In late August 1991, four months before the collapse of the Soviet Union, I traveled to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, with my Finnish girlfriend (now wife) and fellow journalist. One week earlier, on August 20, this small Baltic country had declared its independence from the USSR, after Soviet hardliners attempted a coup in Moscow while Mikhail Gorbachev was at his dacha in Crimea. This was a chance to talk to and write about the brave and weary people who defended their independent television station after tanks and troops rolled in from the Russian capital.
The chance to witness the early post-Soviet years (and a film project) was the catalyst for frequent trips to Moscow—riding on the 15-hour overnight train from Helsinki—and St. Petersburg. I also made occasional visits back to the newly emerging Tallinn when I lived in Helsinki, just three hours away by ferry across the Gulf of Finland. I also journeyed through the Estonian countryside to visit the Riga Film Studio in the Latvian capital. Once a thriving home for filmmakers, it was largely empty in those years of post-Soviet confusion.
I always intended to spend time in Kyiv, but somehow never had the chance. In recent days, I’ve regretted that I didn’t find the time. I’m hoping the day will soon come when I—and millions of others—can visit this beautiful city freely. But that remains only a hope right now as we watch the unfolding horrors perpetrated by invading Russian troops at the mad behest of Vladimir Putin.
That yearning has gotten me thinking about places I haven’t gone but intend to visit. That particularly includes parts of Asia—Japan, Korea, Vietnam and India chief among them. What about you? Where haven’t you visited that you don’t want to miss? Times of turbulence and doubt have a way of making those half-formed plans seem increasingly urgent.
As always, I look forward to hearing what’s on your mind and the chance for this community to learn from each other.
Photo: Tallinn’s Old Town at sunset. Photo by Hendrik Osula/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images.
A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush by Eric Newby is not possible, a day at the beach in Lebanon is not possible . I loved Bulgaria! Sophia, Plovdiv, Trojan monestery, Velkiv . Remnant Soviet concrete and everywhere else beauty and freedom ….may Ukrainian people be supported in goal to breathe freely.
A few years ago, my husband and son traveled to Moscow St Petersburg - a few years before that they traveled to China. They have also traveled to places like Kosovo, Albania, Estonia - they lived Tallinn- and other places. I too love to travel, however am too worried to travel to places in the world like Russia and China, Myanmar, where authoritarianism is the rule. Someday I would like to travel to these places, hopefully if/when these totalitarian regimes have ended.
Other places I’d love to see are Bali, French Polynesia, Japan and Thailand again. Vietnam, Cambodia, and S Korea are also on my list. As an American, I would love to complete my visit to all 50 states, especially Alaska.
Prayers to the people of Ukraine and freedom loving people everywhere that we may live in peace to travel again.
The UK & Ireland. My husband & I went to the UK in January, 2020. Within 2 days we both became ill with what we later learned was Covid. I was much sicker than my husband. Anyway, we saw almost nothing in the UK so it’s as if we never went there.
However I am grateful to be alive and telling you about this visit. But, we have to go back and try again.
Other than that I would love to go to France,
Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. I’ve always wanted to go to St. Petersburg, Russia as well. I’ve been to Vietnam and China and would like to see both countries again. I’ve been on two cruises to the Caribbean and traveled up and down the west coast of Mexico a lot.
Steven, I have to say between you and George Saunders, the kind and open tone you both set in your Substack sites inspired me to go forward with my own (StoryShed Learning & Media) and it's been a salvation and a let-down (like most of publishing, broadcasting, journalism, you name it, seems to be). But I'll probably pop for a paid subscription after late spring and post-tax time. I'd like to support what you're doing, and doing so well. Cheers, Mike
Feb 26, 2022·edited Feb 26, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss
Unfortunately, I have only been to Canada - seeing the Falls, & Mexico - seeing beggars and armed soldiers outside businesses, thinking that could never happen in the US (think again).I would like to see Scotland, ancestral home of my mother whose maiden name was Scott, her father a coal miner, and lived in Glasgow, PA,Tracing her lineage back to the 12, 1300s, relatives were knights, ladies, advisors to the king, & a member of Parliament. It is supposed to be a beautiful country. I would like to visit England, my father's ancestor origins, where a once king of the Anglo Saxons named Egfred had a daughter who married , changing spelling somewhat thru the ages, an Ardery. That was my grandmother's maiden name. Our name, Richards, is a Welsh name, so there, too, I would like to visit.(I wonder if I am related to Welsh Keith??)
