by returningfory2 on 5/29/25, 8:53 PM with 68 comments
by riffraff on 5/30/25, 6:52 AM
Our Lady of Good Health[1] in India is 1962.
I think what the author means is "one of the famous ones in Europe", but the Sagrada Familia is still being built[0], tho arguably construction started two centuries ago :)
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_of_Our_Lady_of_Good_H...
by cess11 on 5/30/25, 5:58 AM
It was many years ago so it might have changed but my experience in Tunisia (as well as Egypt and other places around the Mediterranean) was that if you look and move like you belong in the area most merchants won't bother trying to push you around. I bought some of my favourite clothes in Tunisia and Egypt by asking tourist merchants about theirs and insisting that I want something like that and not the stuff in the souvenir market, many were willing to ask someone at a neighbouring stall to keep an eye on theirs and lead me to a 'real' shop in an area where locals trade with each other.
That's where the good cafés are, and that's the place to meet honest people who might be willing to act like taxi and guide for a day or two, or even invite you to meet their family and share food with them.
by oa335 on 5/30/25, 1:58 AM
by decimalenough on 5/30/25, 6:31 AM
My two cents: I haven't kept up on post-Arab-Spring politics, but the descriptions of Bourguiba (crafty politician, hopeless economics, then senile) and Ben Ali (thuggish, corrupt) seem pretty accurate to me.
by doix on 5/30/25, 7:17 AM
The Star Wars section is also pretty limited, if you're a fan, I recommend checking out the GalaxyTours map[1], the tours were outside my budget but the information they provide is extremely accurate and well researched. Chott el-Djerid [2] was my favourite, basically the outside of Luke's home located in the middle of a dry lake (on google maps it looks like water). Funnily enough, my favourite example of Wikipedia not always being right is also an alleged StarWars filming location, wikipedia claims[3] that Ep 1 was filmed at Ksar Ouled Soltane but GalaxyTours shows that it was not [4].
I'm also surprised there were no pictures of plants in the desert covered by plastic bags. It was pretty shocking, driving through the desert, nothing really around, but pretty much every tree/plant had plastic bags attached. I thought maybe they were intentionally put there to serve some purpose, so I stopped and got a closer look. Nope, just trash bags that blew away in the wind and got stuck there.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medina_of_Tunis#/media/File:Me...
[1] https://galaxytours.com/starwars-locations-tunisia-map/
[2] https://galaxytours.com/starwars-tunisia-film-sites/chott-el...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ksar_Ouled_Soltane
[4] https://galaxytours.com/research/ksar-ouled-soltane-debunkin...
by liendolucas on 5/30/25, 5:46 AM
It was really sad to see how trash is all over the country no matter where you go. Dumpsters are extremely disgusting, full of trash left rotting for days in main streets. People throw away anything anywhere.
I've been to Djerba island and litter is even on beaches. I've seen litter floating in the water which deterred me from taking a swim. On one occasion I even spotted a half broken umbrella pole rusted and buried in the sand, just waiting for someone to be seriously injured which I obviously removed. Broken glass in beaches is also common, so be careful and always wear flip-flops.
This is a huge cultural and not so easy to solve problem as I've seen people dumping trash in front of me as if something completely natural. It is sad because if that problem is solved, it is actually a beautiful country.
Other countries suffering exactly the same problem that I've visited are Vietnam and Maldives.
by dzhiurgis on 5/30/25, 4:46 AM
As someone who grew up there... he's being generous here. I hated those buildings, extremely depressing.
> he said he was from my hotel
I've almost fell for this while in New Dehli. Friendly walk and talk until he lured into some travel agents shop proceed to sell me some trips.
by billfruit on 5/30/25, 2:38 AM
by csomar on 5/30/25, 3:26 AM
> Tunisian cities are mostly ugly as hell.
Bare a few touristic spots, yes. It is unfortunate as Tunisia could have looked more like Santorini and less like the nuclear apocalypse that it is today. I guess on the upside you have little to no homelessness?
> The only problem with Tunisian niceness is that it blends into Tunisian mercantile craftiness.
This is mostly a problem in touristic craft stores which I never visit. I guess tourists are attracted to the Medina; but most Tunisians "Medinas" have completely collapsed economically.
> Informality Has Its Advantages
Given how broken the system is, that's how anything can run in Tunisia.
> Tunisian butcher shops tend to hang not just hunks of meat but animal heads in front of their stores
This is kind of an ad that we just had the animal slaughtered now. Fresh meat.
> Sorry Tunisia, but your mosque game is weak.
He should have focused on Churches, Cathedrals and Synagogues.
> There aren’t many bars in Tunisia, even in the major cities.
There are lot of bars in Tunisia but the second major city is a conservative one. It is the last place where you want to have a beer.
> Alcohol is still fairly taboo in most Arab countries, even in relatively liberal Tunisia, so they probably adopted cafe cultural norms.
No, the cafe cultural norms came from the French. You can see a similarity with Vietnam in this regard.
> but he was most excited to tell me that the U.S. Ambassador had just visited the House of the Governor two weeks ago along with his “black wife” who “wasn’t white like you and me.” Ok, then.
You are reading too much into this. Tunisians are pretty chatty and gossip to unhealthy levels.
> ... where there’s a lot of lingering resentment against their former overlord
France was a popular (and the) destination until 10 years ago or so. France now sucks economically. It has nothing to do with it being a former overlord.
by optimalsolver on 5/30/25, 8:44 AM
by tuna74 on 5/30/25, 5:59 PM
by fuzzythinker on 5/30/25, 4:52 AM
by melling on 5/30/25, 2:04 AM
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/sponsored/star-wars-tunisia-f...
https://depart-travel-services.com/en/discover-the-iconic-st...
by mytailorisrich on 5/30/25, 8:55 AM
All those countries are still close to France, with higher education in French and educated people speaking better French than most French. Arabs countries like Tunisia have adopted policies of Arabisation but French is still widespread.
It is perhaps a bit like India: Nationalism in reaction to colonialism but with major cultural links and the old coloniser is a major emigration destination.
France is the main emigration destination for Tunisians (55% if you look it up), with almost a million Tunisians in France (Tunisia's population is 12 million).
> Throughout this trip, I talked to many Europeans, including Frenchmen, Italians, Maltese, Germans, and a few Brits, and from an American perspective, it was surprising how often the topic of conversation turned to immigration. Or rather, anti-immigration.
Well, see numbers above. Anti-immigration sentiment is growing in Europe because of the numbers and negative impact. It should not be a partisan issue, really, but plain realism.
by mikhailfranco on 5/31/25, 8:27 AM
But perhaps the reported strength of feeling is correlated with the history of the PLO, who moved there after being expelled from Lebanon by the Israeli invasion in 1982. Israel then attacked the new PLO HQ in Tunisia in 1985.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestine_Liberation_Organizat...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Wooden_Leg
Correlation might mean causation in a couple of directions. Did the PLO move to Tunis because Tunisians already supported them sympathetically, or do they now support the Palestinian cause more strongly because they provided refuge and were attacked by Israel? Probably both.
by juniperus on 5/30/25, 2:40 AM
