist destination, on par with popular spots like Hawaii, Thailand and Australia. This transformation, which is designed to give the island a five-star makeover, adding new golf courses, luxury hotels, and world-class service and transportation standards, has al...

The Palace of the Parliament (Romanian: Palatul Parlamentului) in Bucharest, Romania is a multi-purpose building containing both chambers of the Romanian Parliament. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the Palace is the world's largest civilian administrative building (The Pentagon is the largest overall), most expensive administrative building, and heaviest building. The Palace was designed and nearly completed by the Ceausescu regime as the seat of political and administrative po...

There was once a prominent Choson (“morning-bright”) country in the Far East that had followed a preceding 400 year old Koryŏ (Goryeo: 10th – 14th cent.). At the times of the Mongols, Koryŏ (“Korea”) has become distinct from the rest of Asia – its capital lying in Kaesong (Gaeseong or Songdo: the fortress “city of pines”). Choson (1392-1897), however, with a new political center at today’s Seoul, had isolated itself, the same as her grand neighbor – the Ming-ruled China, stepping into the footst...