I have crossed the US 4 times and 2xs by plane. I have seen the Alamo, Washington,DC and Seattle, Washington, the flat lands and big sky of eastern Kansas, men really dressed like cowboys in Wyoming, 115 degrees in Nevada shade where we stopped to get some fresh air -ha -,the Cascade mountains where spring flowers grow in the fall & my son learned to ski, the Gateway Arch in St.Louis , the ominous Rocky Mts from 7 miles above, and San Francisco where I saw a boy chasing after a dog yelling at it in Chinese. These places were highlights. So, in this great country of every sight, climate, history, I would like to be a little provincial and take trips down roads like the once famous Route 66. Or ride my bike through the wild flowered path taken by Angela Lansbury in Murder She Wrote. Or watch a PowWow on an Indian reservation. So many things to see here, all nationalities, cultures,languages - if you can imagine it, it's here.
I was fortunate enough to visit Kyiv in 1989, it was my first trip abroad to Europe. I had always wanted to visit both Russia & the Ukraine (then the USSR). What a lovely city Kyiv is rich in culture & history. The people were remarkably friendly & I spent some time with a couple of chaps having cake & tea at their apartment, one a Russian, the other Ukrainian. Also got to visit both Moscow & at the time Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) on that trip. Watching Soviet soldiers play slots in the hotel was always something that stuck in my mind, along with the empty store shelves and rampant black market. One chap in the hotel, which contained floors and rooms of black market goods even said he could get me a tank! Good think my roomie on the trip brought toilet paper, the Soviet stuff was like sandpaper. Sam and I were even propositioned on the elevator, & we had guys on our bus leaving the airport who were trying to exchange Yugoslavian rubles for American dollars. Our guide caught them & threw them off. I always remembered her name, Sletvana, “daughter of Boris,” she told us. What a lovely lady and guide she was. So much I could go on to say about this trip, from getting interrogated in the subway for about an hour by a Russian police/KGB officer, to witnessing arrests in the free markets, to people in March swimming in an outdoor pool across from Gorky Park, or getting lost in the Hermitage. What a truly memorable trip. It definitely sparked the travel bug for sure.
New England in the fall and New York City snowy Christmas.
Thailand, SA Asia … love the food!
Tierra del Fuego, Hawaii, Big Bend National Park to name 3
A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush by Eric Newby is not possible, a day at the beach in Lebanon is not possible . I loved Bulgaria! Sophia, Plovdiv, Trojan monestery, Velkiv . Remnant Soviet concrete and everywhere else beauty and freedom ….may Ukrainian people be supported in goal to breathe freely.
A few years ago, my husband and son traveled to Moscow St Petersburg - a few years before that they traveled to China. They have also traveled to places like Kosovo, Albania, Estonia - they lived Tallinn- and other places. I too love to travel, however am too worried to travel to places in the world like Russia and China, Myanmar, where authoritarianism is the rule. Someday I would like to travel to these places, hopefully if/when these totalitarian regimes have ended.
Other places I’d love to see are Bali, French Polynesia, Japan and Thailand again. Vietnam, Cambodia, and S Korea are also on my list. As an American, I would love to complete my visit to all 50 states, especially Alaska.
Prayers to the people of Ukraine and freedom loving people everywhere that we may live in peace to travel again.
The UK & Ireland. My husband & I went to the UK in January, 2020. Within 2 days we both became ill with what we later learned was Covid. I was much sicker than my husband. Anyway, we saw almost nothing in the UK so it’s as if we never went there.
However I am grateful to be alive and telling you about this visit. But, we have to go back and try again.
Other than that I would love to go to France,
Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. I’ve always wanted to go to St. Petersburg, Russia as well. I’ve been to Vietnam and China and would like to see both countries again. I’ve been on two cruises to the Caribbean and traveled up and down the west coast of Mexico a lot.
Steven, I have to say between you and George Saunders, the kind and open tone you both set in your Substack sites inspired me to go forward with my own (StoryShed Learning & Media) and it's been a salvation and a let-down (like most of publishing, broadcasting, journalism, you name it, seems to be). But I'll probably pop for a paid subscription after late spring and post-tax time. I'd like to support what you're doing, and doing so well. Cheers, Mike
Unfortunately, I have only been to Canada - seeing the Falls, & Mexico - seeing beggars and armed soldiers outside businesses, thinking that could never happen in the US (think again).I would like to see Scotland, ancestral home of my mother whose maiden name was Scott, her father a coal miner, and lived in Glasgow, PA,Tracing her lineage back to the 12, 1300s, relatives were knights, ladies, advisors to the king, & a member of Parliament. It is supposed to be a beautiful country. I would like to visit England, my father's ancestor origins, where a once king of the Anglo Saxons named Egfred had a daughter who married , changing spelling somewhat thru the ages, an Ardery. That was my grandmother's maiden name. Our name, Richards, is a Welsh name, so there, too, I would like to visit.(I wonder if I am related to Welsh Keith??)
I have crossed the US 4 times and 2xs by plane. I have seen the Alamo, Washington,DC and Seattle, Washington, the flat lands and big sky of eastern Kansas, men really dressed like cowboys in Wyoming, 115 degrees in Nevada shade where we stopped to get some fresh air -ha -,the Cascade mountains where spring flowers grow in the fall & my son learned to ski, the Gateway Arch in St.Louis , the ominous Rocky Mts from 7 miles above, and San Francisco where I saw a boy chasing after a dog yelling at it in Chinese. These places were highlights. So, in this great country of every sight, climate, history, I would like to be a little provincial and take trips down roads like the once famous Route 66. Or ride my bike through the wild flowered path taken by Angela Lansbury in Murder She Wrote. Or watch a PowWow on an Indian reservation. So many things to see here, all nationalities, cultures,languages - if you can imagine it, it's here.
And thus, your question answered.
Paris. Paul wanted to take me to Paris. His untimely death put that on hold. I’m going after things calm down in Europe. And, I’m going solo.
Europe, and back to Japan. New Zealand and Australia if the money and legs hold out.
More of the Caribbean islands to keep learning the history (I visited Antigua last November), South Africa, Germany, and so many other places
I was fortunate enough to visit Kyiv in 1989, it was my first trip abroad to Europe. I had always wanted to visit both Russia & the Ukraine (then the USSR). What a lovely city Kyiv is rich in culture & history. The people were remarkably friendly & I spent some time with a couple of chaps having cake & tea at their apartment, one a Russian, the other Ukrainian. Also got to visit both Moscow & at the time Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) on that trip. Watching Soviet soldiers play slots in the hotel was always something that stuck in my mind, along with the empty store shelves and rampant black market. One chap in the hotel, which contained floors and rooms of black market goods even said he could get me a tank! Good think my roomie on the trip brought toilet paper, the Soviet stuff was like sandpaper. Sam and I were even propositioned on the elevator, & we had guys on our bus leaving the airport who were trying to exchange Yugoslavian rubles for American dollars. Our guide caught them & threw them off. I always remembered her name, Sletvana, “daughter of Boris,” she told us. What a lovely lady and guide she was. So much I could go on to say about this trip, from getting interrogated in the subway for about an hour by a Russian police/KGB officer, to witnessing arrests in the free markets, to people in March swimming in an outdoor pool across from Gorky Park, or getting lost in the Hermitage. What a truly memorable trip. It definitely sparked the travel bug for sure.